After our big project of having the conservatory built we have now started planning on moving upwards into the loft. We’ve been thinking about it for quite a while and even cheekily went to see one of our neighbours who had had a loft conversion to see how they had ended up with their new space.
When we spoke to them we found out that it cost quite a lot of money, way above what I thought. For some reason I had in my head that it was only going to be about 20 or 30k but there was a big big difference. Building is so expensive now, it seems to be a bit over the top. Still I am determined to try to go ahead and see if we can get it within our budget.
I don’t know about you but I tend to rush into things a bit too fast and sometimes that doesn’t always receive the best outcome. Even though it’s a bit difficult for me to say that, my other half is far better at doing all the planning and really looking into things properly. I like to think that I have a good general overview but I must say, Pinterest is normally my best friend when I have any sort of ideas. I can go on that ‘pin’ button and hundreds of ideas come forward immediately, it’s absolutely brilliant and helps me to visualise some of the tiny seeds of ideas that I have flitting around my head trying to take form.
I left the sourcing and phoning around of people to my other half which he did and before I knew it we had three different builders lined up to come round to give us quotes. They were so different, the first one was a big company type where they have the architects, make the plans and deal with any sort of building regulations and planning applications. They would do the build all for one price and promise if anything goes wrong then they will plan in for any eventuality so you don’t have to worry about a thing. Of course, for this sort of peace of mind and hands off approach you pay a really big price! Eek! This price came out of £55,000+ way ahead anything that we would even think to be able to afford.
The second person who came along was a builder who barely even looked at the loft space and just said well when you’ve got the plans get back to me I can make a price from there. That was really disappointing, that they didn’t seem to have any ideas or give us any guidance at all, he just wanted to work from some plans.
The third one however in my Goldilocks story seem to be just right, they came in and straight away hit it off with my OH, he was personable, not to showy and came up with some really good ideas that we hadn’t t even thought of. The fact that they got on well was great since they would be the two people leading the project suited me down to the ground. I really do want to take a back seat with this and not have to get involved too much with the building side or managing the builders. One of the other little extras that we liked was that he put in a call to one of his clients whom he had completed a loft conversion previously and arranged for us to go round and have a look. To actually see first hand the quality of the craftsmanship was a bonus and my OH took him up on the offer.
As yet we haven’t come to a firm decision and the price even from the 3rd one is way above what we first thought. We are now at the stage that we have to think;
Can we afford it?
What will it mean to us as a family to have this extra space?
Do we need all the added extras or should we scale down the plans?
Lots to think about but my gut feeling is to go ahead and keep working in the direction of getting it done. This one is a slow burner and needs time to develop.
Any tips or ideas would be so welcome, goodness knows there’s so much to come to grips with, we need all the help we can get.
Please get typing and let me know what you think:)