Buzz

Get them to make it 150mm and then full fill with 32 wool batts , your brickies will be used to this method and is very difficult not to get it right. This will give you the same uvalue as pir. Cost wise, pir is around £40 m2 woolbatts £17 m2 , but as always shop around for deals .

Hi @Caroline how wide has the cavity been drawn at ? And what u value. I agree with the comments above, if you don't need to use pir then I would look for another solution

Congratulations, at least you have something worth more today than it was yesterday. Now onto the next steps.

If you have had the rest done and have a recommendation why do you feel you need an SE to design the foundations? BC will be on site when you dig the first trench and advise is they are happy or not once they see what's below.

Hi @Drellingore Like you I find it difficult to understand why when you gave your architect a budget they didn't throw up any red flags to the escalating costs before now , they must have known where the final cost was likely to be very early on in the process but carried on regardless, always easy to spend someone else's money. So what does that tell us about them as a company? Either they are incompetent and have no idea when designing a home as to the cost of what they are drawing as they go along or they don't care about the costs as that's your problem, neither are a good look .

Welcome along At a guess I would say your not too far from our build, we are in fenland but very close to the west Norfolk border. Good decision to demolish and rebuild not only do you get the VAT back but your services should be relatively straightforward as well something we had issues causing big delays with. Good luck

The thought had crossed my mind

You must have the patience of a saint , three and a half years to try a resolve a boundary issue regarding a fence built on your land ! I can only echo the opinions above, if its your land then you are entitled to remove the fence (or anything else )whenever you want and you do not need to inform anyone what and when you intend to do it .

Thankfully no CIL in fenland , but definitely something not to forget if your in an area that does impose it.

You have 6 months for the date of issue of the Certificate to claim your VAT back . There are still a few items I want to buy before I claim, gravel extra paving and any thing else that I might want at a 20% discount.

Our certificate was emailed over today , feels like another milestone on the build, despite the fact this will be our second Xmas in the house officially we have(now) completed .

Have a large one and enjoy it . Fair play for posting this issue on the forum, it will serve as a reminder for those who follow as to the seriousness of CIL and how much of a financial benefit it is to us self builders ( if we reminder to fill out the forms 😀)

It can be done and has been done, many time before ,the real question is why has this not been used for mass house building? You would think that one of the big developers must have looked into this but decided that it's not financially viable?

Hi @Indy reading some of the replies above and based on my own experience i would agree with the fact that your architect has given you a build spec without any real consideration as to how difficult the wall and roof detail will be to build in the real world. The floor is a odd thickness, i was told a block is 225mm tall and the 1st row will sit on the B+B floor with a layer of DPM on top so you will need to lay DPM across the floor and up the walls 225mm, so you have 225mm to play with i opted for 175mm insulation and 50mm flow screed, your only adds up to 185 so not sure how that is going to work out on site for you . The walls with PIR are going to be a nightmare to install correctly personally I wouldn't even entertain the idea, I would even consider if you don't want to increase the size of the cavity going for full fill batts and accepting 0.017 u value done properly rather than 0.015 with PIR done half arsed. Totally agree with @Iceverge regarding the roof . IMHO putting PIR in between rafters should be the choice of last resort, fluffy stuff between the rafters and PIR above or below or combination of both . But most importantly whatever you choose to do make sure that it will be achievable on site in the real world, you would be far better of have a house built to basic building regs but done properly than having a higher spec but a difficult design and ends up being build poorly.

Hi @Firsttimer reading similar posts to this over the last few years on here is does appear that the price of electrics is very dependent on where you are in the country and how much your house will be worth when finished as to how much a self builder will be expected to pay . Ours for 365m2 was 7k supply and fit, I did put the invoice up on another post on here somewhere.

Definitely use the concrete at the front of the property, you will be amazed how quickly it will turn into a mud pit once you get started, you will need a lot of materials to be delivered and will need an area for lorry's to access the site without the risk of getting stuck . As you have plenty I would create a roadway for them back down with a large hard standing area to unload onto close ot the house .

Welcome to the insane world of utility connections, you may end up paying over 6k in road closure fees for water , electric and sewers .

Have sent you a PM , I was given his number from the building fraternity hope he can help you.

I do have another number ,he only wanted a copy of the plans and the number we wanted to get to ,he was £250 , I don't think it mattered to him where you are as I get the impression that an actual visit was highly unlikely if you know what I mean .

A 1 Airtesting, don't think he will travel up to you for that though.

Mine was zero rated for VAT ,£180

Hi @Dan1983 we used these https://www.pavingsuperstore.co.uk/strata-paving-porcelain-grey-sandstone-paving-slabs .

Hi @Nytram a lot will depend on where you are building as this has a major impact costs , going into the ground will be your biggest unknown, if you were building in fenland i could give you numbers of groundworks companies who based on my 3 year old quotes would be less than 50k for the above. Although we didn't have any demolition to worry about we did have to build a 6m culvert to access the plot and remove 3 20m-30m tall trees before we could start on the 300m2 foundation which was also block and beam, total cost including both set of drainage and a lot of stone around the plot was 52k

Yes it is reasonable to expect a fall on your patio and your paths too, the only thing up for discussion would be where to have the fall if not obvious but as you have a french drain I'd have thought that was a big enough clue and shouldn't need pointing out .

Hi @LaCuranderaI built in East Anglia during the nuts period and found then as it is very much today a buyer beware market, i had various estimates from trades who clearly didn't want the work but would be happy to do it at an inflated price , not sure how you are doing your build, one main contractor or individual trades with some diy for the simple stuff but if going trade by trade no harm getting new estimates for each part of the build and if you wish you can always post them on here and will always receive feedback as to whether or not it represents fair value for the job.