In April 2007, Mrs Sandettie and I exercised our right to buy
and bought our council house. Being a council tenant for donkey's years meant we got a £24k discount and on top of that, the mortgage was less than the rent. Anyway, we got a cash advance for renovation and so on, plus we'd come into some money from elsewhere, so we had a fair bit of cash to spend on making the place nice with the intention of selling up after 5 years.

We drew up a load of plans and ideas and went out and bought stuff. I bought a load of tools and such and resolved to do most of the DIY myself. This was a mistake.

The plan was this:

a: Landscape the back garden, buying a new shed to contain the bikes.
b: With the front shed now empty of bikes and lawnmower, convert it into a utility room.
c: The utility room would mean the kitchen would be less full of washing machine and dryer.
d: Fit nice new kitchen with a dishwasher, a range-cooker and a cooker hood
e: Tile floor and walls, replace door frames and doors.
f: Fit nice new bathroom suite, tile floor and walls, replace door frames and bathroom door
g: Lay lovely wooden floor in living room, decorate, open up the wall and replace door with double doors.


How it progressed:


a: Cleared area for back garden shed, garden stuff delivered and piled up in corner of garden, rest of garden still maybe half finished
b: Kitchen ordered, delivered in June and stacked about the house. Mrs Sandettie removes old cabinets prematurely. Cabinets put in shed.
c: Bathroom suite arrived in June 2007, mate came and fitted it for me, tiled floor.
d: Collected bathroom tiles, I think knackering my car's suspension in the process. Floor tiles laid a week later by my mate again. Rest of tiles stacked up in hallway next to big fridge freezer that we bought.
e: Collected wooden floor, damaging my suspension further. Leave floor in my parents' spare room
f: Range cooker arrives, along with new washing machine and dishwasher. Dishwasher stored in corner of kitchen, serves as temporary worktop. Corner cabinet erected and put in other corner. No worktop. Old oven and washer stuck in front shed. Both of which eventually donated to my mate for his new house. Cooker hood delivered, stored in shed.
g: In August, start boarding out the front shed. The kitchen drawer cabinet is built. No worktop is added.
h: Replace bathroom door in November. Still doesn't have a lock or finished frame. Bath panel still not fitted and the plinth not fitted to the vanity unit.
i: In April 2008, most of the plumbing to the front shed complete (by my brother).
j: November 2008, shed boarded out. Bloke next door fits small consumer unit. Washing machine and tumble dryer (which was formerly in the middle of the hallway so the front door didn't open fully) finally go into the shed. Floor and walls tiled with tiles donated by bloke next door.
k: 21st December 2008, bloke next door adds plumbing so the dishwasher can be connected.
l: April 2009, new sofa ordered. Living room is wallpapered. I begin fitting the wooden floor (after ruining my suspension even more collecting from my parents' house) This takes 2 months in all, 75% of floor is laid.
m: New worktops put in shed. Utility room 98% finished (just needs a bit of sealant). Still not done even though it's a 5 minute job.
n: June 2009, My brother fits most of the floor cabinets in kitchen and adds doors. I spend three days building and erecting wall cabinets with meticulous accuracy. However, kitchen is a sort of rhombus shape so they're a bit wonky.
o: July 2009, my brother cuts the worktops, fits them all, adding sink unit, sink and new taps. Kitchen 75% done
p: Feb 2010, I finish living room floor except for the thin strip near the wall that is half a board wide. Still no skirting boards.
q: Apr 2010, brother takes away splashback to be cut for walls. They've been standing in the hallway for almost three years so are noticably warped and curved under their own weight. Sharing a room with the tumble dryer for months on end hadn't helped. Splashbacks fitted. Can't afford kitchen tiles as we planned to tile the floor from the kitchen, through the hallway into the downstairs toilet. Plus tile the kitchen and toilet walls.

So after 3 years, I'd say maybe 80% of our plans are finished. Then there is the rest of the house where I wanted to replace all the doors, frames and skirting boards, and then decorate all the rooms and have fitted wardrobes in each. My Gantt chart that I devised in MS Project was scrapped very quickly.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Fri 25 Jun 2010, 10:31, 2 replies)

Just a suggestion
but perhaps if you spent as long on the project as you appear to spend cataloging what you're NOT doing on the project, then you might be getting somewhere? :-D
(Reverend Fister "a disciplined fuckwit", Fri 25 Jun 2010, 11:44, closed)

If I kept off this friggin site
I'd get a load more stuff done too.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Fri 25 Jun 2010, 12:08, closed)