Hi,
On the roof of the extension yesterday to see if anything could be done with the old polycarbonate skylights which have clouded over and found water squeezing out from between the layers of roofing felt, flashing coming away where the roof meets the house, and that in combination with the fact that the doors and windows need replaced made me think it might be time to bite the bullet on the big refurb!
I believe the extension was built around 1989/90, its about 36sqm in an L-shape and the windows/patio doors and skylights probably all date from then. My thinking is to convert to a warm roof, possibly removing the sloping slate front (see pic below) so that insulation can extend to the front wall - the slate is nice, and obviously intended to match the main building roof, but it prevents the roof being fully insulate, obscures the 2nd floor windows etc. Extension DG and doors are all beginning to fail, and the metal frames are very cold in winter and the render is boss, so probably makes sense to do all this at once. This then leads in to thinking about whether to consider external insulation, before re-rendering, my wife starts to talk about replacing the floor tiles and I wonder whether to insulate the floor beforehand and thus it all snowballs!
If I could pack in the job for a few months I'd love to tackle this myself, but that's just not on the cards, so I need to think about getting people in. I've never commissioned a job as big as this before and not sure what ballpark cost I am getting into, and also whether this is a job for a building company, or if I should get an architect involved, or if I should just work with individual trades?
As we don't want to change the layout/floor area, and I have a fair idea of what I want done and at least some of the options, I am wondering if architect is overkill?
Is there a saving to be made by working with individual trades v a multi-trade company/builder?
Not done anything like this before so welcome any thoughts.
On the roof of the extension yesterday to see if anything could be done with the old polycarbonate skylights which have clouded over and found water squeezing out from between the layers of roofing felt, flashing coming away where the roof meets the house, and that in combination with the fact that the doors and windows need replaced made me think it might be time to bite the bullet on the big refurb!
I believe the extension was built around 1989/90, its about 36sqm in an L-shape and the windows/patio doors and skylights probably all date from then. My thinking is to convert to a warm roof, possibly removing the sloping slate front (see pic below) so that insulation can extend to the front wall - the slate is nice, and obviously intended to match the main building roof, but it prevents the roof being fully insulate, obscures the 2nd floor windows etc. Extension DG and doors are all beginning to fail, and the metal frames are very cold in winter and the render is boss, so probably makes sense to do all this at once. This then leads in to thinking about whether to consider external insulation, before re-rendering, my wife starts to talk about replacing the floor tiles and I wonder whether to insulate the floor beforehand and thus it all snowballs!
If I could pack in the job for a few months I'd love to tackle this myself, but that's just not on the cards, so I need to think about getting people in. I've never commissioned a job as big as this before and not sure what ballpark cost I am getting into, and also whether this is a job for a building company, or if I should get an architect involved, or if I should just work with individual trades?
As we don't want to change the layout/floor area, and I have a fair idea of what I want done and at least some of the options, I am wondering if architect is overkill?
Is there a saving to be made by working with individual trades v a multi-trade company/builder?
Not done anything like this before so welcome any thoughts.