The Wharf - Georgian Grade 2 Listed complete renovation

A Grade 2 Listed Georgian Property, in a conservation area, in very poor condition and an overgrown garden, needing complete refurbishment.

Our first big project and not really with a plan to flip when we moved in. We intended to live in the house and gradually refurbish over a few years. Nice and steady pace, doing it room by room.

Well, it didn't quite work that way, nothing survives the first contact in a battle they say.....Our '1st contact' was on day 3 at the start of winter, with a new baby only 3 months old. We knew that central heating boiler would need replacing fairly quickly and knew that electrics were out of date and would need attention before doing a replacement of the kitchen and the decoration of rooms.

The Plumber came round to give us a quote for a new, more efficient boiler. He looked at it for 30 seconds, then turned it off, then condemned it and told us we couldn't;t use it! He also then said that if you are changing bathrooms anyway in the near future then you really need to do the pipework now, and the radiators, as they are old, inefficient and could be really dirty , which may then ruin the new boiler. Great !

So all the floors will need to come up, we need to plan the new bathrooms and they probably will need to chop into some of the walls. He then said we would be mad not to do the electrics at the same time, as they are also way out of date.

So we called our friendly sparky who also said 'just get it out of the way and do one big job where you sort out the fundamentals, get all the ideas you have had planned it, like outside lighting, better internal light controls, more power for induction hobs etc. and you will need more sockets everywhere.

So our 'Nice & steady' became, go on holiday for 3 weeks and return to a house that then had central heating and new electric circuits BUT ... now we had holes and channels in all the walls in every room, with the new wiring. No carpets on the floors, only one working bathroom and we had a bill for £25k Ouch

This then meant we had to sort out every room with plastering, decor, carpets or wooden flooring, new fixtures and buy two new bathrooms.

Oh, did I mention that the plasterers and decorators then said, you should really before we start 'Get all your wooden sash windows sorted first'. Some might need taking out to repair, some need replacing as they are not right for the period and some need replacing'. You need to these before you start to replaster and decorate...

We then went to the local pub where we had started to be accepted as a local. We knew this because they had a good laugh with us and told us that they were going to tell us before we bought it, that we had to liaise with the planning department, heritage department and building control before making any changes to the property. Which we sort of knew, but didn't know that they all fall out with each other and give contradictory instructions to the owners!!

So we learnt how to deal with all of these people, got approval to remove over 30 trees that completely ruined the rear garden, new fencing, sorted the windows, doors and lots of other things over the next year or so. Including converting a triple garage to a new fantastic kitchen diner and new driveway.