[Anonymous]

Hi

we have recently bought a country house in inland spain to renovate and work is due to start in a couple of months. The question for all you experienced or would-be house renovators is where would you go under budget on a renovation plan in order to leave a bit extra for other areas.

I´m sure that a lot is down to personal taste but since our renovation project is erm, pretty comprehensive I was wondering what we could do to keep costs in line with our occasionally extravagant tastes.

Saludos de aragón

sas

[Anonymous]

Congratulations!
One of the first rules of property renovation is that nothing ever comes in under budget!
However, you can save yourself a great deal of money if you DIY as much as possible, even if it’s only doing the preparatory work, rubbish clearance etc.
Don’t skimp on the important things such as the roof, electrics, heating and insulation.
You can make big savings on tiling by buying “seconds”.
Shop around as much as possible for everything.
If funds are going to be limited you don’t have to do absolutely everything at the outset. For example, you can put in the conduits etc for aircon (if you’re having it) without installing it until later.
Have fun and good luck!

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advice.

Unfortunately we’ve got a 19 month boy which together with work commitments pretty much rules out spending much time on clearance. Still, shopping around seems to be our best bet given the prices of beams and tiling we have been quoted!

If you know of any other sites which might be of use, either in English or Spanish we’d love to hear about them. I’m surprised I haven’t found more since there must be quite a few people involved in something similar out here.

Thanks again

Sas

[Anonymous]

Hi SAS,

We are renovating a property here in Asturias and have a 5 year old and a 2 year old! You get used to spending lots of time “doing things at the house” when the children are asleep or taking it in turns to look after the children for a morning / afternoon whilst your partner works at the house and swapping over the next day!! At the mo, that means I paint in the evenings whilst my husband does his marking/planning etc as hes a teacher and he does things at the weekend…

Get yourself a good, honest builder is the best advice! Don’t ask me how though…We have been very lucky with our builder, he is great but things have taken for ever and we will have been renting here for a year before we can move into our house, another cost you may need to bear in mind depending on what you need doing…in our case everything!

Then ask your builder where the local builders yard is (or look for it int he white pages..) and check out prices, or just look in AKI or Leroy Merlin (or the equivalent where-ever you are…you very quickly get very good at talking about houses in Spanish!!

Bear in mind that builders are used to tiling every wall/floor in the kitchen and bathroom…only having two walls tiled meant we could afford to have an external door put in our kitchen…

Don’t buy the cheapest always; for example I discovered that the cheapest Leroy Merlin paint wasn’t as it needed far more coats than a slightly more expensive one!!

Get as many quotes as you can..we had several for our heating and they ranged by about 3000 euros!! (the cheapest and most expensive where from the same plumber though..not sure what happened there…)

Good luck, it is possible to do stuff yourselves with young children, but you do have to work round them, and have to be able to do things by yourself, and need to make sure you get family time still!

Best wishes

Heather

[Anonymous]

Heh, just realised your in Gijon! Do you want to meet up and compare stories then!!

Heather

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately we moved to alcañiz about 7 months ago! Couldn’t really find what we were looking for in asturias. At the time we wanted to open a small hotel but bureaucracy and Alex (our little boy) conspired against us!
Loved it up there though. Alex is of course 100% asturianín so we will definately be back. Do you mind if we pm’d you if we have any other questions?

Sas

[Anonymous]

Whilst Leroy Merlin, AKI etc are useful for seeing what’s available they are generally way overpriced. You will usually get things a great deal cheaper from your local builders merchants, paint supplier on the poligono etc.

[Anonymous]

Hi SAS,

Yes of course, PM away!! Good luck, shame you had to move though..
Our youngest is going to be very Asturian, seems an expert at saying “esto” at the moment and says some words in asturiano….very strange, doesn’t say them in English though..new thread, bi-lingual children!

Heather

[Author]

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