Tiling over mixed floorboard / concrete floor?

Any thoughts on the following?

We're looking at ways to tile the kitchen in our mid-terrace Edwardian house. As is common with these houses, the kitchen has been extended out the back a short way & the original scullery (& presumably the original outside toilet) knocked through which means that the kitchen has ended up with a fairly weird floor: floorboards at the front end and small tiles over the original concrete floor at the back where the scullery was. The tiled part is not flat - the floor level dips towards one of the corners of the room.

So the tiled part is uneven & the floorboards are unsightly, hence we'd like to re-do the floor before we start on the kitchen proper. The builders I've spoken too all seem to want to simply whack plywood down over the lot and then tile on top of that. Is this a sane approach or would it be preferable to poor a new concrete floor to replace the existing floorboarded area, dig out the tiles from the existing concrete & then skim over the lot to make a proper surface to tile on top of? Would the second approach be better in the long run (we're going to be living in this house, not flipping it or renting it out) or am I just thinking up extra work for our builders to bill us for?

(Extracting quotes from builders about this stuff has been an exercise in pulling teeth, so any thoughts much appreciated.)

cheers, Phil

 

I agree with the idea of laying marine ply over the whole area but would want to level the concreted area first. I am not a builder so cannot comment on the best way to level it considering adhesion etc.

 

uphillphil, are you still there?

 

Aye, still around!

 

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