My 1st House Extension

We purchased our house almost exactly 1 year ago (3rd May 2019). It is a 4 bed detached property that had not been touched for maybe 40 years. It was always going to be a big project but one that will hopefully give us a house we can enjoy for years to come.

After a lot of head scratching and playing around with ideas we had the plans drawn up and submitted to the council for approval. We received planning permission for a small front single story extension and larger rear extension the day before the country went into lockdown.

On top of the extensions, the house needs a full refurb inside and out (not just cosmetics). I have done a few refurbs before and am confident in my ability but as you will see from other threads I lack in experience and know how in areas so need help (lots of). I am not a builder but work closely within the industry and love all things to do with construction. I believe most things can be done yourself but that they will take far longer and you may not get them right the 1st time.

Given the current situation we will probably start the rear extension later in the year as it will involve more trades and interaction (plus it gives us more time to sort ourselves out). As the front extension and internal alterations are far simpler and within what i consider to be my own ability (even though it may be a 1st for me) i would like to do as much of it as possible myself. This is not a cost saving exercise but a labour of love. I will get tradesmen in as/when required.

The aim is for a high level finish maintaining the older look of the property externally coupled with a modern high spec finish internally.

I will document the progress and costs etc on this thread if there is any interest.

I have found this site very helpful and welcome any comments and constructive criticism (preferably no abuse).

Thanks in advance for any help given along the way and to those that have helped so far.

I spoke to our BC inspector and she confirmed that they could add a few extra visits in to allow the 2 extensions to be carried out separately. With this confirmed we served the Section 6 Notices and used the bank holiday weekend to start the prep work.

The existing porch had to be removed before we can dig the footings so this was job #1. The bank holiday allowed me to complete this (just) with a bit of friendly motivation from people walking down the street. Everything was removed and cleared away just before i ran out of time. The timber beams and posts were the trickiest which i only just got finished before i ran out of daylight. This will now allow me to mark out the footings and get them dug.

I am now fully committed!

I marked out the footings and had a bit of concern over the location of existing services in close proximity to one of the footings. I spent the next few days preparing myself for some hard work digging them out but then found a local machine and driver at a very reasonable rate so saved my back and got him in to make light work of it (with me on the wheelbarrow).

He had to sit for a while whilst i went and got a breaker as the porch slab was to thick for the excavator to lift. Once that was broken out the rest was a very simple exercise. I got a trench dug at the same time for the new water main.

I managed to sell the old porch door and windows a few days prior so the net cost of the dig ended up being £80 which was a big win plus i didnt have to take the porch to the skip.

It now looks a right mess but i have the BCO out tomorrow to hopefully sign off the dig so that i can call in the concrete.

Good work chap...

Things have been busy at work so i have not had a huge amount of time to work on the house but i have finally got to my 1st milestone of pouring the footings so i will give a quick update.



After the footings were dug the drive was left out of use so i needed to get the water feed in and the trench filled so that we could park the car.

I managed to get the new water supply laid, connected and back filed in 1 day. I have connected it temporarily to the house until it is re plumbed as service routes internally are likely to change.



After a bit of a panic about footings close to services i introduced a small pad so that i can lintel over the existing services maintaining access and the required spacial requirements. I contacted British Gas to see if they wanted to replace the old steel pipe but apparently they have internally lined it when they replaced the main in the road a few months back.


I panicked the night before the concrete pour as it was the 1st time i have done something like this but i shouldn't have. The pour went great. I used a local volumetric concrete firm and they were great. I will be using them again. £412 for 3.6m3. They were able to reverse onto the drive and pour directly into the footings. The wagon was on site for about 30 minutes, with me then working the concrete for the next hour. Everything is now ready for the blockwork. I plan to order the materials this weekend for delivery next week.

We also made a decision on the style of new front door so that has also been ordered from a local joiner and due for delivery in 4 weeks time.

Thanks to everyone that has helped in separate threads, without your input i would find it hard to enjoy and do this.

don't forget to keep us up to date on this thread. keep seeing snippets of the project in your other threads

Blockwork is now up. I decided not to attempt this myself for a number of reasons. I have a few internal smaller walls that i will do myself but i thought this would be a bit too much for me. It took a 1+1 4 days to complete which included a few hours or removing and replacing the garage door lintel as i didnt like the original. It was too high and looked out of place down the road.

I have also hit my 1st budget milestone. I had hoped it would have taken longer to spend it but i have had some large fees to pay and have purchased quite a few tools to enable me to do the work rather than employ people so its actually not that bad.

A few other bits that are going on that i will update as they progress
- Front door is being fabricated this week.
- I am currently installing some lintels above the existing front door to open up that wall
- Materials were delivered for the roof structure so i hope to start on that next week

Needless to say i am well chuffed with the progress.

2 months have gone since my last update and i have a few bits completed that have caused me a few hours of head scratching.

First of all was installing the lintel above the existing front door which will allow the wall to be removed and form a larger hallway. This was by far the most nervous i have been about any task so far. I knew how to do it from research but was so nervous about undertaking it hence a number of posts on here before starting. I had 2 concrete lintels ready to go. Propped the wall and removed the brickwork where the lintels were to sit only to then realise the wall was holding a trimmer for the upstairs hallway!! Idiot - Schoolboy error. This meant the wall remained propped whilst I frantically arranged for to C beams to be delivered so that the inner beam could have the stringer cut into it. Inner lintel went in followed by the outer 2 days latter. They were left in place for a week before the props were removed. This was done just after my last update so they seem to be all good.

Next up was a task I was looking forward to - Cutting in the roof over the extension. I am confident in woodwork and thought this would be a doable challenge. Before i could start with this i needed to install a wall plate. At this moment i realised that the levels of blocks didn't work so had to remove 1 course to both skins and then rebuild the inner skin in engineering bricks for the wall plate to sit on.


Wall plate on and I set about cutting the common rafters. I used a website to give me all the cut dimensions and cut them all in one go. This was enjoyable rewarding and relatively straight forward.

They were all cut in the back garden with each one being dry fit before cutting the next. All common and hip rafters cut in 1 afternoon and installed the following day. I was well happy with the results and for the 1st time it started to look like a house again.

After a lot of can I cant I, the valley rafter messed with my head and I ended up leaving it for the roofer to install once the scaffold was erected.

After a few days of bad weather it was clear that the mess the digger had left the drive in meant that I was pulling mud down the road on in the car each time it rained. Not wanting to upset the neighbours and whilst there was a spell of good weather I decided to crack on with the base for the driveway thinking this will stop the mess and also give me a nice lay down area for materials and skips going forward.

I got a digger and driver in for the day to peel back the existing paving and reduce everything by approximately 400mm to then build a decent sub base. What I had thought would be 2 muck away loads ended up being 4 with half a load left over! Not happy. Still it gave me a bigger drive and set out the garden.


That afternoon the heavens opened and turned the drive and even more so the extension into a swimming pool. Time to give up for the day and start again tomorrow.

After a week of dry weather I started with the base. Geotextile membrane down followed by some recycled crush (to may fines for me - was not great but ok for the 1st layer. Then I cut out the curve to form the swing round by the front door, installed a kerb line at the pavement end and filled with another layer of Type 1. We found the original gate post footings during the dig. Not wide enough for any modern day car.

. . . .


We now have a temporary driveway that will double up as a lay down area. Garden is set out ready to be landscaped and we can park cars out the front again.

You’ve made some excellent progress! Very enviable. Makes me want to get cracking on with my extension. What was the roof rafter website you used? I’ve had some recycled crushed brick recently. Too much dust and sand amongst it. Amongst other things! I think I got the sweepings up out of the full yard! Keep the updates coming!!!!

Small footing for the front garden wall was dug and poured


AND THEN we got the scaffold up ready for the roofer next week.

For anyone that is interested this is the website i used for the rafters -> LINK

Been following you for a while. Very nice progress and encouraging to watch, with similar projects on the horizon and no budget to pay someone.