Home renovation costs

[hiagain]

I viewed a house, that needs renovation work. It's a fairly classic 4 bed semi built in the 60s. It definitely needs a new kitchen and some of the internal walls knocked. There's a messy utility/downstairs loo area that needs to be knocked into another room and also a couple of the reception rooms knocked together. The boiler is currently in the kitchen and needs to be moved at the very least. Not sure if it's needs to be replumbed or rewired, but it may do. Upstairs it needs a new bathroom and fitted wardrobes knocked down.

I'm thinking:

€5,000 rewiring
€5,000 new heating
€15,000 new kitchen
€4,000 new bathroom
€4,000 downstairs loo
€20,000 building work
= €53,000
The estate agent said he thought about €60,000 including decoration

Would this be far off?

 

[joanne82]

Hi hiagain,

It really depends on the finish that you are looking for. If you want a very good finish then I think that €60k would be an extremely tight budget. Do you need new furniture? Painting? Curtains/Blinds? €7000 wouldn't go very far if you do. Get some quotes from electricians, plumbers, etc before you commit to the sale and It's always worth having a contingency put aside.

Best of luck.

 

[hiagain]

Thanks Joanne. I guess I don't imagine a very luxurious finish, because I long for a mix and match, homely, do a bit of tiling ourselves, kids handprints in the tiles type of finish. We won't do anything other than the finish ourselves though, so I will need to get some quotes alright. Will an engineer's report give any info on costings?

 

[censuspro]

€53,000 seems like a massive amount of money for what you want. I'm in the middle of renovating my house which is the same type of house as yours; 4 bed semi, 1950's approx 1600 sq ft. My work is all cosmetic and I appreciate that you are getting a bit of structural work done, but €53,000 these days goes a very very long way in the building.

I see you've budgeted for approx €15000 for a new kitchen, which to me seems a lot, but depends on your taste.

 

[Construct]

Hiagain,

I think you should give some consideration to heating in the long term. In that regard are you going to look at insulation and making the building airtight. We all know that energy prices will go up. Payback in afew years is possible.