Ferdinand

Sorry to hear that. At this point you need to find out where you are (ie evidence as to whether your fear is in reality justified, and to what degree are you howling at the moon on the basis of things you do not really know), and you need to identify potential savings amongst costs which are not sunk (sunk costs are things you cannot affect as they are already committed, though sometimes you can agree eg to a contract variation once and only once you know what you need to do). Sunk costs are spilt milk. Bit you need to work on a detailed level. If you are at second fix stage, then there is a lot you can still do - as finishes and furniture are where we spend a lot of our cash. And there are a lot of things for which you can get less expensive alternatives with a plan to replace in a few years or a decade eg laminate worktop not granite, 1.2k range cooker or £250 5 burner hob, not 5k range cooker etc. There will also be some things you *can* do eg painting the first coats or gardening, sweeping up or humping (metaphorically) bricks. Find them. This thread by @Visti is a fairly thorough 'reducing the budget' exercise, in search of something like iirc a 30% reduction. There are a huge number of good ideas. I think you also need to address this with the other half - you will both need a prop to lean on if you are making serious changes or hard decisions. What did Churchill say? "Action this Day", and then built his own brickwork. Best of luck, Ferdinand

I have recently been developing some theories about sinks, but I will save those Ferdian-slips for another time.

Did you see a big ice cream cone sticking out of the ground at a funny angle? Next time I am up there I will take a piccie of my new car in the Buildhub Services. They do very good coffee. (Bah humbug ... beaten to the draw by @PeterW again)

I might be inclined to paint the plasterboard with something moisture-resistant if I can just because a bit of water spray or dribble can damage it. I would not worry too much about what I used. But this is probably a ferdian-fandango that is not normally done. Though I did used t think that that applied to tiling under cupboards, and it turns out half the BH community agrees.

Excellent thread. I sort of agree with @epsilonGreedy but it is not a dichotomy. A number of the things on the list can be treated as overheads by developers or architectural practices, whilst the self-builder will have to hore another expensive ologist from scratch. eg even in a small architectural practice there will be relative specialists in eg planning policies of council X, layout of parking, and perhaps use of phpp. In this case the skills are available at much smaller cost and risk, an become part of fixed costs rather than options. The self-builder has to select what to use from a list of far mroe than 15, what to self-do (and take the time to become sufficietly competent), what to hire in, and what to ignore. Of course, there are people around who want (and can afford) to go in with all guns blazing and appoint a main contractor and take the hit of not having (or not wanting to) spend time optimising everything. It is all about risk vs cost vs time vs quality, as ever. Ferdinand

@JSHarris, I thought that had a stinking Annual Fee attached ... of the order of £500 ... to be a Registered Competent Person, My BiL did the qualifications at night school with a view to doing electrics, then found just how much he would need to be doing to be worthwhile, and that it would be difficult to justify in the interim while building up a possible business. Eg

Yes. We get condensation all the time on the outside of our 2G fairly new conservatory.

What would I seal that with? Low expansion foam?

Feeling a bit poorer today, as I have had the roofers in this week for several jobs. Anyhoo, he has found a wasps’ nest. In the most awkward place I can imagine. Here is a pic or two. The entry point is under the flashing right at the back of the rhs small gutter of the dormer, where it meets the hipped roof. The distance from head height standing on the neighbour side of the fence is 5.5m. We have no access from the inside without cutting holes in the bathroom. Suggestions welcome.

Solar panels are usually surfaced with a glass type surface, which is reflective. As for trees, a bit of modelling on the appropriate website will give you some indication of which times of year there will be reflection, which could inform your need for deciduous or evergreen trees, or what variety of deciduous. Personally I would be thinking in terms of something like birches or white beam or aspen if you need deciduous, as they are not over large, are relatively unobtrusive, and have leaves which shimmer in the sun and may help dilute the reflection. And I like them. Ferdinand

Welcome. Nice trailer ?.

Could you explain the "fuss"? If there was planning and a pre-existing right to access, what was there to fuss about? The only thing would be the door overswinging the boundary, but a roller door and a blipper would fix that. Ferdinand

I am imagining them lulling themselves to sleep with a dream of counting farmers jumping through bureaucratic hoops.

If he needs an alternative to oil which will also (hopefully) not involve a rapid phase-change, as is not concerned by fire risk, I see that TNT has a higher volumetric heat capacity.

OTOH, the EPC figere is a regulated number from a regulated process, so is harder to question casually. And GIAs may still be comparable wrt you and next door - if for example your Gross Area including walls is less than their GIA that is proof of difference plus a margin of 5-10%.

Welcome. Do tell us more....

It really depends on whether the Bought-in Plan, or a suitable small modification of it, meets your need sufficiently to cover the opportunity cost of not designing your own, and if it actually good, and if it meets your requirements technically (eg heating costs, comfort), and if it *is* actually cheaper as a whole. If it does - good, but you need to do an appropriate amount of due diligence to make sure your decision is correct (unless it is not very important to you). I think the further back the plan goes, the more care needs to be taken ... since lifestyles have changed over say half a century. Ferdinand

I think they can work suprbly @Dreadnaught, but you need to avoid thinking about them like external windows. It is about what yo want to let through ... light, views, colour etc ... and what you want to keep out, and from which spaces and angles. Tints, stained glass, shapes eg whole walls or vertical or horizontal slits at eg eye level or not eye level, are part of your toolkit. Personally is have a special love of etched glass and modern stained glass used as a screen, to give a view through but also a foreground focus. Go for it. Ferdinand

It would be interesting to see a cost comparison vs EDPM.

i was obviously paying careful attention .... to something else .

Interesting. I attached the quadrant round the rooms in the LIttle Brown Bungalow with silicone, so tha5 they cam be removed with a Stanley Knife to lift the click fit floor and subfloor to access service ducts which are under the floor round the sides of room. F

Oops. Clearly slightly mis-estimated at least one person's age. Which way? Ferdy's not telling ! Several ladies taught me not to publish such statements a long time ago, given my age estimating lack-of-skills. ??

On younger self-builders I think that @Visti (Graven Hill) and @Grosey (Cornwall) are both in that bracket. As is @Construction Channel, of course - though building on the family farm. Ferdinand

This podcast and article will be useful background. It is with an architect called Allan Corfield who has structured his charges to give fixed payments per stage based on the work involved dividing up the normal total for a percentage of a given quote. https://www.houseplanninghelp.com/hph168-an-example-of-how-much-it-costs-to-hire-an-architect-with-allan-corfield/ His charges are probably towards te highish end in percentage terms in the example given. IIRC it seems to be based on the top of the normal RIBA recommended range.

I am imag8ning you with one of those Victorian saluting cannons on your river lawn, keeping them all on their toes.