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Getting ready for the earth to move!

Redoctober

Entry posted by Redoctober

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This is a short update and precursor to the updates that will soon follow once the ground works begin in April.

Having now finally sold our house in Milton Keynes, we have made the move north to the Scottish Borders. We are renting a small flat, few miles from our building plot. At £320 per month, I was never going to win the caravan argument! We lost 7 weeks due to the initial sale /purchase of our house collapsing at the last minute. Fortunately it was sold very soon after being put back on the market.

On reflection, that was not such a bad thing as the weather in the Borders was awful during February and early March, so any planned works would have just been put off anyway.

So, with less than 4 weeks until the ground works start, we have set about making the necessary preparations and will also use the time to visit various contractors, suppliers and utility companies to confirm arrangements.

Such as – BT Openreach, Scottish Water and SP Energy. I have to say, my experiences with the utility companies thus far continue to be good – meetings arranged and kept, very informative and happy to help. All approaches were via the internet and their respective websites. Connection costs for all 3 will amount to less than £2k, as BT Openreach appear to be indicating that the connection costs will be covered by their allowances.

We have paid a visit to the window manufacturer, based just outside Newcastle, to discuss lead times -  All seems good.

We will also be popping  over to the stone merchants to ensure they are aware of the time frames we are now working to. To help cement in our mind that the choice of stone we are going for is correct, we will visit a couple of buildings in the Kinross area of Scotland to see it for ourselves. It’s OK seeing various stone options on a sample board  but you really do need to see it on a larger expanse. It’s not like wallpaper, once the stone is up, you can’t take it down again!!

We have met with the Timber frame supplier and our builder who will undertake the majority of the work alongside his various tradesmen colleagues. We lost our plumber two weeks ago due to unforeseen circumstances but thankfully we have another on board. The builder confirmed all systems are go for the 16th April -

We will be travelling slightly further north to Dalkeith, just south of Edinburgh, to have a cup of tea with the guy responsible for making and erecting our oak framed car port, log store and man shed! His surname is quite apt – Mallet – I kid you not!

I have also secured a site toilet on a long term hire - £25 per week was the best price I could find. This includes a weekly service.

Just need to sort out the scaffolding company and plant hire for the TF as and when it arrives.

Hopefully come mid April I will have some construction photos to post, so until then take care and thanks for reading.

PW.

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newhome

Welcome to the Borders! I’m out on the coast, but also originally from the south of England. We used J Thorburn for crane hire. Very good and very reliable even changing the day at short notice when the TF company said they weren’t ready to deliver with pretty much no notice. We opened an account with Jewson and got the rest of the hire from them, or the builders hired it in themselves as you can’t claim the vat back for plant hire anyway. We just used the farm behind us if we needed a forklift and they sent a tractor down for peanuts so worth getting to know if there is someone who will do similar where you are. Scaffolding company was terrible so I won’t recommend the one we used. We also opened an account with Dove and used to mix and match depending on who was cheaper. Both Jewson and Dove have branches in Berwick. 

 

If you get some time to get out and about there are some great coastal places; St Abbs, Coldingham Bay and Eyemouth in the Borders, Dunbar, North Berwick and Gullane in East Lothian, Bamburgh Castle and Lindisfarne in Northumberland. Mackays in Eyemouth is supposed to have the best fish n chips for miles. 

 

 

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Redoctober

Thanks very much for all your thoughts @newhome we certainly do intend to get out and about exploring all the areas you mentioned. We discovered North Berwick on one of trips last year so do know what the area has to offer

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newhome
41 minutes ago, Redoctober said:

Thanks very much for all your thoughts @newhome we certainly do intend to get out and about exploring all the areas you mentioned. We discovered North Berwick on one of trips last year so do know what the area has to offer

 

North Berwick is lovely (went there for lunch yesterday) but heaving with tourists in the summer and £££ to buy there. Where all the investment bankers live. There were some plots for sale when we were looking for a plot. £350 - 400k which I thought might include the house at the time as it was soooo much more than other plots not that far away but no, plot only on the Archerfield estate (which at the time I'd never heard of). This is the type of property they created on those plots I guess. Out of my price bracket anyway! 

 

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-50288832.html

 

 

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Plumbersmateuk
1 hour ago, Redoctober said:

We have paid a visit to the window manufacturer, based just outside Newcastle

I would be interested to know how you get on if you don't mind.

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Redoctober
18 hours ago, Plumbersmateuk said:

I would be interested to know how you get on if you don't mind.

 

Hi @Plumbersmateuk yes a successful visit - It is a window manufacturer just south of Newcastle - Team Valley - they are the nearest stockists / suppliers of evolution windows - https://www.evolutionwindows.com/ the windows and doors we will be using. We looked at R9 but they can be made by any manufacturer and as a consequence the quality isn't as controlled as it is for Evolution Windows. I hope this helps. PW.

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