Full House Renovations

• Structural work: Removing or moving walls with steel beams, repairing floors and joists, and dealing with damp and movement. Where foundations need strengthening, this is done by our underpinning contractors.
• Rewiring: A full or partial rewire and a new consumer unit, through our domestic electrical installation service.
• Replumbing and heating: New pipework, including replacing old lead pipes, and a new heating system through our central heating system installation service.
• Kitchen and bathrooms: See our kitchen renovation and bathroom renovation pages.
• Plastering, floors and joinery: New plaster, repaired or new floors, doors, skirting and staircases.
• Energy improvements: Insulation, new windows and efficient heating controls.
• Decorating: Painting, wallpaper and finishing throughout, through our decorating services.

For period homes, see our period property restoration service, which covers repairing original features.

A full house renovation goes best when the problems are found before the work begins. Before we price the job, we look at:

• Structure: Cracks, sagging floors, removed walls and roof condition.
• Damp and timber: Rising or penetrating damp, rot and woodworm.
• Services: The age of the wiring, pipework, boiler and drains, checked where needed with a CCTV drain survey.
• Asbestos: Homes built before 2000 may contain asbestos, so a survey is arranged before disturbing materials that could contain it.
• Approvals: Building regulations for structural and electrical work, and planning or listed building consent where needed.

Everything is written into a schedule of works, room by room. That schedule forms the basis of your quote and programme. We also recommend keeping a contingency in your budget for problems hidden behind walls and under floors.

The work on each room follows the trade sequence of first fix, plaster and second fix. The order of the rooms matters too:

1. 1

   Whole-house systems first: the roof, structural repairs, damp treatment, the new consumer unit and the main heating and water pipework run through every room. They need to be done before any single room is finished.

2. 2

   Kitchen and bathrooms next: these rooms have the most pipework, wiring and waste. Finishing them early gives you working facilities sooner.

3. 3

   Work from the top down: upper floors are finished before lower floors, so dust, debris and tradespeople do not pass through rooms that are already complete.

4. 4

   Bedrooms and living rooms: plastering, flooring and decoration once the messy work nearby is done.

5. 5

   Hallway and stairs last: they are the main route for materials and trades, so they are decorated and carpeted at the very end.

We plan this sequence in your programme, so each trade follows the last without gaps or rework.

Sometimes, but for a full renovation it is often easier to move out. When the whole house is being rewired and replumbed, there will be days without power, water or heating, and dust and noise throughout. Living elsewhere usually makes the work quicker and safer, especially with young children or anyone with health conditions.

If you need to stay, we can phase the work. That means finishing and sealing off parts of the house in stages, keeping one bathroom working and setting up a temporary kitchen. It takes careful planning and usually adds time, and we tell you honestly what to expect.