Benpointer

You may be right, we'll see. But the question is ambiguous and no steer on how to answer it. If the question had been how many kitchens and utility rooms in total I'd have answered 2. Mind you, we have a pantry too so should that be 3?

Wow, that must have been a big build! Aston Martin DB5 estimated to fetch almost £500,000 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn00d30gw7xo

Depending on the amount you buy direct, 5% of total cost sounds reasonable to me. 👍

Hi Square Feet, Here's an empty copy of the spreadsheet I created. VAT invoices template.xlsx It's based on the format of Table A from the reclaim form https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65858474fc07f300128d46e8/VAT431NB.pdf The total VAT we're reclaiming is quite a small %age of our total spend because most of the spend was on zero-rated build and install work where the contractors supplied the materials. The big ticket items of groundworks, timber fram, windows, zinc roof, solar PV and electrics, were all in this category. Our main materials spend items were timber cladding, floor tiles, kitchen units, doors, lighting, insulation, plus lots of timber and fixings. How much you will be claiming back depends on how much you put through contractors and how much materials you buy yourself. Hope that helps. Ben

I know there have been a few of these but I thought I would add our VAT reclaim journey to the mix. We moved in on 23rd February 2026. We received our BC completion certificate yesterday (18th june) following a painless final inspection. I reviewed our spreadsheet of project VAT invoices today: By comparing it with the spend spreadsheet I'd kept to manage the budget, I found an additional £1800 of VAT I could reclaim - not sure how I missed those before. Some of the paper invoice copies I had, proved to be no such thing - rather, sales orders or pro-forma invoices. A few calls and emails managed to secure real VAT invoices. 161 invoices in total, totallying £20.9k VAT to claim Plenty of company names on invoices didn't match the official HMRC company names for specific VAT registration numbers. For instance: Screwfix is really Kingfisher and Toolstation is really Travis Perkins (with the same VAT reg no.). I am not sure how much of an issue that is but I corrected them anyway. We had maintained a spreadsheet in the HMRC template format so populating their template was a simple cut and paste. I used the online HRMC form to submit the claim, guided by Google Gemini. I know AI gets a bad rap but I really like Gemini. I guess we'll see if my trust is misplaced. Some points about the online submission. There seem to be some trick questions, e.g: When did you occupy the property? Gemini advises making sure it ties in with what the Council know because HMRC can check (really?) But in our case that means three invoices since 23rd February could be discounted. I changed the spreadsheet description for these entries to make it clear we had to do this work to pass BC. We'll see whether HMRC allow those. How many kitchens or utility rooms do you have? In our case 1 of each. Gemini advise entering 1 kitchen, 1 utility room but you can only put in a number, so I entered 1 (as in 1 kitchen or 1 utility room. The risk in entering a number >1 is that HMRC assume it's a multi-residency project and will reject. I received an email confirmation of my submission straight away, will keep you posted on progress or issues.

Yes, the inverter too, it's part of the same stack. Sloppily I just refer to the whole unit as 'the battery'.

Just had our 27kWh Sigenergy batteries (LiFePO4) moved from the house to an outbuilding. The main reason for doing that was due to the plant room getting very hot but, whilst I am prepared to believe these batteries are very safe, the thought of losing our new timber-framed house to a battery fire was, er... troubling. If it goes up now I would lose my workshop but I reckon the fire brigade ought to have a good chance of stopping it spreading to the house 🤞 (The plant room is now running 7°C cooler on average btw.)

Quite. Our Q350 is using 21W - half a kWh per day - so next to nowt.

Just to report, our underfloor cooling is working nicely: 31 deg C outside, 23 deg C in the house - even with the lift and slide doors open. Beautiful day here in Dorset!

We ended up with TECE cisterns. Quality seems very good - no issues in operation, very quiet. Instructions are those awful wordless pictograms so sub-optimal but just about workable.

Not heard of Kress before. They look very good but pricey, though I would much prefer to buy something made in Europe rather than China... for emotional rather than logical reasons. (Edit: though I see they have a factory in China too!)

Thanks for all the replies so far. Mammotion looks like a lot of kit for the money but the support concerns would put me off. I would like a local dealer I can speak to face to face, so limiting myself to Segway, Stiga or Husqvarna currently. We probably will want a GPS guided system rather than old-style buried wire, although I need to get my head around the whether there is an ongoing cost for Network RTK (Real-Time Kinematic positioning).

Hi all, Looking for robot mower recommendations. We have a relatively flat and open 1/2 acre (2000m2) grass paddock into which Mrs P. has dotted 15 or so trees. I can't be doing with a ride-on mower - had one in the last house and it just becomes a chore. So we are looking to buy a decent robot mower. Currently I'm thinking an appropriately sized model from Segway, Stiga or Husqvarna. Does anyone have any experience, good or bad? There are plenty of YouTube reviews but I don't feel I can trust them as most seem to be funded by the manufacturers. Ideally, I could do with a garden / landscaping site as geeky as this one, but I can't find RobotMowerHub.org.uk. Again, if anyone knows a good site? First World problem I know but... Thanks as ever. PS here's a couple of shots of our paddock, from last autumn.

Doesn't the VAT reclaim depend on BC sign-off?

Good grief, I reckon even I could lay blocks better than that!