My kid’s moving out! House buying.

[littlespark]

Just gauging the collective intelligence here on perils and pitfalls of renovating a possible house my middle daughter (19yp) wants to buy with her own money. She pays the bills, daddy does all the donkey work.

The market around here is slow at this time, so there’s not a huge choice of properties in driving distance to both our house, and her place of work.

I’ll show you all what we viewed last Friday… and possible plans.




Property is 50 to 60 year old ex-local authority stock. 3 bedroom. Semi detached with cavity walls. Garden of grass to front, hoping to put in a driveway, and all slabbed to back and side areas.



South facing living room. Solid fuel burner that feeds some wet radiators. No mains gas on this street. Other heating is a few night storage heaters and immersion tank. Not sure if it’s one or two immersions… but must heat overnight and has a boost control.

Ceiling appears to have been newly plastered, but that might just be to cover old cracks or whatever.. there’s no evidence of flooding above.

Strange small room past the left of the fireplace. Not really big enough to do anything with.
Was originally a storage room with solid wall here, and access door to outside.



Kitchen needs redone. There’s no door for a start. A lot of the drawers don’t shut and there’s no wall units. There’s a serving hatch into the living room.



Bathroom is pretty good… but no extractor fan. There’s a separate shower cubicle to the right of the picture, where space has been taken from a bedroom to fit it in.




Hallway. Big wasted space under the stairs there. Space for a WC?
The cupboard at the end holds the consumer unit, which is a dual rcd Hager board for 24hr, and an older fuse board for the storage heaters via a mechanical timeclock.

There’s ample space under the timber floor for running new pipes and whatever. Will want to insulate under there as well, but don’t know if it’s best with spray foam, polystyrene blocks of just rock wool held up between the joists.

Another plan would be to take that end wall of the hall away, moving the CU, cutout etc and putting the kitchen under the stairs, and into that small area. Open plan into the living room.

Current kitchen could be split into a WC and utility room.



In summary. Lots to do, many ideas. Wife doesn’t like all that plain wood.
Is rooftop PV doable? Or does one still need to be MCS registered to get any payback?
Get PV, get battery storage.
Daughter might be eligible for green home grants from Scot.gov


What’s your ideas?

 

[Moley]

That looks good enough to move straight into compared to what my daughter has taken on. They don't have a wall left on both floors. The previous owner took a dividing wall down and the RSJ wasn't supported properly so the upstairs floor is at an odd angle. The floor is going to be jacked back into place and new RSJs fitted. You can see light through bits of the roof. Total rewire needed, new central heating etc.

 

[westward10]

I would recommend she finds a decent electrician.

 

[littlespark]

I would recommend she finds a decent electrician.

Well, thats not very effing funny....

I'll be the electrician, the plumber, the joiner, the tiler, the painter......
or do you think i should get a professional in?


That sounds awful, Moley.... a sagging RSJ... What did the home report say about it?

 

[plugsandsparks]

Looks really nice for a first home at 19. Solid fuel is a nice touch, you could use A/C for upstairs and kitchen/lounge , much better than storage heaters (yuk)
If the gnd floor is coming up and and its wooden joists, you could staple net to the underside of the joists and drop rock wool in, will make a big difference.

 

[buzzlightyear]

I'll be the electrician, the plumber, the joiner, the tiler, the painter......
or do you think i should get a professional in?

Yes, I have done a lot of property development, bathrooms first kitchens.
If room down stairs the extra bog. Double gazing is a must
If no gas, central heating electric.

 

[Simon47]

Property is 50 to 60 year old ex-local authority stock.

Ah, from when they built decent homes. Maybe not very efficient by modern standards, but I'd rather have our 80 year old ex-council house than the modern chap the cobble together.

Solid fuel burner that feeds some wet radiators. No mains gas on this street. Other heating is a few night storage heaters and immersion tank.

My first thought is to fit a thermal store in place of the hot water cylinder - as large as you have room for. Feed the wood burner into it, and run the heating from it. You can still have multiple immersion heaters.
It means you can use the WBS to provide both heating and hot water - and use the immersion heater(s) to top up as required.

There’s ample space under the timber floor for running new pipes and whatever. Will want to insulate under there as well, but don’t know if it’s best with spray foam, polystyrene blocks of just rock wool held up between the joists.

If doing all that, wet UFH is worth considering.

Is rooftop PV doable? Or does one still need to be MCS registered to get any payback?

I think it has to be registered to use an export tariff - but you can use it internally, such as heating the thermal store.

Obviously it all depends on your budget and available time.

 

[Hakuhou]

hoping to put in a driveway

Don’t underestimate how difficult a new dropped kerb can be to put in.
Scotland might be different, but for my local council you need planning permission and the local highways authority to approve the installation. The latter are a nightmare to deal with, thought getting the DNO to attend is difficult, it’s because they’re waiting on the highways authority to show up.
Not to mention having to use one of their approved contractors, which will happily charge you an « approved » price.