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Weeks 75 to 90 The plasters have finished the open plan vaulted area and it’s given us the boost to get going again in other areas. At the opposite end of the building is the plant room, this was the first room we started work on to enable the solar to be installed. I’m back in here to tile the floor and since it’s the first floor I have ever tiled I am very happy with it. I have left the service penetrations until all the services are in, we currently have temporary supplies from our existing home. We have a provisional date in August to close our village single track road (that goes to the school so can only be closed in school holidays) and will then have our own services coming into the building I will then seal up any air gaps and finish the tiling. Whilst the plaster was drying in the open plan lounge and kitchen we started on the MVHR installation. We made it as light as we could but it’s size was still too much for me to help with so we had to think of alternate methods of lifting it luckily our business had tools we could improvise with. I’ll let the photos show how this went. In the loft it all looks nice and neat. We could have floor mounted it but it would have taken up a lot of room and the pipes coming down would have needed boxing in. We could have put it in the loft but changing the filters would not have been so easy. This is a good compromise, once the pantry kitchen units are in you won't be looking up as much and we will be able to access it easily with our step ladders for filters and servicing etc. Once the MVHR was hung we moved on to fitting the plasterboard up in the pantry then I taped and jointed it all and painted the lounge and the pantry. Tape and Joint I had the opportunity of using a different corner tape around the velux, since this was not an area like a doorway that was going to possibly get knocked. I have previously used the corner paper tape with the metal reinforced edges. I have found you need to be careful on the corner you don’t rip or sand the paper. Traditional metal corner bead for tape and joiners is too thick and it can be hard getting plastic corner bead for tape and joiners. I do know of few places but they don’t deliver it due to its length and fragility. The tape I used was, SIME edge protection very similar to Strait Flex Tuff Tape both are on Amazon, it’s described as plastic coated and although on a roll when cut and folded for the corner it is not floppy like paper tape, and more like the metal reinforced paper tape but with a stronger corner. After using it around the Velux I decided to use it on the pantry doorway where I was matching up to the wet plasterers metal bead. I am happy with the outcome and will probably use it a lot more. When I first used it I bed it in and wiped out as usual but later found out they recommend to do the first finish coat straight away. The instructions on the tape are in Polish I think but the copy below is from an America website for Strait Flex Fold Original in half at the center crease, with the print-sides facing themselves. For outside corners, fold more than the desired angle with the print-side facing the wall. For inside corners, fold less than the desired angle with the print-side facing out. Apply all-purpose compound to the corner. Press Original into the wet compound and adjust, if necessary, to create a straight line. Wipe down tight and smooth with a taping knife. The first finishing coat of compound can be applied immediately. Let this dry completely, for several hours or overnight. This last step saves a day compared to paper tape that is covered the following day. Second fix electrics has started in the lounge and the light fittings have been put up and testing started for the electrical certification. The kitchen has been delivered and that went very smoothly all placed neatly in the middle of the room then a few days later we have spread it all out into appliances, pantry units and main kitchen units, the island was placed in its approximate location and immediately became a huge flat surface that we could fill. Whilst David is installing the kitchen we are also both test fitting and plumbing in the bathroom and putting the plasterboard up. We need to keep moving on with the bathroom as this will be mainly me painting and tiling whilst David will continue the kitchen installation on his own and second fix electrics. Going room by room works for us well as we can both work to our own strengths without waiting for other trades this will hopefully mean we get to move in later this year but with some rooms completely not started. Thanks for getting to the end of this update, if you have read my other blog entries please note that the posting date today does not match the week numbers as I am a little behind updating the blog. We have been working on the bathroom since May, lots more in the next blog and I have the build costs to update.

Weeks 91 to 105 In May we started in the Bathroom. It took us almost a month to first fix plumbing inc wet room former, create stud wall behind sink and toilet, plasterboard, tape and joint and then paint. By mid June David handed the bathroom over to me and I was dry laying the floor tiles out it took me a while as you may remember the plant room floor was the first floor I had ever tiled and I was about to cut larger, heavier, more expensive and diagonal cuts, Oh and it was a wet room. Once I was happy with the tile layout I used Impey water guard system on the walls and the floor. I chose Impey because the former has a sort of backup weep system in that should any water get through the grout on the floor it will drain on top of the membrane and has weep holes in the long trap to escape. I was a bit nervous about unrolling a sticky membrane on my own but I found that ok with the laser for guidelines and just removing a bit of the backing at a time. The sealant that you use in-between the membrane joints on the other hand was the most sticky and messy sealant I have used. Particularly on the floor I could not help getting a bit of tile on the floor/wall joint or the toes of my shoes (when kneeling down) in the sticky sealant days later. I had read on Build Hub about this being sticky but had not comprehended how messy compared to other sealants. On the 24 August I handed the bathroom back over to David to fit the shower, toilet, sink and mirror. Whilst fitting the bathroom David and I also put the plasterboard up in the front bedroom so that once the bathroom was finished I could move straight onto another room with the plasterboard jointing. I have started this and the photos are the end of the first coat so tape not covered yet, screw heads one coat. Could be a while before I carry on with this. David has fitted the kitchen and pantry and the worktop was fitted by Wren. Our water connection has been completed this required a small road closure which had to be completed during school holidays as its the main route the children use who walk to school. The 3 phase electric supply has been moved from the temporary location into the house and we will now start looking for our supplier. We are still temporary connected to the house we live in as the solar on the new build is feeding the old house this will be changed to feed the new build hopefully only a few days before we get the supply connection. Openreach are here at the moment installing our line. The original plan back in 2023 designed and plotted by Openreach was to connect to an electric pole on the border with our neighbours where our electric also comes from. The electric company have recently stopped new connections to their poles, (I don’t know if this is everywhere or just local) so although its been coiled up at the pole a few years from when we made the temporary electric connection, we now had to find a new route. This meant finding our existing connection that was underground (from a different pole) breaking into this and pulling a few meters of cable back from its coiled up position to a junction box with the existing house cable, or digging up the shared drive and laying the cable back to another pole that already had a connection on it. The timing of this meant we had only just dug a trench down the side of the drive for the water, had we known earlier about the change made on new connections to poles we would have obviously laid the cable at the same time as the water. A big thank you to open reach who I think felt sorry for us as had one of my emails been answered in June (when I wanted to check were still putting copper in the ground) we could have laid a cable down the drive, unfortunately new connections sent me round in a few circles but the current solution is ok for now. I guess eventually we will pull a fibre cable in and presumably they will use the copper cables to pull the new fibre though. It’s 2 years from the start of the foundations and we have come a long way and are happy with our progress. Of the most common hiccups that I see on TV programs we are doing OK. We didn’t have a ‘blow out’ on the ICF concrete pour, we haven’t run out of money yet, and we are not expecting a baby (I'm 57) so I think that just leaves health. I am now on a break from the build whilst I recover from surgery but as I had 6 weeks notice we planned my jobs in the build and I now have at least 6 weeks to catch up on a mountain of paper work before I can return to light duties on the build. I have two companies for which I need to complete and submit end of year accounts, the self build VAT to catch up on (see below) and a website for our new holiday rental to set up to take bookings for next year. We are on schedule to move in to the build later this year but Im not sure if I will get back in the build to finish the tape and jointing in our temporary bedroom this year or we move in as it is, but at least we will have a working bathroom and kitchen. The costs to date are: General £4230 Plastering (open Plan area) £4160 Plasterboard and jointing by us £1124 Tiling Plant room floor and bathroom walls and floor £1000 Paint £246 Carpentry £746 Kitchen/pantry £11130 Kitchen appliances £1385 MVHR £3490 Roof insulation and airtightness £4778 Electrical Connection £4969 Electrical installation £2588 Plumbing installation £4257 Water connection £4566 Services trenches £3730 UFH £909 Drainage wastewater, soakaway and guttering £8538 Floor insulation £2669 Screed £2737 Wood Cladding £5694 Render £3090 Solar 7.5kWp £8574 Roof covering £23311 Windows £20869 Shell build excl roof, inc founds £119614 Pre build costs (architect, SE, BC and surveys) £10528 Total Net £260,000 VAT to reclaim so far £9500 Cost per m2 £1900 Big costs still ongoing Plumbing, Ensuite, Tiling in hall and pantry, Wood floors in bedrooms and open plan area. Landscaping and now all the service connections are in we can resurface the drive, as part of the planning condition, for the first 10m near the road.

The key word is “reality”. These drawings are single discipline, unless you have provided a ‘line out’ of your other large bore services such as soil and waste pipework etc, so that is always the crux. Current project, CVC supporting and myself installing (and adapting the design to suit) on the fly: I changed a few bits around, and did my own thing with the manifolds to make it more sympathetic. Actual install when it was WIP: As you can see, I abandoned the square box manifolds as I had other services in some of the posi joist voids which took up too much space; these needed to take priority so needs must. It gets very busy very quickly, but this is a sizeable home (~400m2) and I had to get a lot of ‘stuff’ squeezed in. The MVHR install is considerable, but I have installed it all with ZERO impact on GIA; no boxing in etc, and CVC providing solutions to achieve this wherever I needed to reach out. It would 100% been a complete PITA to have to do this from scratch with no initial design, and I have a long history of such installations and am very capable, so any novice or DIY self-builder should defo reach out for support and CVC will do their best (based on the information you give them ).

Courtesy of @craig - 22 windows plus 2 doors and a set of Bifolds going in this week. Windows are aluclad Zyle Fenster (tilt & turn downstairs, outward opening upstairs) and the bifolds are Cortizo Bifold Plus.

This totally sounds like a scene on grand designs where the woman boasts about her expensive kitchen widget and kevin Mc Kevin understands how they are 10 million over budget. Sounds like a way to lock you in to only being able to buy a certain type of hob, whereas a normal one is basically the same size hole. I'd do myself a favour and just keep it simple and not create my future self another nightmare.

Availability of sensible priced plots and then the extra cost of a custom build compared to a standard box, is what limits the number of self builds. If only government were to mandate that the mass market house builders who buy up most of the building land in large blocks, must sell a certain percentage of their plots for self build, at the same per house cost as the whole site cost them.

When I was a lad at Uni I met a Mr Dibner at my local pub - he used to live not far from my digs. At that time I'd not heard of him - and he wasn't the sort to point out his fame. After getting on well a few times, he offered to take me on one of his jobs - a quick inspection of a local chimney... just a small one. Lets just say it didn't go well for either of us. I was OK going up, but it took him nearly 3 hours to get me back down. All was well until we got to the bit where you had to go around the Corbeling near the top. The memory of clinging upside down off an ancient wooden ladder miles in the air is something that still gives me nightmares. It wasn't the height that frightened me, it was gravity and the woodworm holes. And the ground - the ground always wins! After that experience, jumping off a building with two decent ropes attached was a doddle... Even HSBC tower where you had to tie a bloody great knot in the end as the ropes as they ended 580 odd feet above the ground and it would be too easy to absentmindedly abseil of the end! I do get vertigo on tube escalators though...

Reading a lot of these posts it's pretty clear that that many on BH don't have a high opinion of folk like me who design as a day job. I can see many professionals have lost their compass and are not delivering value for money and are not that good at running a business, hence the poor service delivery. I've been in the construction industry for over 40 years, 20 spent as a contractor running my own business' , did my own self build, really pretty much all by myself on the tools ( took me three years) then off to uni to be an Engineer, now for the last ten years I wear two hats as an Engineer and Architectural designer. Thus have a fairly rounded view of the in and outs of this. I can say that in the last 20 years there has been a race to the bottom, not just from designers, but also say the timber frame suppliers, ground works designers ( UFH and rafts etc) and designers who think that if they curtail their design brief, caveat it a lot the money is going to flow. But in the long term it doesn’t, as often the key to good business is repeat business, recommendation, even in the short term cutting you brief down often leads to problems, queries, design mistakes that just eat into your profit and leads to potential claims or Clients rightfully withholding money. Ok, lets look at some financials. The bottom line for a new self builder ( not someone who works in the trade with contacts) is the tendency to split each element into work packages, say foundations, timber frame and roof ect. Each package supplier takes the cream out of the job, leaving nothing for the self builder. Then you have planning and BC regs on top not least, that all adds to the cost. I work on a lot of projects where I'm involved holistically. I work very closely with the Client, not just as a designer but also do hand holding and participate in all of the design. Now to be blunt. Say for a self build the design fee is £10k. An experienced chippy ( joiner may cost you £250 a day, a labourer £150 as day, total 2.0k per week. All I have to do to wash my face is to save you a few weeks, just on the labour alone and I have well and truly washed my face! The pendulum is swinging back where folk are clocking that we need to "go back to the old days", but now you need someone like me who can cope with the modern code requirements for example, and the modern way of doing business., much less trust and more hard arse stuff. I get this kind of business where folk are happy to pay me a bit more as I can guide them, hold their hand and most importantly we all have fun, we do whacky designs that you only get to do on self builds! We also tend to avoid " work packages where we can, say from MBC et al and keep the cream to ourselves. This also often helps cash flow and gives the Client more control on day to day site activity. Now in the round if you want to make some money then try and find a designer like me that is local to you, with good contacts.

In my day job I sometimes ask AI for it's calculations for a bit of fun! A lot of the time I find it's completely wrong! I checked a beam design against AI and found it to be a factor of ten out, on the unsafe side. One of the bits it missed was the destabilising loads ( an unrestrained load applied to the top flange) loads, the lack of adequate lateral restraint and the support conditions, all that lead to is being miles unsafe. Now AI aggregates information, you could have ten undergraduates all uploading their student projects and AI thinks.. this is right, but it's dangerous bollocks! There is good reason for BC to reject you! If you want to use AI to generate calcs then you have to be competent enough to make sure it's not rubbish. By all means use AI to do the donkey work for you, but unless you know what you are doing, have the knowledge to understand what the calculations mean then you are an idiot!

Thanks for allowing me join this self-builder community. I'm building my home, and first project of this scale, in Norfolk with my husband. We are trying to be considerate of sustainability and use local materials when possible within our rather modest budget. Our architect has designed a timber framed structure with straw bale walls. We are doing all the construction work ourselves unless it requires certification, specialists or we get stuck! Neither of us have formal building experience, so are learning as we go. I'm hoping this forum will be an invaluable source of information and advice. I'd really appreciate anything which helps us get things right first time and avoids costly mistakes! Hopefully in return I can offer some entertainment value with our dodgy DIY antics!!

There’s a material difference between something like a landscape visual assessment and structural engineering calcs. The former is a nonsensical piece of paper that needs to be produced to check a box on the planning application. Money down the drain. The latter is integral to the safety of the house and its inhabitants, and something I would gladly pay for an expert to do.

If you want (need) to micro-manage at this level then the blame lands in your lap, sorry. You 1000% should NOT have had ANY other trade on site whilst the floor was being laid. You want things done in an extremely particular way, beyond the comprehension of most ‘typical’ trades, which means you need to engage in hand-holding; each plank laid down as you wish, then it gets drawn around with a sharpie, then each plank has a piece of masking tape applied so it is numbered, when lifted the number is written on the floor (inside the sharpie rectangle), and both are complimented with an arrow so the installer knows which way around to then fit each plank. Zero ambiguity, zero personal preference, zero chance of it going any other way. History keeps repeating itself here, so either change what you’re doing or don’t expect a different outcome. Sorry to be brutal, but without this info you won’t succeed. I am principal consultant on site currently and I take this approach with the trades that require direction from me. I explain that it may sound like I am teaching my father how to (expletive deleted), but that is how it is, take it positively or walk away. The good ones actually appreciate this as they can push back, stating that the additional quality etc will add time & money, which my client agrees to and accepts. Sometimes trades just need to know (be told) if it’s a sprint or a marathon.

Your proposal invites discussion, that in itself is healthy. I think it's fair for you to ask the question, most of us on BH won't take a negative view of this as you are exploring if you can benefit the self build market, and if you can make a living out of it and a bit of money then your are justified, a fair days pay for fair work. Here is bit of context and bit of my background. The first 20 or so years of my career were spent being a builder, some of that was building houses for self builders. I had generally 6 -8 full time staff then sub contractors. Depending on the time of year I may only have had four subbies, then at times up to about twenty folk working on one site. To keep them all working I would normally run one big project and say a couple of extensions, attic conversions at the same time. This allowed me to manage resources, deal with changes, cash flow, maybe planning and BC delays. You should be pretty familiar with how this works given your background. When I got to near 40 I could see the writing on the wall personally. My wife and I parted, my German Shephard died and I was left living in my lovely self build on my own with this huge weight on my neck of the business and my duty to my employees. I shut the business, paid all my staff the redundancy, phoned my competitors, told them I was chucking in the towel and pleaded for them to take my lads on. Some did! Now I also squared up all my builders merchants.. some told me, even my accountant.. you are limited Gus, if you walk away you'll be at least £100 - 200kk better off. But I paid the money as I knew my personal reputation can't be valued. Now I was lucky as I sold everything just before the 2008 crash. I then trucked off to university to become a Structural Engineer, graduated, trained and now my consultancy is in October this year going to celebrate it's tenth anniversary. But part of my success is my contacts from the old days! I am still in contact with my old suppliers, they give me names of good creditable builders, as they remember I squared them all up. One of my ex employees is now a BC officer in my local area, his wife, who used to inspect some of my project is now a Senior in BC. They are consummate professionals and remember me as "not a chancer". In summary, my own view is that if you want to build a sustainable business in the construction industry it's going to take 5 years living on the edge, another three years to stabilise, it's really only in the last couple of years that I've felt I've arrived, lots of repeat business and a huge amount of experience under my belt now.. 40 years! Ok, the above is not a rant.. it's intended to let you see there is no fast buck here in the construction industry. Developing an app is not going to work long term, unless you have lots of contacts and an already established business that brings in the bread and butter. Let's say you are digitising and facilitating via an app the procurement and build process, that's just using modern tech, the game remains the same and the profit loss sheet still stacks up the way it pretty much has over the last 40 years. The tek has changed, but the fundamental principle of turn over is vanity, profit is sanity has not changed, you may also want ( I suspect you may not) but just look at Ruskin the common law of business. But the bottom line is that it looks like you want to project manage, use your QS skills.. with a fancy app. To make a living out of this, you need do the basics very well, get repeat business, you'll need to have lots of contacts, cash in the bank, be legitimate, have insurance etc, and be very good at what you do to be able to justify your 10%, your app ain't going to cut the mustard, the app is your potential cream, your USP that delivers that extra profit. I think you need to have look at your business model in term of the app. But if that stacks up for you then it would be welcomed by not least myself and folk on BH.

Thanks for the heads up. Could members please use the Report function for anything dodgy, as we mods then get an alert. I will now put this account on ice, thanks.

Out of interest, in addition to the architectural electrical drawings mentioned above, in France you also need schematic electrical drawings. They're normally drawn by the electrical contractor as part of their contract. Without it the Electrical Inspectorate won't test the installation and, without their certificate, you don't get a mains connection. It's also used for subsequent maintenance. Example below for 1 row of my consumer unit (still in draft, which is why there's a duplicate D2.1):

When the client is clever and pragmatic enough to ask them to do so, and to be happy to pay them to do it . Anything else is wishful thinking and short-sightedness on the clients side. Pay people to take time to plan and discuss, and they will, which is why I am flat out busy working for self builders who want something better / more robust than making daft assumptions that “it’s all going to go well”…. . Not aimed at you @Mr Blobby, just a point to consider moving forwards, to help you get what you thought you’d be getting. Half a days wages would have likely mitigated this type of misunderstanding / faux-pas out, but you as the client also need to be present, often, and with some time to invest, if you really want to influence things and bolster the outcome. How many car journeys do you set out on, wearing a blindfold?

Thanks for your reply. I do appreciate they are really busy, and not looking for them to come up with the solutions. We are having issues with the B5 compliance, we had contacted the fire service who said they needed to talk to the building control officer. Our officer said to forward the information over to him which we did immediately. This was 2 weeks ago and he is not replying to any of our attempts to contact him, even though he has mentioned the issue to our structural engineer while disusing a different issue. Its cost us money and time. We are now unsure of how to proceed. Firstly.. Thankyou to everyone that took the time out to respond and apologies for taking so long to say thanks, I Hadn't checked or seen that we had so many responses. I am starting to remember that the admin is one of the reasons I stopped social media. So the update is positive, I think we finally figured out how building control works. We had thought part of their role was in an advisory capacity and no-one, including them would tell us specifically what their role and responsibilities were, who they were accountable too, how the game plays out and what the game rules were, so when they just wouldn't respond to our emails or anyone in the company would answer the phone, and then would make extraordinary demands of us with no other additional information or guidance, we felt like we were being taken on a merry dance. We have since figured out that they are as a general rule NOT working in an advisory capacity, because if you build something they advised on and passed, and something went wrong, they are then liable, which makes perfect sense why they would be reticent to pass on their knowledge. The B5 requirement was a headache because the impression we got was that we HAD to install this HUGE turning area that would dominate our land and involve taking out a lot of trees to produce. This has now been satisfied with a sprinkler system installed in the house, of which a certificate from the company installing is enough and it was this extreme request that was solved with a simple solution that broke the camels back and we figured out the way this particular inspector seems to work. He will throw at us the worst case scenario, we find the simplest solution to solve it and as long as it is reasonable and under someone elses name, he is happy. I know it may sound daft and we are slow learners, but the parameters with which it all operates just isn't written down anywhere and my brain needs to fully understand the system we have to work within, before it can function. Anyhoos...We got there, we submitted our actions and we got the go ahead from building control at the end of last week so WE'RE OFF. Thankyou everyone and I am sure we will be back with more further down the line.

Do NOT have the connector and isolator tap behind the appliance. Fit it inside an adjacent cupboard unit so it is accessible, and does not restrict the appliance going fully back into it's recess. Same for waste fitting and electrical socket.

My self build journey, to illustrate how things have become harder. First self build 2003. Moving from England to the Highlands. A big motivation of self build Vs just buy a house, was we could buy a building plot and a static caravan for cash without having to sell our old house. If we had gone for the "simple" option of just buy a house we would have been trying to sell and buy at the same time under 2 different house buying legal systems which just sounded like a nightmare. Plus a self lbuild had been on my bucket list for a long time. That first house the only technical design input was from the timber frame company. Total cost of all drawings planning and building warrant £2K No surveys. TF company was paid to build a and watertight shell and we fitted out the inside employing trades as needed. House prices here were rising fast then, and by the time we had finished house value comfortably exceeded build cost. That all worked out well. IF ONLY it was still that simple. A few years later we decided we wanted a smaller house, (done the 5 bedroom thing) and were lucky after some searching to find a plot 2 doors up the road from the first one. The plan had always been start the new build, put the old house on the market and sell it to finish the new build. Our timing was poor. This was post 2008 crash and the market here was dead. The old house was on the market for 2 years and had just 6 viewings. My work as electrician took me all over the place, and I was seeing the same houses everywhere just stuck with a for sale board that had been there well over a year. All the agents and any "helpful" adviser could say if it's not selling, it is over priced, reduce the asking price. That would be all very well if you could reduce your asking price and then reduce the asking price of the house you bought. But self build does not work like that. Try telling a builders merchant house prices have crashed so you want all building materials reduced by a similar amount and ditto tradesmans wages. If we had reduced the price to distress sale levels, we could very well have ended up selling our 5 bedroom house for less than the build cost of the replacement 3 bed house. There was no way I was paying to downsize. Our build ground to a halt with just me doing what I could but held up by bigger things needing doing. Our saviour from this situation came in the form of a lady that wanted to buy the house and run it as a guest house, but could not get the funds to buy it without accounts, so her offer was to rent the house for a few years and then buy it. So we accepted and reluctantly went back to being landlords. That did eventually work out. It ended up being 7 years rental before she finally bought it, and those 7 years of rent, pretty much paid for the completion of the new house. So it worked out financially better just because of that. The actual sale price of the 5 bed house was only £50K more than the build cost of the new 3 bed house. As others have said a self build now likely costs more than the market value unless some house price inflation saves you. As for complications and red tape. The old pay the TF supplier not a lot for all the drawings seemed no longer available. We ended up paying an architecturtal technician and a SE to produce all the drawings that cost us £10K. We didn't have to do any surveys or that nonsense. The only other bits of paper we had to pay for (but not on the first build) were air test, and as built EPC. Building control seemed more stringent on the second build, with the added irritation that we had to keep paying an extra £100 per year to keep renewing the building warrant up to completion. And self build site insurance was a LOT more expensive second time around.

a better finish is achievable, but it doesn’t come flat packed, local company made these 3 doors for me.

For a set task by any trade, I am increasingly asking myself ‘what can go wrong here’ and ‘what is most important to get right’. It’s amazing how you can often predict what the f. ups will be in advance. Then make sure you’re around for that part and be firm and unapologetic. A good trade will like that you’re double checking. Listen to all the ‘we normally do it this way’ lines, decide whether you agree and, if not, explain politely why you want it done.a different way. Check in with your trades a lot at first, then less as you trust them.

Your question is fundamental. It goes to the heart of the horror that self-building can become. And is the main cause of self-build-sleep-deprivation-syndrome Humility, respect, time, trust, effort, plain speaking. And knowledge of their (the trade's) networks Self builders are - to the trades we deal with - mostly one off customers. And because we self builders have to invest so much more time , emotion and 'fizz' into our builds than those who 'simply' sign a cheque, many self builders ( not all) think we're special. To trades people, we aren't. We're one of many jobs they have on the go at any one time. Either invest in someone who can manage the situation for you or take the time to understand the trades networks so you can break through their communication blocks and accept that substandard work does occur and that some work will have to be remedied but most of all - be lucky DIY know when an error is something you just have to accept - and when not. After more than 10 years at it, I'm only just getting to know like and trust a core of people who communicate well, do what they say they will do, when they say they will do it to an acceptable standard. 10 years to many people is just too long.

This is with lights on last night

To me the barriers are many fold: Finding an affordable plot in a place you'd want to live Finding an Architect who is on the same wavelength Getting through the broken planning systems - including paying for endless reports by "experts" Dealing with endless planning conditions Dealing with endless Building Control issues Finding out enough to make an appropriate choice on construction method Finding a builder and/or trades competent in their work, affordable, and available Having to make many many decisions on little information and only idealised drawings for reference Lead time from initial idea to moving in date measured in several years. Or you can just put up with the utter c**p thrown up by the nationals and shortcut the whole thing to a few months.

So after 6 months of delay due to one shoddy bricklayer and another one who was shoddy with a massive 'I'm the best' ego, it is finally third time lucky and the two guys we waited 6 weeks to start, take pride in their work and are really approachable when you want to ask a question or raise an issue. Just how it should be. Being behind is a pain though, as it will mean I will be cutting the roof and installing the standing seam roofing most likely in November. But so long as it doesn't get too wet, it might be ok. Here are a few photos. I made a jig up to cut the insulation at the angle of the cavity tray and I was chuffed how it turned out. A rather laborious task though, but I said I would get the trays and insulation all ready for them I also knocked up probably 12 different mixes over the last few months. We tried 5 different sands, grey cement, white cement and lime ...., but non of them really worked and they were either too grey or too yellow, but we kept searching and finally found a local firm in Thatcham who had some sand from a quarry a long distance away. The colour looked like it would work and as soon as I mixed up the 5 sand, 1 white cement and 1 lime mix, we both said "that's it". Sand cost us about £90/ton, which is not cheap, but I didn't want to be looking at the house thinking "I don't like the mortar colour". Here are a few pictures of progress from the last two weeks.

New Tank Fitted over the weekend Grant Tank - 180L 2.7m2 coil surface area couple of errors in pipework configuration that are resulting in increased heat loss but I'll fix them over the next couple of weeks. meantime a quick experiment on boiler efficiency (compared to old tank data) revealed Boiler efficiency Old tank when heating HW - efficiency was 88.97% (condensate volume 157 grams - condensate stopped after 10 mins of a 30 min cycle due to return temp being above 54 deg) New tank when heating HW - efficiency is 93.29% (Condensate volume 332 grams was generating condensate all the way thro the 45 min cycle) Can show workings if required....... Heat Loss Old Hot water tank fully lagged pipework - london loops everywhere (U loops on any hot outlets from tank) best I could get in term of temp decay in the tank was 0.4 deg per hour (most of the time it was 0.5 to 0.6 deg per hour) so heat a tank to 50 deg and 20 hours later it would be down to 40 deg (thats a just bearable shower according to SWMBO) New Tank - no lagging on pipework yet and minimal london loops and the tank losses are down to 0.19 deg per hour - so heat a tank to 50 deg and 24 hours later it's still over 45 deg - I think I need a better hobby!!!! PS Yes I need to fit a tank stat PPS The tank is set up as a vented tank (so no G3 certification is required)

I think you have to change your expectations or nothing will suit. I don't know when I last used a decimal mm in construction. I appreciate it may be a mindset and things like cutlery laid approximately can be an issue. I'd be interested to know what measurement would have been acceptable 1mm? 0.5mm? Measuring tapes aren't even that accurate. pencils get thicker as you draw a line. Saw blades have thicknesses, materials are variable, hands are not machines. There will be many worse discrepancies in your house should you choose to look for them. Nobody else will notice.

It’s what I do / have done, in every single kitchen and bathroom job I’ve ever done. Dulux Diamond for the finish stuff in kitchens for most folk, or appropriate bathroom paint from whoever. 2 coats on brand new plaster in the same day, and customers think I’ve gone the whole 9 yards. Contract stuff is fine to leave on ceilings, but it isn’t very good on walls as it’s quite chalky and doesn’t wipe at all well. I use it sacrificially, for obliteration, and as above for use as a paint-come-filler for the very minor imperfections that you cannot see with the eye (until you pole sand lightly to show any defects). You must leave this to go bone dry before sanding, and I only say to dilute 10% water if spraying; current client is about to go full on Picasso and that’s the instructions for dilution from Wagner. Depends on how fussy you are whether you pole sand ceilings, or not, but my go-to plasterer is on site atm and he is shit hot, so very little needs doing tbh; he’s incredibly fussy in corners etc, and is pretty much the best plasterer I know or have ever met. If the plasterer is of ‘lesser finesse’ then you’ll have it “all to do” downstream and will soon regret not getting someone better. He’s Coventry based, and if anyone needs (wants) an exceptionally good spread then PM me for his contact details. He’s also an excellent external renderer, and does micro-cement and Venetian (etc) plasterwork. He has pics of some of the jobs he’s done and it’ll blow you away! Tres bien It’s all in the finish folks, and you’ll be staring at it in every room for the next couple of decades or more, and if that’s not right then what was the point in getting everything else behind it A1?

Two thoughts: 1. If designing from scratch the additional cost of adding cooling will be minimal in the overall scheme of things so put it in at the start. 2. Why on earth would anyone building a new house in 2026 NOT want to add cooling?

Well done. End of story.

Nope. It’ll fight your plasterboards until the death. Screws will wind in and pull through the boards, as they won’t be tight against the studs. Seriously, do not use 100mm, persevere and get 75mm.

You can ask for this to be more 'in depth', so they charge more for the investigations and remove as much ambiguity as is practicable.

I've now reached the happy place of 'offer and acceptance' for my subject-to-planning offer which in Scottish legal parlance means that we have a bargain and timescale agreed. I wanted 12 months to complete planning, the seller offered 3 and we compromised on 9. So I now have until April next year to get the planning I am happy with before I have to pay for the plot and take ownership of it. We've also agreed that if my application is stuck in the planning process through no fault of my own the timescale will be extended to reflect that. I'm not looking for any comments on this regarding legal safeguards just now thanks. This may be a little simplistic, but in my mind there are four possible steps to the planning process: Pre-application enquiry Planning permission in principle (same as outline planning in England). Full planning Building warrant I've opted to skip step 2 as I think I should be ok to move straight on to step 3 once I have a positive pre-application enquiry response. If you've any thoughts or advice on that then I would be interested to hear it. As you can hopefully see from the photo it is a gorgeous plot in a beautiful part of the world. The image above shows what will be the view from my future house. I feel very excited and lucky to have this opportunity.

Depends what you'll use garage for, but if the floor is reasonably flat swisstrax is an option worth considering. It worked out cheaper and easier than epoxy for us (in part because we didn't need to grind/prep the slab), and it looks fantastic too. There are a couple of caveats you have to weigh up with it though. - Doesn't need much cleaning because of how it's designed, but dust does accumulate underneath it. - You don't want to drop anything very small on the floor! Also water goes through it (which may or may not be a good thing) - Not that confortable walking in socks (there is another models which this isn't an issue with though, although it accumulate more dust due to flat surfaces). On the flip-side, you can pull it up to clean underneath it you want,change the design or replace damaged tiles, things don't bounce off it etc.

It's just that I did a search and that came up, showing it is common. I'm pretty sure we sourced ours through a paint merchant, and it was not a mass market make.

Back by popular demand! (Well, one person asked.) I said the previous blog was my last. I lied. This bonus edition focuses our efforts to landscape the garden. Just before we moved in in February the rear ‘garden’ looked a bit like this: Fortunately, we’d stayed close enough to the build budget to have some funds still reserved for landscaping. It turns out that landscaping is expensive - similar costs to groundworks in our experience. Last year, while waiting for planning and itching to do something, we’d engaged a garden designer to help us meet some key requirements. We wanted to create a small garden with multiple planting and seating areas with level access from the house and wheelchair access to all areas. The designer came up with a design we liked - an interesting mixture of curves and angles, with planting and seating areas as requested. We ended up adapting this design to form the skeleton of the garden. In truth we were never likely to take any design without tweaking it but if we attempted the design ourselves it would have been very boring compared with the garden we now have. (We also ditched the designers planting list suggestion but Mrs P. was always going to have the plants she wanted, and why not?) One reason we had to adapt the design was that the fall in height was more than we planned for at 1.6m, and we only had about 12m distance to manage it given we wanted a terrace with level access next to the house. For comfortable wheelchair access I find it’s best to limit ramps to no more than 1:20 gradient, which implies we needed to fit in 32m of ramps in a 12m x 15m area. So the paths became a bit more meandering. Here’s my amateur attempt at trying to gauge shape and fall of the paths. Our excellent local landscape gardener Ashley Ralph (Ashely Ralph Landscaping - I’m not on commission!) started work in February to turn our amended plan into reality. Marking out was fun! This photo shows just how tight a space Ashley was working with. Cern Abbas Giant eat your heart out! Anyway... we needed quite a few retaining walls, which means a lot of trenches and footings. It rained a lot in February too, which added to the challenge. It would have been nice to achieve this with less concrete and fewer concrete blocks but I can’t think how that could have been done. Ashley, with Francis driving the dumper. The block walls were capped with sandstone copings and given a sand and cement render finish. We remembered to run some armoured cables and blue water pipe to allow couple of electric sockets and water taps. In the end we decided not to bother with external lighting even though we’d got planning permission approval because we rarely need it and are happy to use portable rechargeable lamps when we do. The paths and seating areas are in resin bound gravel; here are the paths edged in red setts then with and a concrete sub-base on type 1. Here’s the scene before the resin top-coat is laid but after the planting beds have had their topsoil put in. Troy's taken the idea of 'beds' too literally: For the terrace we used the external version of the internal 900 x 600 porcelain tiles we use throughout the house. The external tiles are 20mm thick rather than 10mm and have a slightly rougher surface for slip resistance. We used the same tiles for the front porch area. The walls at either side of the rear garden have drops of over 600mm so our building inspector insisted we put up ‘fall protection’ which we did using locally sourced cedar slats, fixed horizontally to posts ‘resin-studded’ to the walls. This doubles as screening from our neighbours and provides extra shelter and structure for climbing plants, so we were not too upset at having to do this. (The wider gaps at the bottom are deliberate here, to allow jasmine to grow through from the other side. Beer at bottom right is entirely incidental!) The final step for all that hard landscaping: the resin bound gravel surface. We think it looks great. It’s very smooth to wheel on and all the gradients are good too! For the planting beds we imported a fair amount of loamy topsoil to go over the existing heavy clay. Hopefully this will give a good balance with the underlying clay retaining water whilst the surface soil doesn’t get waterlogged. The beds are not enormous but it is going to take a lot of plants to fill them. That, and time to allow the plants to grow and establish themselves. Er… planting beds Troy! Obviously Mrs P. is in charge of the planting as I haven’t got a clue. The beauty of raised beds is that you can put the soil you want in them. One of the beds closer to the house will have sharper drainage and is going to become a Mediterranean garden. Another has been filled with ericaceous soil for acid-loving plants. I do know that we have some of our favourite plants already planted or planned, including roses: Nye Bevan, Claire Austen, Queen of Sweden, Champagne Moments, Donahue; also various peonies, hydrangeas eryngiums, achillia, lavenders… and lots of others. But plenty more planting opportunities according to Mrs P. - I’d better check that budget again! Well, that’s it for this bonus edition garden landscaping blog. A big thank you to Ashley and Francis for all their incredible work building our garden, and to Mrs P. of course for great plant choices, all that planting, and green fingers. After all, what is a garden without plants? That’s definitely it now… …until the epilogue maybe. Ben

If its a proper screed, nice and flat, then if you just want to stop dust, just use a densifier. Its clear like water and just soaks in. Cheapish, and dead easy to apply. If you paint, you are appying a coating. Again, if its completely smooth, and with proper prep, a single pack product will work up to a point. However, not all single pack products are equal. Id certainly not be buying from B&Q. Ive found Promain very helpful if you ring (an actual telephone call, madness i know!) and explain what you are doing. For me, if painting, its 2k epoxy every time now. But i prefer to tile. Did my last garage with tiles and its absolutely the best solution long term. Good epoxy is expensive. Tiles more so, but the difference if you do it yourself not that big. Depending on the tiles of course!

I think there are two big issues with the "stuff": 1- it disproportionately affects lower budget builds. 2- it mostly has to be paid out early, sometimes years before even starting the build, this can be challenging financially. A lot of this is ripe for disruption but I fear the self build market is too small to make the development costs worthwhile. @Gus Potterhas written persuasively in other threads about the savings from getting a good designer/engineer in early. It seems to me the issue is that obviously makes that professional more expensive, and how does a self builder separate someone who is offering a better service from someone who is just charging more? There is no way of knowing whether a professional has settled for the first option they found or considered 10. This is why I try to do as much as possible myself, I'd rather die by my own mistakes, at least I will have learnt something!

Double C no question. USB A will hang around but anything new will come with C and adapters are easy to get. Having said that, personally I wouldn't get socket integrated USB at all. The prices are high, standards change, the standby energy use of them adds up and the risk of them breaking/costing you more money during their life is not great either. (Some types of electrical testing done during EICRs and fault investigation would require all these sockets to be disconnected before the test is run, that's going lead to the electrician charging more). I'd rather get something along these lines for when USB is needed (not a recommendation just result of quick search - in fact not sure the foldable pins is a good idea). https://www.amazon.co.uk/TEKRAT-Charger-Foldable-iPhone-Samsung-White/dp/B0DNRLYSZ1

Once you have a decent topo it gives everyone a reference for follow on work. You will be surprised how many times it is referred to from planning drawings, services, site setout, groundworks and landscaping.

I'd say confidence is a big issue, most self builders are doing it for the first time and spending their life savings. This leads you to stick to what is known/common which is very often what is used by volume builders. One advantage of self building should be to build bespoke to the situation and to use innovative ideas that haven't reached or aren't suitable for the volume builders; leveraging the experience of others (e.g. this forum) is crucial. Another thing I have found is that you have to try and understand everything yourself. Any professional you employ, no matter how good, has a different set of incentives (being paid, maximising profit, reducing their risk) which are different to your own, you need to try to be an intelligent customer. Easier said than done. I'm still amazed that no one has invented a better way to finish an internal wall than to throw wet muck at it and smooth it over! Probably they have but big plaster has shut them down.

Painfully true. When I started this process 5 years ago - there was still a sliver of a chance that we would come a little bit ahead - i.e. about 10% profit if we decided to sell at the end. It was never intended to be a flip for profit, but doing the math at least keeps you sane when sinking your life savings, blood, sweat and tears into something. A whole host of things since then have happened which means there is no chance I would make the money back if I was to sell it now. The market turned, materials went up, labour went up, we up-specced the material choices (🤨), mansion tax coming and general taxation levels going through the roof. I could easily have bought something of a similar size in decent nick for cheaper than it's been to do the work myself. But, it would have still needed a lot of work to get it up to the right standard and not been exactly what I wanted - so here we are. Will definitely need to live here for at least 10-15 years to stand a chance of the markets recovering and us being able to recover our funds. Luckily, that's the plan anyway 😄

Perhaps explain briefly what a rough experience you have had before, and invite communication right from the start in the case of any doubt whatsoever. Not so easy, I appreciate, if you are not on site, but can they get you at short notice on your mobile to clarify any uncertainties, for example? Absolutely agree with @saveasteading re a dwg. Am I, however, right in remembering that you have only general, not detailed dwgs? Even an agreed scribbled (annotated with dims where applicable if not to scale)sketch can be invaluable in lieu of a detailed dwg, as long as the context is clear and understood.

Before they start check they have the drawing. Ask them if there are any issues arising. That is their moment to explain that they disagree or agree to build it as designed. Then you have an agreement and they work to it, or you don't and you have to manage the situation. You'll often find that they haven't got the drawing, or that your workers are not the one you agreed the job with.

In the"old days" A first time self builder with no experience could save at least 15% on the build cost of a house. Now in the old days the market was rising, thus the value of the property also increased by on average, say 10%, over say a 2 year build time. You had to be a complete idiot to lose money on a self build. So even if you were not that good your self build could return a tax free return of up 25%, but nine times out of ten you would not lose your shirt. The market has changed a lot. @saveasteading who has decades of experience pointed out.. and I agree, much of the profit for the volume builders now lies in the land transaction, the actual building of the houses are not the main profit element, the house building is just a means to and end, basically a bit of a hassle! Now if you buy a serviced plot on one of these serviced schemes, the seller (developer) has already taken off the cream of the profit, you as a self building then are looking at marginal profit, but carry much more risk. Self building in this case is not going to make you lots of money, it may give you the house you love though and if that has value for you then it's viable. Now say you do a house that sells for 300k. You'll be lucky to clear 20k after all the taxes etc if you sell it on , if your motive is to make money, you'll have to risk dealing with a builder, a huge amount of personal time.. etc.. the reality is you are likely to be better off if you just do a Saturday morning shift in Aldi, you may even get a pension contribution! I've had the good fortune to talk and meet with @Square Feet who has some ideas about how we get back to making self building more attractive, not least financially. It's early stage ideas, will take time to develop, but looks promising. The reality at the moment is for your average self builder the financial risks are high vs the rewards. There are still a good few very well off self builders who don't really mind if they make money of not. But the whole idea is to encourage young folk to self build and improve their financial health which results from their own hard work. But as above.. it really is the case.. you are better off at times doing a Saturday shift at Aldi!

Town and Country planning act of 1947. Fix that and all the other dominos will fall.

Milton Keynes people. Part of the reason Milton Keynes exists is to make available serviced plots of land for self builders. There are hundreds of them in MK. The local authority in charge obviously has a different mindset and has done for very many years. Now, whether you want to live in MK is a different question but the point is, this is not a new idea and it has been done ( is being done). Why the idea has never really spread is beyond me.

Sorry, but that's not the road block to more people building custom homes.

That is for very special circumstances... a bridge, a block of flats. I've not done or seen one for decades.... commercial or home. (on big jobs we had a lab that did slump tests and took cubes for testing, and so did the supplier. The problem will have been the fibres. Adding them to an 'easy flowing' mix will seriously stiffen the whole thing. A vibrating poker would have made it run but obv that wasn't to hand. I've gone off fibres recently because they seem to stick together in great clumps more than they used to, and the handling issue. But it also looks very dry indeed. How did it even reach there? You have nicely laid mesh so cracking shouldn't be a problem... if they get the mix right. In fact your photo is an example of doing things right, apart from the pile of mess in the middle. Cemex you say! Worth noting.