In need of some advice before we do something that brings utter financial ruin…an Edwardian house for sale near us would make an amazing home as we look to grow our family over the next few years. Trouble is, it needs loads of work.

From the ad pictures alone, it will need new flooring, damp sorting and likely new windows as well as electrics and plumbing checked over. And a comprehensive survey to check for rot etc..

I don’t have any contacts in trades, both my wife and I have busy jobs and are unlikely to have time to do anything significant in terms of project coordination or works ourselves beyond decorating.

We’d need to budget staying elsewhere while the place is made habitable.

My dad is a recently retired chartered surveyor – he’ll probably have a fit when/if I tell him – so having a few ideas on likely costs and people we’ll need to engage would probably help preserve family relations.

So, fair to say we’re out of our depth here and looking for some collective wisdom to help us decide whether it’s a silly pipedream or something that could be doable with some realistic budget setting and time allowances.

Web suggests we should do a visit with a builder or architect for some initial costing, but before we even get to that point, what should be considering and how can I start doing some ball park costing? I have no idea how much a new floor costs for example. Are there any good sources that we can refer to online or should we just get someone local to have a look and see it as a small-ish but necessary upfront cost before going any further.

Thanks for any thoughts!

+1 for finding a local trades person to give you an idea – offer to pay them a decent sum for their time & it will be money well spent. Where is the house?

Sounds like a job for George Clarke or Kevin ,
Kevin if you want kids
😁

That’s not going to happen at a sensible price without you making some substantial effort. A fully managed hands off resto will be serious $$$

The buildhub forum is great. But it’s focused to those that do as opposed to those who do not.

Whatever you think it will cost, double it and you’re probably about right.

No specific advice, but some friends did similar about 20 years ago.

Bought a big Edwardian house out in the countryside near Exeter.

The previous elderly owners had retreated to a couple of rooms downstairs, and it needed windows, roofing, electrics, water, heating…. everything basically!

They got it habitable in a couple of years, but they’re still working on bits of it now!

I know they took in lodgers (how I met them in fact, lived there for a year, and still good friends a decade later) to help pay costs, and wife carried on working, whilst husband went part-time to work on house.

It’s an amazing place, but I’m not sure I’d have the patience and time (and money!) to do a project like it.

How well do you cope with stress? Family friends did it and it was a roller coaster of stress and turmoil. But they love the result.

I don’t have any contacts in trades, both my wife and I have busy jobs and are unlikely to have time to do anything significant in terms of project coordination or works ourselves beyond decorating.

I don’t think that’s a problem, provided you can find a trusted builder who has the contacts. Work I’ve had done has all been through a builder I know – he charges a small fee but because the trades are supplying him not me, their quotes are much lower. They also do a good job because he’ll give them future work while I’m a one-off customer. I watched next door try to project manage their own refurb, and it was chaos, trades in the wrong order, etc.

If you are getting trades in for everything then you’ll need to buy well. It could easily end up costing way more than buying a non-wrecked house, although you would get what you want. I’d want to DIY it. Any chance of a sabbatical?

as we look to grow our family over the next few years.

There’s your problem, the task will always be less of an issue for a young couple, willing to take on loads of late nights and stress.

But if kids are in the picture or likely within the next few years I’d honestly walk away, the last thing you’ll want is for your kids earliest memorys to be Mummy and Daddy bawling at each other in a half built kitchen about plumbing/electrics/plastering…

It will probably get snapped up by a developer anyway, someone with a phone full of trade contacts. It’ll be back on the market, sorted, with a coat of magnolia in 8-10 months…

Don’t!

It took me 5years to completely gut a 2 bedroom Victorian terrace/cottage.

It started because MrsRNP originally wanted a cast iron claw foot bath, that snowballed to all floors and ceilings out and roof off, at one point you could see sky from the kitchen. Did it all ourselves apart from plastering, roof and comissioning the boiler.
Nice when finished, then we sold it!

Edited to add
We don’t have children. My dad regrets renovating our family home when me and brother were small as it took a lot of his time up. We loved the cement trucks, reclaiming bricks, and generally ‘helping’ out!

Ask around friends does anyone know a good general builder firm to come and have a look at the work and give you an idea of costs and what needs/can be done. Lots of money as well.

post a link to house, so we can advise/mock/support/etc

Thanks everyone, lots of useful points there.

To help gauge the scale of what we’re taking about, it’s a 4 bed, semi in south east London. According to the floor plan it’s 1,600sqft internal.

Completely get the budget and cost doubling – I’ve been involved in some money sink capital projects in the NHS so was going to take that approach – but I still need a rough starting point to help decide if it’s a goer. Are we talking 100/150k or more?!

George Clarke & Kevin – they probably have a bit to answer for in even getting us to think this could a possibility.

Stress point – yes, marriage survival is another factor in our thinking…

We’ll check out the build hub forum and also look around for some local websites for suggestions

Overall it depends how much you want to do it. We bought a place about 6-7 years ago that had been uninhabited for 2 years and in decline for a decade. Had loads of potential and in a good area so we went for it without hesitation. Took about 4 years to complete, but we lived in it with 3 young kids, and I made most of the cash to pay for it as we went along.

The whole place was gutted, reconmfigured internally with new everything. Were also able to put a large double story extension on the back.

At different times we had bathrooms and kitchen in the garden. Wife an I slept on a mattress in the kitchen for 8 months.

We got thorough it withough any major problems but it was all consuming. I worked every day for about 3 years (sat/ Sun too) to afford to do it. My wife was around to project manage and quite enjoyed that. We found and relied on one fantastic local tradesman (kitchen/bathroom fitter) who helped ius a lot. Brought his friends in the trade to us who all worked really well (groundworks/ brickies/ roof carpenters/ roofers/ plumbers/ electricians etc) and he also suggested an architect who was great and really reasonable.

Now we have a great house and it worked out well financially too. Probably invested £200K in the process after buying the house, but we did watch every penny and subcontracted everyone ourselves.

You will probably know if you really want and are able to go through with it. Get an architect or alternative to look at it with you if you can. Hard to find the right person first time at short notice though so perhaps ask your dad. Good luck!

Sounds like the sort of thing where you’d want a really experienced chartered surveyor who isn’t in a rush to get to his next paying job to help you work out exactly what needs done, how much it might cost and what the end result might be worth (financially or emotionally!). The perfect guy would probably be someone who wants to protect you rather than a mate who might egg you on, if only you knew someone…

My dad is a recently retired chartered surveyor – he’ll probably have a fit when/if I tell him – so having a few ideas on likely costs and people we’ll need to engage would probably help preserve family relations.

In my experience parents of adult children quite like to *occasionally* still feel needed and useful, and nothing makes them happier than when their fully grown children come to them for wisdom and advice rather than cash! Now the trickier bit might be how you deal with ignoring his advice should you choose to do so – which is why I mentioned the emotional value of the finished thing. He presumably has/had a wife at some point and knows its not really your decision anyway 😉

We restored, ie paid someone to do all the work , a farm house in Ireland, most of our Victorian terrace in London and had a good look at a country house in Somerset 19th century- £900 for a survey iirc(thank god we binned it off) unless I had the time to be very hands on managing it I wouldn’t do another. Also it’ll cost a fortune, expensive issues will be hidden, and you’ll pay a builders and suppliers “gentrification tax” in se London too 🙂
Is it listed?

Gut it completely. And treat it like a new build shell.

It’s the easiest and quickest way.

Also we’ve waited nearly five months for the builder we want to have time to fix some of our previous builders restoration work in south west London, he starts on the 18th. Good builders are busy as anything so you’ll have to factor that in.

I had thought of it as i worked with builders throughout my Uni time and picked up quite a lot of skills I never knew I had, but if I was living there I just could not do it day in day and do my job.

Take whatever number you’re given by a builder and triple it.
Costs will be more than you think and there will be more problems uncovered when work begins.
If possible ci sider knocking it down and rebuilding.
Better house and no VAT.

Love this forum, thanks everyone.

A developer may well nab it, but in the meantime, it’s fun to think about.

Poly gets post of the day. Enjoyed that – thanks! My parents actually did a similar refurb job themselves 30 years ago which had them living out of one room with 3 v small children through a pretty tough winter while the work was done. They still live in that house so they may buy into the romance of it all. And my dad definitely needs a project now, just need to check a few things first for my personal credibility when I bring him in.

Keeping an open mind. Lots of points to consider for go/no go. Off for a walk to have a look at it. If the roof looks duff, then we probably won’t take it further. For now, the dream’s alive. Maybe.

Thanks again

Plenty of resources on how to restore period houses.

Don’t do this

Gut it completely. And treat it like a new build shell.

It’s the easiest and quickest way.

You’ll end up with dpc’s and other crap

The hardest part will be getting the tradesmen, if you can find a builder who knows what he’s doing and won’t rip you off or bodge it then it’s an exciting opportunity. Otherwise expect a nightmare

Slightly different take on this from me, my folks bought a large (8 bedroom) Victoria villa in Crieff when I was 8. They then spent every waking moment and every pound they had renovating it. Took them thirty years to complete it, in fact a house that size and age is never really complete.

During that time I spent little or no time with my parents as they were always too busy renovating the house that they thought would make a great family home. It will, for the family that buy it now both my parents have passed away. As a result of this I had a terrible relationship with my parents. We were ships that passed in the night and I was occasionally an extra pair of hands for heavy lifting work.

My advice is that unless you can afford tradesmen to do the majority of the work so you can spend time as a family together then don’t waste the best years of all of your lives doing something that you won’t enjoy together.

These days I pay tradesmen to do as much as I can, and I love spending time with my kids (and wife).

Getting work done around London is a nightmare, my handyman painter tap fixer type person wants 200 a day, he started way lower but soon cottoned on. I reckon he spends half a day in traffic.

I can see why, last visit in Jan 20 every 20 houses or so had a skip outside and a loft or basement conversion going on. Teddington area.

I guess it’s stamp duty and the absolute difference in price from 2-3-4 bedrooms.

Very roughly. No idea but let’s say it takes 5 months (20 weeks). 1 builder + 1 other skilled trade + 1 labourer per day minimum. Some days more. SW London, guessing again but let’s say £250+£250+£150 =£650 per day. I expect more. 20*5*£650 =£65,000 labor. Plus material + profit for the building company / management costs.

Now I have no idea how realistic the day rates are, or the time span but playing around with simple idea such as this can give you ideas of how cost scale.

My ex and I bought farm outbuildings to convert; 3 young children; lived in a static caravan on site.
Spent evenings and weekends cleaning bricks and doing other preparatory stuff for builder and other contractors.
Would never contemplate the like ever again.
The pressure was a major part in ending my marriage.
Whatever cost estimate you arrive at, treble it.
If you go ahead, assume that anything which could go wrong will go wrong.
My advice would be…don’t.

I have done one 3 bed edwardian semi and two flats myself. My way is to do everything I can myself calling trades in as needed. None of the properties sound as bad as the one you are thinking of

the house took me working 40 hrs a week on it on top of a full time job for 18 months plus a bit of buying in trades plus paying pals to labour for me. That was a full rewire, a full replumb, new kitchen, central heating, damp proof repoint and repaint externally and a full redecorate. I worked myself into a state of total exhaustion. I really have no idea of the costs but it was a long time ago

I sold up after 2 years and more than doubled my money. some of what i did was good and quite honestly some rather bodged but I learnt a lot

The two flats – the one we live in has been an ongoing project. almost complete 30 years on ( but I did nothing to it for the middle 15 years) 🙂 Oddly for a flat its been extended – 2 more rooms into the eaves space. Again its had a partial replumb, new kitchen, new bathroom etc etc. The other flat has had upgrades when its empty. Last 3 years its been basically totally refitted new everything. £15 000 or so in materials and builders costs plus many hundreds of hours of my time. Its a one bed flat.

I would think paying someone to do it would be uneconomic and also that doing extensive works with a family would be difficult. I spent a Christmas without a kitchen washing up in the bath, I had wires hanging everywhere during rewiring etc etc

At a very rough guess i would think £100 000 minimum for what you want plus the costs of alternative accomodation and a time scale of at least 6 months to make it livable.

would I do it again – not now but in the same situation I would. Its made me a lot of capital but I enjoy building work and designing stuff. One thing is the fittings yo use soon add up. basic B&Q kitchen tap £25. Designer tap – £250. Cost soon add up on that sort of thing.

My mates just spent c 100k on a refurb, fully managed I reckon it cost c 30k in mgmt fees, the boss did not work just managed the project. I did a similar renovation and came in about half but did so much running about, buying materials, chasing everyone up.

Problem is for a newby like me is if the plumber does not come on time, you have guys standing around unable go continue. Pretty steep learning curve for me, I would do it again if the economics were good.

Other learning point is when something goes wrong everyone blames everyone else. There was almost a fight at mine between the window supplier and fitter.

Busy jobs, not heard that before.

no experience of building or costs,

budget for living elsewhere

cant supervise organise the builders and other trades

Obviously youve been watching to many channel 4 rebuild programes a or are just a bit scatty brained.

Leave it to people with experience and lots of money and may have jobs in a few years to pay for it all, either via a mortgage or loans.

Walk away now.

Or enjoy the journey. I am doing a house at the moment have done one before. Learnt a lot learning more but I live the work so for me the journey is the enjoyment. I hated it when I finished the last one.

I’m in a similar position to the OP but a little further down the process. Have an opportunity to buy a nice 3 bed detached early Victorian house that need everything renovating. Expected a full strip back, new heating, rewire, some damp issues to sort etc. Has potential to go into loft and extend out back so could be a perfect family home. Just had detailed survey done and initial feedback is concerning, woodworm in ground floor beams and issues with damp apparently means the whole ground floor will need replacing, one of the chimney stacks is leaning and rotating so will need to come down as will a very odd looking and very small mid 20th century 2 story extension. All I can think of now is the film Money pit. Still hanging onto the dream but will reread this thread with my wife for a bit of realism. Lots of work to do just getting a sensible idea of what will that work will cost before we could start even thinking about extending

Roof was the decider for us.
I checked myself as the report, as expected, was vague and covering the surveyors arse.

Roof was good, damp damage in rooms was before the re-roofing.
Ultimately the roof and walls are the only thing kept. Thick end of redecorating I told the wife as she never got a chance to view it before buying.

Fortunately I ride with a carpenter, plumber and stove fitter and have a friend with an electrician partner so knew I wouldn’t be looking for trades or having them take the piss on pricing. Carpenter saved us a fortune on glazing as his friend owns a glazing company and did us a trade deal.

3 bed house as good as finished in 11 months and well within budget as we have frugal tendencies. Fair bit of labouring and strip out ourselves. Rented a flat for first 6 months as had a toddler, but moved into half the house after that.

Still got some finishing stuff to do, odd bit of skirting, trim, caulking etc.

Worked for us, only way we could afford to get a larger place around here and has allowed my wife to give up a rubbish job.

Would do it again, but want to make the most of staying put here for a long while after the effort put in.

I’ve not read all the above but I would certainly recommend visiting with a friendly builder who has good all around knowledge.
Our builder was really great and made lots of helpful suggestions about where to spend money and where to save it as we renovated.

Anyway, we renovated a large Victorian 5 bed townhouse and did everything.
Roof plumbing electrics gardens bathrooms kitchens decor sash windows. The lot.

My wife wasnt working at the time and project managed /dealt with trades/ planned / prepared / looked after kids!

I grafted most weekends and evenings in the autumn/winter, had summer mostly off except outside jobs.
For big jobs like knocking walls down, doing the roof/gas/electrics/kitchen we had trades do most first fix stuff.
I did mainly finishing / interiors. Glad I did as to be honest I do a better job than most trades at the detail stuff any it annoys me if it’s not finished perfectly.

Took 4 years to complete (less than I estimated) and about £100k. If I was doing less/minimal work it would have maybe been £150-200k.

The fabric of the house was all good, no rot/damp etc.

Was terrifying when we took the plunge to buy it, it was a wreck internally. But it was such a bargain, we thought ‘now or never’ and in the end we have a great house and I’m very glad we did it.

Oh yeah and the house is big enough that we could live in it whilst we renovated, just by closing rooms off.
Hallway was the worst – mess everywhere very disruptive.

If yo do it, make sure you do it in the right order!
Roof electric gas first. Then rooms starting at the top of the house. Then hall at the end.

Done a few large properties myself and recently on the latest work i have noticed the cost of trades getting quite expensive, you will need a builder and a labourer for at least six months (6k a month 36k) plasterer and mate for 2 months (12k) plumber and mate 2 months (12k) electrician and mate for a month (6k) bathroom fitter and a tiler for a month (8k) so atlesst 75k on labour x 1.5 so a 100k

Also i have avoided victorian and Edwardian stuff like the plauge… the fit and finish has to be perfect and you have to use very good quality fixtures and fittings, also the expectation of a buyer in the future if you need to sell it will be “Edwardian”

I doubt you will get change out of 250k if you do right and you really need to be onsite.

By the way George and Kevs TV programmes are at best woolly on actual cost.

Totally hands off, in SE London if you got any change from £150k you’d be doing well.
All comes down to spec etc of course. Plus if you’re extending, if the roof is knackered etc

Loads of useful pointers in this thread, hope it helps other people.

Having had a poke about and dropping by the agents yesterday, we’ve decided against going for it.

The works list would include new flooring on ground floor (lots of dry rot), new wiring, plumbing, central heating installation, new windows and some small outbuildings taken down as the garden isn’t directly accessible. We’d do the classic kitchen knock through, but it doesn’t need an extension. The roof looked reasonable.

Totting all that up plus factoring in staying elsewhere for the works got us quite easily to 150k and 6 month duration. Thanks for those who gave ballpark figures that helped with that.

Predictably, despite it going on just the day before the agent said there had been loads of interest and viewings had already happened with people who were organised enough to take a builder round.

Although it’s a lot of work, the location is great, it’s priced well and it will be mega when done.

The main off-putting factor was the logistics of getting everything organised, lead time for securing builders, getting the loan sorted, checking in on the project each day etc. We’re not ready for all that.

We’re definitely open to some degree of renovation for when we do buy, but this one is probably just too much work with time and costs that could easily spiral. We’re both in the nhs and things are pretty full on at the moment so just focusing on that, staying sane and getting our current flat finally sold seems the priority.

If nothing else, this served as a nice distraction from the obvious and we’ve picked up loads of sensible suggestions for future reference. Thanks for the comments, hope this helps others who are considering something similar.

Cheers, Mush

Good call, coincidentally a friend has just pulled out of a purchase after getting builders quotes. Went back to vendor to renegotiate and they were not interested. Strange market i really hope reality normality comes back soon as i am waiting to buy.

Sad thing is above buyer had verbally committing to sell theirs so the chains broken. Stamp duty holiday is partially to blame so hoping no extension post March.

In 2001 we bought a shell – it had been uninhabited for over 50 years (apart from livestock until the local council found out LOL). THe person we bought it from had made a start on it (rewired and new glazing) but they had run out of cash so we took it on. We absolutely blitzed it over the next 12 months – fortunately we could stay at the in-laws so we went to theirs straight from work every night for a bite to eat then worked until midnight most nights. We did almost everything ourselves (apart from fitting a kitchen) but by the end I didn’t want to DIY a thing for years – it totally drained us.

I wouldn’t do it again but I do have to admit it was very satisfying to be able to say ‘we did that’.

Good to hear the update mush. I missed out on the opportunity to buy a 3 storey victorian terraced house next door to what was until last year my wifes house, would have been the ideal situation for stripping and doing it up.