saveasteading

I don't agree with that. we need legislation and control of it. Yes there are also specialists who write themselves in to planning control. The archaeologist or naturalist who says that it may be a sensitive site and that they themselves should be paid to research further. (I'm not mentioning these at random, and it bothered me a lot at the time) But a good planning agent or designer can cut through some of that. Also these costs come off the land not from the builder. An acre of farm land in SE England is worth £10,000. Get planning permission and that becomes 800k to £1M or even much more. £50k may go to the community. Someone's garden worth £30k to the house value sells for £200k with permission for a house. I'd be interested to hear the equivalents around the country. These windfalls are where the money goes. Another discussion might be on why the big sites sell for so much money when years before they were worth next to nothing... is there a value below which they will not stoop? and is there a value above which the developers wont increase. None of them.

I had a summer job scraping manure out of the internal joints in an old rural stone building. Guessing it had been there 100 or more years. It was very effective material. Ahh not that kind of muck?. But everything we use is made of treated ground or dead trees. Even the modern materials are oil based, so dead algae remains and packed out with some sand. It's all we've got!

@JKaines It looks to be well considered. Unfortunately I can't see a commercial value other than the philanthropic one of letting the world have it free. If a business was to copy it then so be it.. I'd be interested to look at it critically (any suggestions would be foc of course) if you care to send the files, and maybe build my own garden building to test it. I especially like the idea of zero waste. what lengths are the timbers?

That was 50 years ago. I still have mine but it is a museum piece. No, you just need a water level. £15 at screwfix. I haven't looked elsewhere.

add to that their own preferences, prejudices, and making it interesting for themselves more than for you.

Get them to sketch it or describe it enough for you to draw up. To scale ad with dims. I'm afraid for you if you don't have drawings. It can work but there's a lot of risk.

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.

Your plumber may be limited in choices if they use a single merchant, as many do. Best discuss with plumber ASAP. Try talking to Trade Underfloor Supplies or similar. They supply the whole kit and I'm sure many plumbers get it done this way. But check you get the grant benefit.

This was 10 years ago. Just something called garage floor paint and a diy product as well as from paint merchants. Just had a look. Leyland seem to do one. You may be stuck with grey. It was just paint so it dried and couldn't possibly be tacky afterwards.

Unless it will be used for other purposes with nasty spills and lots of movement, I would just paint it. One coat of single part garage floor paint. A commercial garage has dozens of movements. Yours presumably won't. Even commercially I once suggested to a client that they ignore the spec of hi-tech flooring and just paint it. This was a commercial vehicle service bay so getting lots of movement. They saved many tens of £k. Once a year they overpaint the slightly worn area of the repeated wheel routes.

The only self build I would recommend as financially advantageous to amateurs is renovation. Something tired but functional. Then don't remodel it but just bring it up to date with lots of diy. Conversion may be more advantageous with the VAT benefit, but not if there are major works to structure.

The stupider they are, the less they realise you have knowledge or deserve respect. So if they are not paying attention or respecting sensible questions... beware. I don't wear a badge saying " I know this stuff" and it helps me test them out. Of course I don't know everything eg electrics. Advice to a first time self builder? You do have to ask these questions but not all day. You do have to get tough. You do have to handle the master programme. Be there doing secondary work, even tidying, and it goes better. Praise when due.

You are right that the bco hardly visits. They used to tell me that was largely down to trust, but now it is just minimising cost. There were always things where I wondered why they weren't asking anything. I worry about other people's projects. My photo file is very boring indeed (to most people). "How many pictures of a hole in the ground do you need?"

At first I thought, great idea. But they could end up being a shanty town as planning would be " interesting". I've seen this though. Was it on Simon Reeves series on Scandinavia? The value of the plot could be interesting, as it would be fully serviced and the developer could calculate this any which way. You've got me thinking though.

That's just good design isn't it? As opposed to some projects where a planning drawing is just handed over to a builder. Or an Architect's drawing with "detail by SE/ specialist / builder." Some of us have always done this, learning practicalities along the way. I can't recall any bco looking on site at anything that wasn't readily visible. I suppose they saw that there were detailed drawings and accepted them. So I guess being asked for PH certification for an already well designed building would be an expensive extra. No client ever asked, and we researched and decided not to go that direction. But I can see that, with funds available, it is a way of ensuring quality if you are starting from scratch and don't have a trusted team or procurement process.