lizzie

Thank you @JSHarris I have ordered one. Really appreciate the link.

My alarms are mains......hopefully electrician will be in touch tomorrow and we will get to the bottom of why they did not work. Meantime have bought some battery ones to cover us until we find out what the problem is/was with mains linked ones. TBH I think I will keep the battery ones operational too and get them put up in the individual bedrooms (we only have a mains one in corridor to cover bedrooms). Fire extinguishers and fire blankets purchased and I hope to get some guidance from local fireman on how to use. I sincerely hope I never have to use!! I am very lucky being single storey and my garden hose was just outside the slider so it was very quick to get it in and on once the electrics were off. Water everywhere, good job I have tiles not wood or carpets.........I have 6 bar of pressure and I had the hose full on! I am now researching which plugs to pull out of the sockets and which can be safely left in.......turning into my Mother who used to unplug everything before she went to bed. Can't do that in our new airtight house though.....mvhr, ufh, boiler, the list goes on. I was amazed today at just how hot the TV got - def taking those plugs out when I go on hols or maybe even just to bed. My dear OH has bought me a new hairdryer and that definitely will not be left plugged in!

Noooo please thats an evil place. When I had all the trouble with my boarding I asked on there. Its very scary dont go there.

I paid a lot of money to a professional project manager who at one stage (things were going horribly wrong) yelled at me he could manage my build from 800 miles away via his mobile phone (he told me that from his mobile phone)....I was so shocked I was speechless and that does not happen very often. I ended up having to go to site every day sometimes twice a day (was renting 5 miles away), it took over my life, I didn't know what I was doing, contractors took advantage of me, I had to put my business on hold to try and get the house finished....it was a complete nightmare and you would have though having a professional on board it would have been ok, how wrong can you be. I never set out to be a self builder I was led into it unwittingly and it was the worse 2 years of my life. The lovely people on this forum helped me so much and I am eternally grateful for their help and support. I truly don't see how you can do it remotely.

I am using G7 and changing every 30 days in this hot weather. I have a hay field next to me and it is just dust. Think thats why mine are getting so bad. I am changing the extract less often but still more than yours partly because I have had to have the windows open so much due to the overheating and the place gets full of dust. Its windy here and it blows in. I have room filters on all extract and intake outlets too and they are getting filthy but I wash those!

I think so, I had stone tray in one shower and it was not slippery. I would say go for a stone if you can because they are less prone to movement and so less prone to leaks where the tray and tiles join and you can get water ingress with moving tray and silicone seal at tiles. TBH I think go for the best tray you can manage its an important part of your bathroom, other areas can be economised on perhaps

Personally I would pay the £40. Its a very small price to pay for safety in the shower you can lose £40 somewhere else perhaps.

If you get a good one they do an excellent job. Finish is all important and a bad job can ruin the most expensive bathroom. Most higher end developers use a mastic man nowadays, thats how I got mine. Not sure how you would source one as an individual. The one I used came with a vast array of colours and finishes his van was a veritable Aladdins cave - bet there was not one made that he didn't have. My second fix plumber put his hands up and admitted he was not the best at it and having got to know me he knew he would not be able to do it to my standard. My superstar carpenter stepped in and did it all, he is a demon with the mastic gun and if he ever needs another career he could be a mastic man!

You can use a rubber mat like the ones they provide in hotels where shower is over bath. Less than £20 when I bought one for an elderly relative. £400 extra sounds a lot ....do you want to tell us your budget and we may be able to suggest something?

I had a mastic man in a house a few years ago...I am in the Midlands, he travelled from Cornwall and was booked solid. He was good.

I have a Bora and am very happy with it. Bora specialise in these hobs Siemens Neff et all are jumping on a bandwagon. Not sure how their product compares with a specialist like Bora. Someone else will know for sure.

I had the same with the airtight tape, they left it on the internal frames and plastered over it leaving a thin strip visible it was a nightmare to get off

I got nothing at all from our Internorm suppliers. I found the hard floor protector on a roll from Screwfix was good. It didnt leave any residue. Its transparent blue and looks bit like the the protector that window companies use.

@mike2016 anyone buying would want to replace the kitchen but will want something useable pro tem so just try something first. Clear out everything as @newhome suggests and just replace a few chosen pieces on those open shelves. Scrub everything until it shines and then scrub and polish again....review those wall tiles then, they are dated but they are of the same era as the kitchen and maybe some work on the grout may just do it. Replace the flooring as its had it. go for something clean and light not dull and serviceable. Paint the walls a light neutral and then get the EA round again. I bet they say it is fine.

@JSHarris it is usual with best & final written offers if it is a non dependent cash purchase to include some proof of funding e.g. a bank statement showing funds or a confirmation from their lawyer that funds are available. Dont just trust what is written in their offer letter without seeing proof, sadly people can and do bend the truth if it suits them. Good luck I hope one of the others works out well.

Sounds not untypical. With their offer did they show proof of funding in the individual name too? I agree with lots of agents being lazy these days, they use kids who think Right move is all it takes to sell a house. Part of the skill involved form the EA end is not only finding the purchaser but in holding a sale together to exchange and for that you need an agent and team. Old school sixth sense flushes out a lot of these odd ball purchasers (not always of course!), if their money is good and they do the deal fine but in my experience of dealing with them they always want something tweaked and they want clear title properties that they can use for whatever purpose they need.

+1 @ProDave

I gave mine away to the last groundworker I used. I wanted rid of them and I know they can be a pain to try and sell on due to transport so took the quick and easy route.

@JSHarris I have sold properties to 'fringe' religious organisations before I have also let properties to them. They are not your usual customers. They target certain types of property which suit their needs. Yours is a corner plot on a main road (I mean not an estate road), it is fairly private and secluded but easily accessible looking at the photos you posted - they all like those. In my experience they will offer over the odds and they sometimes offer on multiple properties as they expect a fall through rate. An experienced estate agent may well have got to the bottom of this before it got to wasted legals. If as an agent you have dealt with these types of organisations before you have learnt to ask questions both of purchaser and vendor before tying up the sale. Your next in line can buy their searches to speed things up. Good luck.

It can't.

@JSHarrisSo in essence you think they want to run it as some sort of hostel/hmo. If I were the beneficiary of the covenant I would absolutely not agree to that and if I were a near neighbour I would object to any application for a change of use. Who wants something like that on their doorstep. It will affect property values.

Exactly

I don't think doing a bit of work from home or from your shed or whatever constitutes a breach of covenant. A covenant and a planning condition are two very different things....a certificate of lawful use has no bearing whatsoever on a covenant restriction. I think you need to be careful you don't end up in a mess with your home recategorised as semi commercial premises not only in breach of covenant but also affecting your right to a 100% tax free gain on the sale of your house as your principal residence. The covenant restriction does not mean it cannot be owned by a charitable trust but that it must be used as a private residence whoever owns it ....e.g. not run as an HMO or business premises, B&B etc. Used as a private residence does not mean it cannot be used as a buy to let investment but merely that it should be used and occupied as a 'private' residence and not sublet into separate units. It does not stop you taking in a lodger or using the rent a room scheme as it is still a private residence. Do you know yet precisely what it was that made them back off? If not I would wait until you know.

I got the bosch battery mower as petrol ones way too heavy and I cant start them. The Bosch mower not cheap at circa £350 but worth it. Getting their strimmer next, I have an old gtech battery one and its rubbish.

That your house on the MBC facebook page?