Grotty house advise

[Martynt74]

That side extension seems really....odd.

Is it. Makes it look like it's only around 2m wide and seems an odd thing to have done.

Glad you're keeping a downstairs toilet. They're a godsend!

 

[Semple]

Yeah looks like a nice very large house, but that layout is very strange, and lots of wasted space too, i mean look at all that landing room!!

I really wouldn't bother wasting time sugar-soaping the walls, if it's that old the plaster is likely in bad state anyway. I would start with a room and rip it back to brickwork, buy yourself a load of drywall in bulk and do the walls and ceilings of a room, you'll spend far less time ripping it all out and putting up new drywall than you will trying to scrub nicotine stains from the walls/ceilings. Also if you're planning on moving/removing some of the walls, that's a good time to start.

You've mentioned not having a particularly large budget to make a start on the works - which isn't very wise when taking on a project like this, but needs must i guess. Bottom line is you'll only be able to do a room at a time... I would pick one of the smaller bedrooms that you can at least throw a lick of paint over the walls and set up your wardrobes and a bed for sleeping. Put plastic sheeting on the outside of the door as ripping the house apart will generate tons of dust. This at least allows you to work on your master bedroom without having to faff about with constantly moving your belongings around.

Whilst you're yet to move into it, i would plan out what works you intend to do with each room, price up what you need - costs of materials, costs of labour if you can't DIY bits, and then sort out the rooms in priority. The last thing you'll want to be doing is attempting small parts of each room as you'll be forever working on the house.

I would leave carpeting the rooms until the very end if possible, as carpets love to soak up dust, and you'll be fed up of seeing the sight of dust after a few months.

 

[Funky-Melon]

That side extension seems really....odd.

Is it. Makes it look like it's only around 2m wide and seems an odd thing to have done.

Glad you're keeping a downstairs toilet. They're a godsend!

Yeah it is a bit odd, it's got two front doors as well The one you see on the porch and another at the front of the extension, quick drawing on my phone on what we're planning to do to the downstairs, though will be further down the line and we're not 100% decided.

Yeah looks like a nice very large house, but that layout is very strange, and lots of wasted space too, i mean look at all that landing room!!

What would you change landing wise? We've not really planned too much for the upstairs except maybe moving the door to the master bedroom and putting an ensuite where the first double wardrobe is later down the line. The loft room (not in floor plan) I think has been bordered out, plastered and carpeted etc rather than fully converted but there is a decent space up there too, I can't see anyway we can get a staircase to it though.

You've mentioned not having a particularly large budget to make a start on the works - which isn't very wise when taking on a project like this, but needs must i guess.

Yeah, we're first time buyers and it was either this or a small 2 or 3 bed box house for the same money. We've got enough to make a start but we won't be knocking down walls anytime soon. Structurally it's sound, it's just pretty grotty. I'll get some pictures up of the inside when we're in next week.

We're both on good salaries and there are no kids involved (yet) so we plan on just doing bits as and when we can

 

[IvanDobskey]

Good luck, looks like it has some potential

 

[PurplePhoenix]

If long term rip it all out and start again, If you are going to sell in a few years just wash the walls.

If you are in the area I think you are in, Knock down the wall to open up into the side extension, Loads in the area have done it and makes the house feel much bigger.

 

[Semple]

What would you change landing wise? We've not really planned too much for the upstairs except maybe moving the door to the master bedroom and putting an ensuite where the first double wardrobe is later down the line.

If it's viable (depending on where your load-bearing walls are), as the master bedroom is huge, and you don't need that much room for an en-suite, i'd look at moving the bedroom wall over that contains the door, and then squaring off bedroom 3.

 

[eviled]

that porch re-do looks a huge waste of money when you look at the work ahead of you.

speaking from experience, methodically plan the structural work and any heating/electric work or additions you will do and do all of that first

 

[Funky-Melon]

that porch re-do looks a huge waste of money when you look at the work ahead of you.

Agree and its not high on the priority list by any means. The current front facing porch sticks into the drive which makes parking a second car harder, so moving it to the side would give us more drive space.

 

[Quartz]

Why do you want a shower downstairs? Just have a loo there. And put it at the fore, not by the kitchen: make the storage area to the rear, possibly with direct access from the kitchen.

And you have a dining room so you don't need a breakfast area in the kitchen.

I like @Semple's idea of squaring off bedroom 3.

Edit: could you expand bedrooms 2 & 3 to over the side extension? And you might also consider knocking the back two bedrooms together so you have a joint study one end of the house and your master bedroom the other.

 

[Funky-Melon]

Well we're in and it's grottier than we recalled, in fact it's disgusting. One of the removal guys knew one of the sons of the guy who owned the house. He smoked 40 a day till he died (33 years he owned this house) - The walls in this house are an advert to stop smoking.

Things to sort that we weren't aware of and our homebuyer survey missed.

- Tile missing on roof of porch, looking on streetview this was missing in 2012 and still is today, puddle in porch as a result and entire front door, side door supports and floor/roof of porch are rotted
- Master bedroom window won't close, completely seized, looking on maps, it's another thing he's not bothered to fix for many years
- Both gas an electric meters are PAYG
- Several windows just push open when shut and locked, few of them blown

Sorted so far:
- Temp fix on the porch, got some felt and wood and screwed it down to sides of porch. It's water tight for now but only temporary
- Quotes for new front door - £1600 fitted
- Quotes for windows
- Swapped meters for 'normal' ones.
- Scrubbed most the kitchen with sugar soap, gradually priming it with BIN sealing primer
- Cleared out loads of left over ****, despite us saying we wanted it empty to our solicitor, the 3 sons didn't bother with much.

To do:

Everything else

 

[glenimp617]

Take lots of photos so you can appreciate all your hard work. You'll soon forget how bad it was over time.

 

[Abyss]

Well we're in and it's grottier than we recalled, in fact it's disgusting. One of the removal guys knew one of the sons of the guy who owned the house. He smoked 40 a day till he died (33 years he owned this house) - The walls in this house are an advert to stop smoking.

Things to sort that we weren't aware of and our homebuyer survey missed.

- Tile missing on roof of porch, looking on streetview this was missing in 2012 and still is today, puddle in porch as a result and entire front door, side door supports and floor/roof of porch are rotted
- Master bedroom window won't close, completely seized, looking on maps, it's another thing he's not bothered to fix for many years
- Both gas an electric meters are PAYG
- Several windows just push open when shut and locked, few of them blown

Sorted so far:
- Temp fix on the porch, got some felt and wood and screwed it down to sides of porch. It's water tight for now but only temporary
- Quotes for new front door - £1600 fitted
- Quotes for windows
- Swapped meters for 'normal' ones.
- Scrubbed most the kitchen with sugar soap, gradually priming it with BIN sealing primer
- Cleared out loads of left over ****, despite us saying we wanted it empty to our solicitor, the 3 sons didn't bother with much.

To do:

Everything else

Congratulations! You'll look back at all the hard work you've put in and be proud of how you've transformed your new home.

Given the time of year I'd prioritise getting the property watertight above anything else, including windows and properly sorting the porch out. In the meantime you can be sugarsoaping and painting everything. I'd personally wait on doing any alterations to the property until you're properly in and settled. We had quite a few plans for our house but have changed our minds since moving in and living in it.

I know an estate agent friend who flipped a property similar to this. Brought for 90k a few years back, he only actually officially owned it for something like 3 weeks. They picked up the keys and arranged for a contractor to completely rip out everything in the building. Plastered where it was required but nothing massively extensive. I think he said he spent a total of around 3k on it and then sold it for £130k. If you can see past the initial grottiness of places like this and they are structurally sound then can be a real goldmine.

I can't see how it's possible to spend £3k in total flipping a house.

- He'll have lost at least £4k-£5k in stamp duty, surveys and buying costs
- I can't see a professional contractor doing a full strip out, make good, plaster where required and redecorate for £3k. I'd expect at least double that once you factor in skips, labour, plasterer etc. The £3k might have been his skip quote
- It will then have cost him to sell the property in legal fees
- There's also potential estate agent fees of circa £1.3k to £2k , although guessing he didn't have to pay that

At a wild guess I'd expect to lose circa £15k flipping a £90k house that needs gutting, making good, decorating then selling.

 

[Funky-Melon]

Congratulations! You'll look back at all the hard work you've put in and be proud of how you've transformed your new home.

Given the time of year I'd prioritise getting the property watertight above anything else, including windows and properly sorting the porch out. In the meantime you can be sugarsoaping and painting everything. I'd personally wait on doing any alterations to the property until you're properly in and settled. We had quite a few plans for our house but have changed our minds since moving in and living in it.

Thanks.

Yeah getting it water tight is the priority, along with sorting the master bedroom (windows and carpet). We just need one room done to start so we can begin to start to unpack properly.

Noticed this morning after a shower that water is dripping down the dining room wall - Bathroom is above, so another fun surprise to look at - The first of many I'm sure!

 

[rhysduck]

You're a bit mad OP moving into this house before you've renovated Good luck in your adventure!

 

[godinman]

Might be cheaper to just take up smoking mate.

 

[Liquid_Entity]

Might be cheaper to just take up smoking mate.

Clearly was the nicotine holding the house up.

The best of luck to you and look forward to one day seeing the end results

 

[eviled]

I moved into a similar situation - leaky roof, broken windows, no usable bathroom (had to shower at the gym!)

You will be fairly motivated living there, I did bathroom first - complete redo to a reasonable standard, and then just decorated the bedroom and living room - just to a liveable standard. Re-glazed just the front of the house and then did a kitchen extension and redo.

You want to get the big destructive things first
- heating - making sure all you pipe work is ok, rads in the correct places, boiler where you want it, runs for future bathrooms done
- electrics - does it need a complete rewire? sockets in correct places ect.


Last thing you want is to finish a room to have to chase a wall for cables or rip the floor up for pipework

 

[Duke]

Can't wait to see the before and in progress pics

 

[Funky-Melon]

Some pictures of the place for those interested and a few 'progress' shots.....

​

Spoiler: Warning: Picture heavy

Left side partly sugar soaped and primed - This was a tester to see how well it would work, seems good so far.





Top of all cabinets clean, left side shows how gross they were, right is how they come up.



Left side of ceiling done



Primed one of the cabinets after cleaning, think we're gonna end up priming everything - Right side has been sugar soaped twice, still looks crap!





This is the weird 'shower room' that's in the kitchen...



Next year we plan on ripping that shower room out, relocate the boiler, install an RSJ as one of the walls is load bearing and do something similar to this, with an island in the middle.



Oh and one of the 'jail' rotting door, just for laughs....

That will be replaced with a composite door and side panels in the next few weeks.

 

[Rroff]

We have those style ceilings as in pictures 2 and 3 in a couple of rooms in the house we've just moved into - I hate it can't wait until redecoration is done.

One thing I do find is the first couple of weeks you tend to see every flaw magnified in a house but with time it starts to normalise a bit.