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littlespark

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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.


IMG_6554.jpeg

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.

IMG_6555.jpeg

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.

IMG_6556.jpeg

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.

IMG_6558.jpeg

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.


IMG_6557.jpeg

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?
 
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.
 
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?
 
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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
scaffold board against the kerb? might just be ramped enough to get up with her little car.

im going back tomorrow for aanother look. going to look in attic, under floors etc where i can..... check the cutout etc.... See how easy it would be to move.
Plans are to shift the kitchen to the back.... to make it lighter... so the head, timeclock, CU all need to move out the cupboard if its coming out... .. possibly just along the back of the fireplace area.

Of course i'll ask the DNO/MO to move it for me..... 😇

If all goes well, we'll put in a cheeky offer this week.
 
scaffold board against the kerb? might just be ramped enough to get up with her little car.
Without a dropped kerb, the pavement is effectively a ransom strip - you can't legally cross it with a vehicle.
A dropped kerb also gives you a 'no parking' zone for others across the front of it. Without the dropped kerb, your vehicle can legally be blocked in.
 
The drive isn’t going to be a problem….. there’s other houses on the road done it, and I know a few of them as customers.

First job would be to sort the heating out. I might leave it as 2 systems, so if there’s a powercut, can still use the stove for heat.
Getting rid of the storage heaters and will replace with rointe or whatever.

Solar water heating is a good idea.
 
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.


View attachment 119360

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.

View attachment 119361

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.

View attachment 119362

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.

View attachment 119363

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.


View attachment 119364

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?

Looks absolutely lovely!

With regards to PV been looking into that myself the only reason for MCS certification (for own solar install) is if you want to sell to the grid (the energy supplier will require it as part of SEG Smart Export Guarantee)

The only areas to consider with doing your own Solar Install would be if the place is mortgaged, the affect on the home insurance and if selling in future with the solar included the impact of not having an MCS certificate.
 
Looks absolutely lovely!

With regards to PV been looking into that myself the only reason for MCS certification (for own solar install) is if you want to sell to the grid (the energy supplier will require it as part of SEG Smart Export Guarantee)

The only areas to consider with doing your own Solar Install would be if the place is mortgaged, the affect on the home insurance and if selling in future with the solar included the impact of not having an MCS certificate.
Fair points there.

I could still get battery storage that charges overnight on off peak… leave the PV side of it just now.

There will only be her living there just now, but we suggested she could get a friend to rent the spare bedroom.
Her boyfriend is at uni, so unlikely he will move in… in fact, I think he’s heading to Norway for a year on some student exchange programme.


In other news…. My youngest has had an unconditional offer for Napier uni in Edinburgh…. So we really will have an empty nest come the latter half of the year.
 

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