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Weather tight house to minimal viable home for two. The cost?


epsilonGreedy

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On a wet Sunday afternoon I have been musing over how many £'s it will take to get from a weather tight shell to a minimal viable home for two people.The reason for this project planning is that Swmbo has decreed a third winter in the static caravan is a winter too many.

 

The definition of a minimal viable home I am budgeting for is:

  • One fully decorated bedroom 4m x 3.8m
  • Plaster boarded living room 5.4m x 5.2m
  • Family bathroom finished to an average standard (the fancy wall hung Geberits will be in the ensuite to be completed later).  
  • Very basic kitchen or we could use the static caravan kitchen for a while as we transition to the house.
  • Electric fittings to habitable rooms.
  • UFH working.
  • HW tank plumbed in.
  • Stairs fitted with balustrade around the landing.

 

What have I overlooked?

 

I will post my budget spreadsheet in the next post and update that based on any feedback.

Edited by epsilonGreedy
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My first stab at a budget. I am punting ball-park figures at this stage. The lefthand numeric column is for materials and the righthand is for professional labour.

 

Any feedback is welcome.

 

Forgot to say this is for a 1500 sq ft L-shaped house. In this budget I have excluded 150 sq ft in the single story rear entrance lobby utility area. 

 

Budget.png

Edited by epsilonGreedy
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Change your target.  NOTHING has to be "finished" to move in.

 

We moved in with:

 

Kitchen diner functioning with cheap temporary worktop and sink (later moved to the utility room)  Floor laid, walls plastered and painted, no finishings, no skirting etc.

 

Rest of downstairs just bare OSB floor and walls.

 

Utility room washing machine and tumble dryer connected  but room just bare OSB

 

Stairs in but temporary hand rails

 

Upstairs bedrooms plastered and painted, no carpets, no skirtings.

 

Bathroom just about finished, en-sute not even started.

 

NO DOORS or even door frames on ANY rooms.  Bathroom and bedrooms had very temporary cardboard doors to give a little privacy.

 

Heating and hot water functioning, but only the kitchen / diner had the UFH pipes laid.

 

We then carried on building it around us.

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2 minutes ago, ProDave said:

Change your target.  NOTHING has to be "finished" to move in.

 

We moved in with:

 

Kitchen diner functioning with cheap temporary worktop and sink (later moved to the utility room)  Floor laid, walls plastered and painted, no finishings, no skirting etc.

 

Rest of downstairs just bare OSB floor and walls.

 

Utility room washing machine and tumble dryer connected  but room just bare OSB

 

Stairs in but temporary hand rails

 

Upstairs bedrooms plastered and painted, no carpets, no skirtings.

 

Bathroom just about finished, en-sute not even started.

 

NO DOORS or even door frames on ANY rooms.  Bathroom and bedrooms had very temporary cardboard doors to give a little privacy.

 

Heating and hot water functioning, but only the kitchen / diner had the UFH pipes laid.

 

We then carried on building it around us.

 

Actually my move-in level of finish is close to your thinking. I have emphasised more plasterboarded walls because living with exposed inner block walls in the first habitable rooms is less appealing than your interim timber frame OSB panels. I will spend a day coating the inner block walls with a cement/sand thin render once the roof is on to help reduce air leakage but left like this represents a dust health hazard I suspect.

 

Temp stairs handrails. Yup a good idea and would help save the final balustrade from knocks during the remainder of the build.

 

I feel it is psychologically important to have one room 100% finished and think this will be the master bedroom with its bamboo floor.

 

After that I will try to finish the large sitting room with the feature brick fireplace and wood burner, because then we can have guests around.

 

I like the idea of recycling temporary kitchen worktops into the utility room. I hope the disposal of the posh static caravan will pay for the longterm kitchen fitout.

 

Following that I will just buy the remaining materials in bulk and bang in the VAT reclaim because I do not want to get into a dispute about multi year occupancy prior to a final VAT reclaim. 

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I keep a running cost of spending, and looking back it looks like about £25,000 from bare shell to when we moved in.

 

Re the VAT, I am getting a little nervous of the time it is taking so this spring intend to get a temporary habitation certificate and do my VAT claim then, buying as much as I can think of first.  I don't think we will have an issue as the council tax valuer is still of the opinion the house is not "ready" so still has not valued it so we are still paying council tax on the caravan.

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You mentioned bamboo flooring in the bedroom, but will you need flooring in the kitchen and lounge?

 

You will need some kind of door frames to hang the doors as well as hinges, handles etc.

 

You can just put in a simple hanging pendant light which can always be replaced by a nicer light later. A pendant light will light a way larger area than downlighters.

 

Consumer units are pretty cheap so get one big enough for the whole house, it might only be an extra £20 or 30, just don't put all the MCBs in it. So you don't have to pay to have it rewired later.

 

Sounds like you plan to put the ducting in but not connect the MVHR. Will you need an extractor for the bathroom?

 

Good luck, it's hard when your other half isn't enjoying it.

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1 hour ago, AliG said:

You mentioned bamboo flooring in the bedroom, but will you need flooring in the kitchen and lounge?

 

 

I need to be careful about pampering Swmbo, if she is too precious for raw screedflow concrete floors what next? Flowers on St. Valentines day!

 

Seriously though we found some delux reconstituted stone tiles at the Bicester self build show that create a French limestone floor effect. The salesman was offended when I referred to them as ceramic tiles. We are both prepared to live for a year with a few rugs on concrete if this gets us to an ideal long term fitout.

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Just now, AnonymousBosch said:

Get it in writing - know what I mean? Or add it to the pre-nup ?

 

 

Her best friend has been renovating a house for 20 years and most years that has involved pulling it apart more than putting it back together again. I will use that other house as a reference should Swmbo complain.

 

She seems happy with current progress. 

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7 minutes ago, epsilonGreedy said:

 

Her best friend has been renovating a house for 20 years and most years that has involved pulling it apart more than putting it back together again. I will use that other house as a reference should Swmbo complain.

 

She seems happy with current progress. 

 

She knows @Onoff then?

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