On rocky ground

Agreed I'm happy doing the bits that can be hidden but anything on show needs the professional touch ?

Interesting comment as there seems to be a lot of debate around pro's and cons re construction method. Did you price up both methods?

Thanks for that, yeah hopefully once we have a design/layout we are happy with we will stick to it, as I said we will be going for very straightforward style, something pretty much boxed shaped so shouldn't be too much in the way of wanting to add anything too fancy further down the line as that's not really our tastes.

Timber frame would be the plan and a fairly low key design, no visions of large amounts of glass and UPVC also suits us fine. In terms of kitchen/bathroom fit out happy to go with middle of the road or lower budget finishes that can be upgraded further down the road and spend the money in getting the fabric of the building right. But I take your point that its a bit of how long is a piece of string type question as there is a such a variety/price range of choices to be made. Pleased to hear you think this is not an unrealistic target, albeit that it will take a lot of effort involved as I was beginning to think the whole idea was starting to look like a pipedream.

Hi! We are looking to build a 200m2 house plus an integrated garage and really need to get it done for £1000/m2. This will no doubt require a lot of DIY tasks to be undertaken to be within that budget, looking for some real world experiences of what the forum have tried and any definite no go areas for a relatively novice (in house building terms anyway) DIYer. We have a family friend who has a groundwork/plant hire company who can help with that side of things. Hopefully he can get us materials through his trade accounts if this is allowed which we are hoping will bring down material costs. This will be in SW Scotland and the site already has services on it.