Brand new house built in 12 weeks
Discussion
Gazebo now ready for roofing.
The only labour I did was 4 hrs digging holes.
Construction was 1.5 days 2 people, so 3 days labour, which cost £300
Steel £470
Wood £170
Ready made concrete for posts £50
So to this point of the build, total cost is £990 for the 12x12 gazebo, without the roof coverings.
Its going to be roughly the same again for the roof I suspect, as the tiles are going to be expensive.
The only labour I did was 4 hrs digging holes.
Construction was 1.5 days 2 people, so 3 days labour, which cost £300
Steel £470
Wood £170
Ready made concrete for posts £50
So to this point of the build, total cost is £990 for the 12x12 gazebo, without the roof coverings.
Its going to be roughly the same again for the roof I suspect, as the tiles are going to be expensive.
Started painting, rafters are going to be black too.
Got my roofing quote now. Gulp. I knew the tiles would be expensive but didn't quite factor in all works
400 del carmen prime roof tiles £640
Lead £250
Laths £80
Nails £40
Felt £50
Random consumables £20
Labour £500
I could have saved a little going for ridge tiles on the hips but roofer strongly advised going the lead route instead, due to aesthetics.
So all in, I'm looking at £2.5k.
Was expecting/hoping for £2k all in but when you break everything down, it is what it is and will certainly be a construction that will last many many years, so still good value when you consider the longevity we'll get out of it.
Got my roofing quote now. Gulp. I knew the tiles would be expensive but didn't quite factor in all works
400 del carmen prime roof tiles £640
Lead £250
Laths £80
Nails £40
Felt £50
Random consumables £20
Labour £500
I could have saved a little going for ridge tiles on the hips but roofer strongly advised going the lead route instead, due to aesthetics.
So all in, I'm looking at £2.5k.
Was expecting/hoping for £2k all in but when you break everything down, it is what it is and will certainly be a construction that will last many many years, so still good value when you consider the longevity we'll get out of it.
CharlesdeGaulle said:
I agree that the lead will look better. It seems decent VFM overall for something that you're likely to use a lot.
Yes. Despite going over budget, it makes sense. I've been here before with trying to save here and there. Eg tiling my bathroom half way up the wall, instead of all the way.Now I wish I had of tiled it all the way up. Do it once, and do it right as the old saying goes.
So the roof is now on. Almost finished now, just a bit of painting left and some edging trim where the roof tiles finish. And the roofer is returning to put a 2nd coat of lead finishing on the hips.
He was supposed to do the roof tomorrow but I got a call Mon evening to say he was starting early. So I had to rush out and get paint for the wood and get it painted. I knew it would be much easier to paint with no roof on so got started about 7pm Tue night and finished the painting in the dark. Just an outside wall light to help me see.
It was a pain in the arse to paint, twisting all shapes to get into all the joist angles. So well worth rushing into it and getting it done before the roof went on as it would have been twice as awkward to paint.
So within a couple of days, quite a change
From this
To this
Shame about the bad pics but I'll get some daylight ones up once I've cleaned up and washed the patio area. Pretty messy right now.
I've been steered a fair bit by both the joiner and the roofer. Joiner suggested the exposed rafters which I'm pleased about now, as it gives a little bit of a design feature to what is basically a square frame with roof on top.
And the roofer steered me towards the lead lined hips which again, gives it a better overall look.
Another poor pic due to darkness but a close up:
I'll get some better pics in daylight but overall, I'm quite pleased with how its turning out.
He was supposed to do the roof tomorrow but I got a call Mon evening to say he was starting early. So I had to rush out and get paint for the wood and get it painted. I knew it would be much easier to paint with no roof on so got started about 7pm Tue night and finished the painting in the dark. Just an outside wall light to help me see.
It was a pain in the arse to paint, twisting all shapes to get into all the joist angles. So well worth rushing into it and getting it done before the roof went on as it would have been twice as awkward to paint.
So within a couple of days, quite a change
From this
To this
Shame about the bad pics but I'll get some daylight ones up once I've cleaned up and washed the patio area. Pretty messy right now.
I've been steered a fair bit by both the joiner and the roofer. Joiner suggested the exposed rafters which I'm pleased about now, as it gives a little bit of a design feature to what is basically a square frame with roof on top.
And the roofer steered me towards the lead lined hips which again, gives it a better overall look.
Another poor pic due to darkness but a close up:
I'll get some better pics in daylight but overall, I'm quite pleased with how its turning out.
We will be reaching the 10 year anniversary of the house being built this summer, so a good time to reflect on how its went
So whats went wrong? Glad to say, nothing major.
Had a leak in a shower which was due to the silicone deteriorating
Had a leak in the hot press, which was a replacement connection between 2 copper pipes
Had a few cracks in the walls with the house settling
The outdoor central heating boiler stopped working twice, and had to get a new pump fitted
A few cracks in tiles where there has been movement in the floor
A leaky toilet (eugh)
A chandelier light in the hall stopped working and its far too high up for me to even attempt to see what’s wrong. I really need to get a spark out and hopefully, salvage what is a very nice and fairly expensive light fixture
The lock on the electric box on the exterior wall broke (the little triangle key thing was made of plastic and has deteriorated over time) I reckon the meter readers have been using pliers instead of the key to open it as it needed a bit of a jiggle to get it open with the regular electric key and the pliers have ruined it. I had to use pliers myself in the end and I made it even worse as the plastic just broke off.
So while there are a few items on here, got to be happy overall that they are fairly minor.
Virgin media came into town and can now get up to 1000MB speed. Had that for the last 18 months but dropped down to 350mb on the contact renewal, that’s plenty.
We changed furniture quite a number of times, especially in our separate lounge and we still haven’t really settled on that room but we’re doing some bigger jobs this year in terms of the overall look of the house. Will see what pics I have on my phone. I didn’t post the finished gazebo construction since my last post, so I’ll dig out something on that. I’ve had many people commenting on the gazebo since its been built. Had joiners in last week doing work on a new floor for our lounge and they were asking about it and thought it was a great construction. I even had people who seen it from the road park up to come take a closer look and I happened to be outside at the time when one guy came over and asked if I didn’t mind answering a few questions about it! To be honest, when you look online for an outdoor gazebo, you don’t see anything like this and bespoke is really the only option for doing it like this.
In terms of overall interior design choices, I think we’re happy with most things we’ve done. My daughter is growing up now and having a decent sized bedroom really helps. We fitted her a 3m run of wardrobes on one wall and at Christmas, fitted a corner desk for her and she still has plenty of space left over to not make it feel cramped. As shown earlier in the thread, we went grey wood effect floors in all but 2 rooms downstairs and grey kitchen cabinets. They aren’t out of fashion yet, but the missus is talking about replacing the flooring. With the kitchen cabinets being made of wood, the option is there to have them painted a different colour (which is partly why we chose that type of cabinet) but the flooring is another thing entirely. Its about 900sqft of tiled floor and its an enormous job to lift them. I don’t know if it would be better to just floor over the top of them rather than try to lift them but I’m kind of hoping the missus takes the floor off the radar for a bit as I’m happy enough as it is for now.
When we had joiners in to do the floor, I asked them about coming back to do some panelling in the entrance hall and they mentioned that with 9ft ceilings, you have more design options that would be appropriate and they gave us some suggestions. So that’s something we’ll do this year in the hall. We also need a complete repaint of the skirting and walls. Bar one room, which is pink, the walls are all white and the missus wants to keep everything white. I would like to add some colour but she gets to make the final decision so I’ll trust her judgement on that.
The shutters still look good in our opinion and are a fairly timeless look and we’re happy with those so while not exactly cheap window coverings, I think they were money well spent.
Overall, it’s been a great house to spend the last 10 years. The layout just works extremely well for us. The window seating idea that the missus came up with has been great. My daughter will have friends and they’ll all sit side by side at the table, building lego or whatever and for birthdays/celebrations, you can cram quite a few people around the table to blow out candles, drink tea, eat cake etc. I like the look of the window seating but functionally, its excellent for informal dining. We typically sit there when having our dinner, rather than in the dining room. That room doesn’t get used very often, mostly Christmas time and now and again, rather than all the time. The sunroom/window seating set up is where we generally find ourselves, as its in the same area as the kitchen so much more simpler and accessible.
Its with a hint of sadness that I think I will lose my projector and surround sound set up in the separate lounge. We’ve just got a new floor in there and we’re getting new furniture. The double windows at the front look out to the front of the house and into the fields and trees beyond and for the last 10 years, I’ve had my cabinet with large TV on top, speakers and subwoofer either side, completely blocking the view out the window. I can see why she wants to do it and it’s a nice feature of that room that I’ve blocked out for 10 years.
Will dig out some pictures later and post them up here so that the thread catches up from when I last posted back in 2020!
So whats went wrong? Glad to say, nothing major.
Had a leak in a shower which was due to the silicone deteriorating
Had a leak in the hot press, which was a replacement connection between 2 copper pipes
Had a few cracks in the walls with the house settling
The outdoor central heating boiler stopped working twice, and had to get a new pump fitted
A few cracks in tiles where there has been movement in the floor
A leaky toilet (eugh)
A chandelier light in the hall stopped working and its far too high up for me to even attempt to see what’s wrong. I really need to get a spark out and hopefully, salvage what is a very nice and fairly expensive light fixture
The lock on the electric box on the exterior wall broke (the little triangle key thing was made of plastic and has deteriorated over time) I reckon the meter readers have been using pliers instead of the key to open it as it needed a bit of a jiggle to get it open with the regular electric key and the pliers have ruined it. I had to use pliers myself in the end and I made it even worse as the plastic just broke off.
So while there are a few items on here, got to be happy overall that they are fairly minor.
Virgin media came into town and can now get up to 1000MB speed. Had that for the last 18 months but dropped down to 350mb on the contact renewal, that’s plenty.
We changed furniture quite a number of times, especially in our separate lounge and we still haven’t really settled on that room but we’re doing some bigger jobs this year in terms of the overall look of the house. Will see what pics I have on my phone. I didn’t post the finished gazebo construction since my last post, so I’ll dig out something on that. I’ve had many people commenting on the gazebo since its been built. Had joiners in last week doing work on a new floor for our lounge and they were asking about it and thought it was a great construction. I even had people who seen it from the road park up to come take a closer look and I happened to be outside at the time when one guy came over and asked if I didn’t mind answering a few questions about it! To be honest, when you look online for an outdoor gazebo, you don’t see anything like this and bespoke is really the only option for doing it like this.
In terms of overall interior design choices, I think we’re happy with most things we’ve done. My daughter is growing up now and having a decent sized bedroom really helps. We fitted her a 3m run of wardrobes on one wall and at Christmas, fitted a corner desk for her and she still has plenty of space left over to not make it feel cramped. As shown earlier in the thread, we went grey wood effect floors in all but 2 rooms downstairs and grey kitchen cabinets. They aren’t out of fashion yet, but the missus is talking about replacing the flooring. With the kitchen cabinets being made of wood, the option is there to have them painted a different colour (which is partly why we chose that type of cabinet) but the flooring is another thing entirely. Its about 900sqft of tiled floor and its an enormous job to lift them. I don’t know if it would be better to just floor over the top of them rather than try to lift them but I’m kind of hoping the missus takes the floor off the radar for a bit as I’m happy enough as it is for now.
When we had joiners in to do the floor, I asked them about coming back to do some panelling in the entrance hall and they mentioned that with 9ft ceilings, you have more design options that would be appropriate and they gave us some suggestions. So that’s something we’ll do this year in the hall. We also need a complete repaint of the skirting and walls. Bar one room, which is pink, the walls are all white and the missus wants to keep everything white. I would like to add some colour but she gets to make the final decision so I’ll trust her judgement on that.
The shutters still look good in our opinion and are a fairly timeless look and we’re happy with those so while not exactly cheap window coverings, I think they were money well spent.
Overall, it’s been a great house to spend the last 10 years. The layout just works extremely well for us. The window seating idea that the missus came up with has been great. My daughter will have friends and they’ll all sit side by side at the table, building lego or whatever and for birthdays/celebrations, you can cram quite a few people around the table to blow out candles, drink tea, eat cake etc. I like the look of the window seating but functionally, its excellent for informal dining. We typically sit there when having our dinner, rather than in the dining room. That room doesn’t get used very often, mostly Christmas time and now and again, rather than all the time. The sunroom/window seating set up is where we generally find ourselves, as its in the same area as the kitchen so much more simpler and accessible.
Its with a hint of sadness that I think I will lose my projector and surround sound set up in the separate lounge. We’ve just got a new floor in there and we’re getting new furniture. The double windows at the front look out to the front of the house and into the fields and trees beyond and for the last 10 years, I’ve had my cabinet with large TV on top, speakers and subwoofer either side, completely blocking the view out the window. I can see why she wants to do it and it’s a nice feature of that room that I’ve blocked out for 10 years.
Will dig out some pictures later and post them up here so that the thread catches up from when I last posted back in 2020!
To finish where I left off, the gazebo finished. This is it today, middle of winter so not getting used. Although there is a gas fire pit to call upon if anyone calls and wants a cigar and a little dram
Christmas decorations up
And in use. It's a nice little outdoor space to light the fire pit and have a drink.
Speaking of Christmas decorations, I really can't help myself. Not to everyone's taste and no idea what the neighbours think but sure, it's only for a few weeks....
Did some changes out the back, painting the flag stones. Will post those later if I can find the pics.
Christmas decorations up
And in use. It's a nice little outdoor space to light the fire pit and have a drink.
Speaking of Christmas decorations, I really can't help myself. Not to everyone's taste and no idea what the neighbours think but sure, it's only for a few weeks....
Did some changes out the back, painting the flag stones. Will post those later if I can find the pics.
One of the other things I did back in 2021 was painting our patio out the back.
We were working to a budget at the time, and we channeled our funds to getting the interior right for the most part.
Our side patio out the sunroom has block paving which has held up fantastically well over the last 10 years. The paving flags however, not so much. Just cement pavers with a colouring on the top, rather than all the way through. Very cheap though, and did a job.
With labour costs the way they are, it's an expensive job to get new paving so I decided to paint, as an experiment. Seen plenty of people do it online, but nobody follows up.
So after 2 years, I can confirm that for a good look, it needs repainted every year. The paint can flake and crack and lift and then it doesn't look good.
I don't mind too much though as it's an easy job. 1 large tub of exterior paint is enough for the area pictured plus a couple of side paths.
You might notice the colour deterioration from earlier in the thread, the paving had lost its colour.
And then finished
Tried a stencil. That thing there took me 4 hours. I planned to do a border but would have been a 2 day job so cancelled that project. Too much like hard work
Funny that the stencil has held up perfectly over 2 years with no flaking.
Everything was 2 coats but of course, adding the stencil was a 3rd coat. Not sure if I did 3 coats all around would have stopped it flaking.
I can't actually show the flaking as it's snowing outside but overall, it's actually easier painting it than cleaning it. So no regrets in that respect.
Maybe just need to choose a better colour this year but with an extra wide roller and a wide painting bucket, it's a 2 or 3 hour job once a year.
We'll eventually put in a more long term solution for that patio but it was an interesting experiment to try out.
We were working to a budget at the time, and we channeled our funds to getting the interior right for the most part.
Our side patio out the sunroom has block paving which has held up fantastically well over the last 10 years. The paving flags however, not so much. Just cement pavers with a colouring on the top, rather than all the way through. Very cheap though, and did a job.
With labour costs the way they are, it's an expensive job to get new paving so I decided to paint, as an experiment. Seen plenty of people do it online, but nobody follows up.
So after 2 years, I can confirm that for a good look, it needs repainted every year. The paint can flake and crack and lift and then it doesn't look good.
I don't mind too much though as it's an easy job. 1 large tub of exterior paint is enough for the area pictured plus a couple of side paths.
You might notice the colour deterioration from earlier in the thread, the paving had lost its colour.
And then finished
Tried a stencil. That thing there took me 4 hours. I planned to do a border but would have been a 2 day job so cancelled that project. Too much like hard work
Funny that the stencil has held up perfectly over 2 years with no flaking.
Everything was 2 coats but of course, adding the stencil was a 3rd coat. Not sure if I did 3 coats all around would have stopped it flaking.
I can't actually show the flaking as it's snowing outside but overall, it's actually easier painting it than cleaning it. So no regrets in that respect.
Maybe just need to choose a better colour this year but with an extra wide roller and a wide painting bucket, it's a 2 or 3 hour job once a year.
We'll eventually put in a more long term solution for that patio but it was an interesting experiment to try out.
Edited by soupdragon1 on Thursday 18th January 19:37
gangzoom said:
soupdragon1 said:
Not bad for 1 days construction - most of the house frame in place already 
Great thread, 1 day to get the frame in place.......in contrast I think our build took about 100 days to get all the steels erected. 10 months in and we are only just getting the tiles on.Unlike you we are having plenty of time to decide on finish and fixings
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