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The Fun Irish (House)

A blog by mike2016 in General

  • Entries

    42

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    115463

About this blog

The slow crawl towards building a new home in Dublin....

Entries in this blog

driveway

Driveway to Darkness - Part 1

After following others journeys into the self build world for years, it looks like I'm finally about to embark on my own after several soft starts. The first major work is to realign the driveway and I've opted for paved over other styles and to do most of it myself. I got a driver & digger to take up the concrete driveway and grass and pile it up and hired a grab truck to take it all away. Less than two days later I was left with a barren front garden! Since then I've been figuring out a fe
driveway

June 2022: Patio & Finding an Engineer

While I was uncertain about ever getting to build my new house I decided to hire some plant and build a patio out in the back garden of my existing house. It will allow me to sit out in the morning, absorb the sunshine and ponder things! I found some nice 40x40 concrete flagstones and edged them in and finally grouted them yesterday. They need a cleanup and a wash and I've to fix the drainage in one spot but otherwise it's done! The experience will also come in handy as I'll explain shortly. 
planning condition

Finally - Planning Condition Submission Accepted!!

There were two obstacles blocking me from proceeding with my build. After finding a professional who could sign off the compliance paperwork (I couldn't afford the Architect) I had a boundary issue which I agreed with a neighbour to resolve and then I had to add a window to the plans and submit them for approval before I could lodge a commencement notice and get going.    Issue 1: When the house was built years ago a hedge was planted at 90 degrees to the house fronts but the land

2022 Update

After giving up for a year or two, my stubborn side has gotten hold of me. I've been looking at direct labour and surmounting the crazy compliance regime in Ireland when building a new house and involving a bank. As I can't afford an Architect or a builder I needed someone else to sign off the build stages & compliance paperwork. Well, I finally found someone for 5K so that hurdle was crossed. I then went about examining the planning permission I had previous obtained. There was a compliance

The Empire Strikes Back.....!!

Interesting developments in the last week. While trying to figure out a way forward for my build as cheaply as possible I discovered a company that does SIPs and has just finished a slight larger house for a LOT less than the tender prices that shut me down last year (€375k). So my job this month is to crunch the numbers again, get a more formal quote from them and see if this is a runner.  As always there are three factors I've to balance: Architects fees - the crowd I used before are

Renovation Required....!

So, my house build has fallen through but that releases some money to go about making my current house (2 storey semi detached) more comfortable. I got a Solar PV system installed recently and am waiting on the grant to come back for that. It's a 4.2Kw system with a 6Kw battery. IT cost €8K after the grant and it has an Eddi diverter for hot water from any excess. I'm surprised they fitted 13 panels on my roof which exceeds the max 12m2 planning laws but a woman in Limerick won a court case wher

Tenders are in...

Background: I'm living in a house with a side garden I got planning permission on. Just purchased it a year ago so only 1 year down on the mortgage.    Recap: I was going to wait a year to get my finances in order but the Architect talked me into going out to tender anyway to see what prices come back. We sent out 6 Tenders and 3 responded. I can go back to the cheapest one in a year they said and get it repriced accordingly.  So i was rightly worried that prices in Dublin would b

The Banks press Pause

Disappointing week. I've been waiting three months on a decision by the bank about splitting the property folio and allowing me to sell the old house but keep the side garden to build on. They are concerned if I don't sell the house they are taking a risk as the LTV would then exceeds the Central Bank limits. The reduced property value post split plus the fact I've only a year paid down on the mortgage plays into this. I thought they would hold the side garden as security but it doesn't work lik

Tender does it....!

I received the tender documents from the Architect last Friday, about 4 weeks later than I'd hoped. Still it had around 12 documents and a cover letter for me to absorb and read over the weekend. They provided all the details the builders need to price the job which is a lot of detail, wall makeup, foundation and roof elements and I finally get a preview of different cross sections of the house. They provided a window and door schedule, room elevations including a design for the kitchen, utility

Windows and Tenders

I'm currently awaiting the Architects tender documents for review. It's been a two month process and I've been making inquiries into specific heating, MVHR and window options. Budget as always is a worry. I've drawn up a list of timber frame companies and builders and met those on the short list face to face. The Architect will have other names to drop I'm sure but getting a feel of the building pulse and talking with the builders really helped me identify the risks as they see it. Masonry vs Ce

Got Planning!!

Planning Permission Granted! After trying to ring the planning department on the day of decision at around 4pm and not getting through I resolved to wait until the next morning. At 5:03pm I get an email indicating that planning had been granted. I'd forgotten I'd subscribed to any activity on my planning application! Now, I've still to see the official notification letter with conditions etc but thankfully it was plain sailing. No objections, no requests for information. I took the planning site

Financing & Insurance

I've been spending the last week or two chasing banks because of a clause in the Self Build Costing Template - "*Standard Timber Frame Structure with traditional block exterior". I've found they nearly all have a timber frame line in their stage payments due to front loading of the mortgage when using a factory built house, but they all without exception carry the clause above. I'd not queried this up to now but decided to chase it. I've enquiries out now with several banks but so far only 1 per

Planning Permission

My planning permission is now submitted and I've a reference number and everything! So, there's about 5 weeks waiting for objections and then 3 weeks where the planners will come back with questions / start examining the submission. Then you get a preliminary approval with a 4 week cooling off period before the final official permission is granted, with their contribution bill! Once granted, I'm planning on some preliminary groundworks on the current old house to realign the driveway and access

Overheating

Well, finally after years of iterations of drawings in the pre-planning and planning phases we're off to the races! Before I post the final plans I was talking to the Architect today about the potential for overheating shown by the PHPP calculations. I'm going for a Passive House and my concern was rising global temperatures (during the build and more likely afterwards!). The PHPP package allows for 10% of days where the internal temps can rise over 25 degress celcius. That's a lot of days! Not

Standing on the Edge...

So I'm currently contemplating whether to pursue my 3 year old dream to build a home or skip it and plough the money into the second hand home I just bought. To explain, the house has the site attached to it, which I now own, so at least land isn't the issue. There's going to be other moments I'm sure when I wonder if I've made the right choice but now would be a good time to call it a day. The scary thing is not knowing how much this is all going to cost. Prices for materials and labour are goi

I just wanted to buy a garden but had to buy the house!

Well, that's been an interesting few months! I've been hoping for the last 18 months to buy the side garden off my landlord (I've been renting there 8 years) and go straight to building. But, nothing is ever that easy! I was asked for plans, which required a bit of homework, an Architect or two and pre-planning. All worked out and I shared the sketches here previously. But when crunch time came the landlord found it too difficult to sell off part of the site as he had an existing mortgage on the

So it begins...

I got the notion last week to start up a Blog on buildhub after enjoying the advice and knowledge everyone had contributed over the past year (or part thereof) since it launched. I've been on a journey to finding my own home for about two years after renting for the last 20. I thought I'd summarize where I'm at and how I got here to help others hovering around the same place and to spur them onwards to achieving their great dream too!    So, where am I exactly? I've completed Stage 1 -

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