[Closed] kitchens and house buying

Are you DIYing the kitchen and bathroom? Or using tradespeople?

Without knowing how expensive your tastes are, I'd stick my finger in the air and say 5k for the bathroom and 8k for the kitchen including appliances.

Basically knock 15k off your offer price.

We're in the same boat. We've bought the house but the kitchen is awful. We've budgeted £4k and the independent guy reckons that will be no problem. Granite or that rock hard plastic surfaces, inbuilt dishwasher and fridge. The range cooker is already there though. 13' by 9' for ours.

I'm not doing it it'd be a ****ing disaster! if we could get the kitchen and bathroom and the rest I could repaint for 15k we'd be fine

We were quoted 7k for the most expensive Cooke and Lewis kitchen minus appliances but including a pretty expensive worktop. Reasonably big kitchen too-my dad was fitting it though.

Cooke and lewis ..... Less said about that the better.

Also without size that is useless.....

As above 15k will put a bathroom and kitchen in BUT you will spend more.

And dont underestimate a repaint..... Currently replastering the hall between coffees - as i have every room in this house

Where are u?.. I could fit kitchen beautifully cheaply..im in lincoln

In reading so it might be a bit far!

My sister did a galley kitchen for £2k from Ikea, a number of years ago. I seem to remember hearing they are good for kitchens.

Bathrooms can start at around £400 all in to, well basically the sky's the limit. It all depends on what you, or your other half, wants it to look like. That's only for the actual stuff (bog, basin, bath & taps) by the way, getting someone to fit it should to be too expensive if you keep everything in the same position it's already in, once you start moving stuff about is when it gets expensive.

As for boiler, I'm sure if you out the make and model up here there'll be a few people on here, me included, tell you if it's good or bad.

we paid half that for new kitchen and bathroom- fitted, in london
shop around get recomendations!- our bathroom guy did a good job but ran waaay over schedule!!, did a lot of the stuff myself; painting , taking down old tiles, ripping out units etc

We had our kitchen done by Homebase about 3 years ago, was around 8-9K, large-ish kitchen with all built in appliances.
My tip for getting a bathroom done cheaper is to get all the fitments, bath, taps, shower, etc from Ebay instead of a bathroom shop. You can honestly get as good quality for a quarter of the price.
Lot of snobbery around these parts about that sort of thing, but just go compare tap prices as an example - B&Q v Ebay. No contest!

Sorry DezB but have to disagree with the eBay route for anything to do with plumbing. I work in a plumbers merchants and I've lost count of the amount of people that have come in with something they have bought off the Internet that they need a fitting for to get it to work. It's inevitably shoddy quality with fittings that would only fit if you had access to a very large hammer.

Simple solution is, don't go to eBay, don't go to Wickes/B&Q/Homebase, go to your local plumbers merchant and get everything there. Not only will it be pretty much the same price you pay at all of the above it'll be much easier for your plumber to out in.

I did about £30k on a renovation - kitchen, carpets, various faffing - 3 bed terrace. This was 11 years ago.

I just get all my Plumbers bits from Screwfix / Toolstation. Occasionally I have to bodge the odd thing e.g. Modern sink but Victorian era out flow pipe, couldn't find the right U bend anywhere so I ended up buying two different fittings (one metric, one imperial), cutting them both in half and welding one half of each back together with pipeweld - worked a treat.

[i] It's inevitably shoddy quality with fittings that would only fit if you had access to a very large hammer.[/i]

I must've been "lucky" then (I think "sensible" is a better word). As the stuff I bought was all from [i]local plumbers merchants[/i] with Ebay accounts. All excellent quality gear.
The only thing we had problems with was the toilet cistern. And that was the only thing I didn't get from Ebay, but let the plumber buy!

"complete refurbishment"

If that's how the house has been described by an estate agent, then it needs more than painting after the kitchen and bathroom are done.

Normally that description is reserved for complete strip outs.
Plumbing
Heating
Wiring
Plastering
Etc.

ikea do very cheap kitchens I reckon about 2 k for your kitchen for everything then fitting

Bathroom deonds does it not.
You can get completes sets [ bath, bog and basin for as little as £300 or as much as you like.
£5 k easy if you dont use much trades folk.
No idea if you do use them

"complete refurbishment"
If that's how the house has been described by an estate agent, then it needs more than painting after the kitchen and bathroom are done.

This is very true.

Ikea do some decent, well priced kitchens. Some people don't like the brand but a couple of K on units and the same on fitting can put some more expensive options to shame. Don't forget the floors and walls by the way. Oh and full rewiring and plastering isn't 'that' costly in the scheme of things but it is very disruptive if you are living there. Always factoring in the costs of being someplace else when thinking about budgets.

'Complete refurbishment' to me sounds like more than a new kitchen and bathroom.

Impossible for anyone on here to say how much your kitchen will cost as you haven't said how big/many units it is.

3 years ago we bought our current house that was described as 'dated'

Every room needed decorating
New curtains etc (yes they are bloody expensive)
New carpets
Full rewire
New Boiler & Rads
New bathrooms x 2
New kitchen

Difficult to put an exact figure on it as we also had a big cellar converted at the same time in to a kitchen/utility and kids play room, but builder aside i reckon about £22k for a 3 bed semi.

If you are even half serious, go and look, take lots of photos, make a big spreadsheet, spends lots of time getting quotes, update your spreadsheet, then add another 1/4 or 1/3 on top, because it will always end up costing you more than you think.

Impossible for anyone on here to say how much your kitchen will cost as you haven't said how big/many units it is.

yes i did.

Oops sorry so you did, it is early 🙂

My house was listed as dated electrics and boiler

Previous owners were heavy smokers

Im probably 6 grand deep so far and not at the kitchen or bathroom yet. No tradesmen involved other than my dad some weekends on big stuff and his guys to sign off

Replaced all rads and Boiler Replaced all wiring. Stripped and rebuild/painted all windows , stripping the tar. Soaked wallpaper , replastering walls and renewing all the white gloss woodwork ( with stained redwood nowt fancy)

This summer its neaten the roof . Replace woodwork on dormer and clean/paint the cast iron gutters and down pipes

HOWDENS JOINERY also really good value for cabinets, and theyre fully assembled,ready to fit,check em out..:)

Btw, my £30k refurbishment didn't include double glazing, rewire, central heating or plastering - that had already been done (part-finished project).

You have to remember that with kitchens and bathrooms getting the preblumbing, electrics, walls and floors sorted (in pretty much that order) first is most important and can swallow up your costs. A cheap kicthen or bathroom suite in a sorted room will be fine. An expensive cabinets and taps can't fix a shonky shell.

OK so kitchen is actually quite nice, no real work needed, electrics need looking at, bathroom needs re doing and so it might be time to put a new boiler in too. Then redecorating and some plastering. The garden needs fencing too... time for some serious thought.

And however much you think it will cost to put right - double it.

Electrician and tame builder visiting with me later this week.