Home of the brave

If you are brave enough to take on a home that needs renovating, the rewards can be rock solid. You will be able to buy a property that you may not otherwise afford in an area you would not be able to live in, and you will get to create a home that suits your tastes.

To do this will be easier if you have cash. “Banks don’t seem to have an appetite for that type of thing,” says Gavan Russell of Locations estate agents. The surveyor’s valuation report on a seriously dilapidated property will certainly not make pretty reading, and many estate agents will ask if you are a cash buyer before even showing you the property.

One possibility, says Russell, is to buy a home while it is affordable and sit on it while you build up the funds to do it up. Or some will do essential work so they can move in and hold off doing an extension or attic conversion until a few years down the line.

Yet banks are willing to discuss the option of lending on such properties, says Aine McCleary, Bank of Ireland’s head of mortgages. She has seen a rise in the number of people buying doer-uppers: “Typically first-time buyers would have focused on new-build properties,” she says. “But, in recent years, given the reduction in the availability of new-build properties, first-time buyers often buy second-hand houses or apartments. In some instances, FTBs are buying houses that require work or even significant renovation. We are happy to guide first-time buyers on all aspects of the mortgage process, no matter what kind of property they choose.”

Bank of Ireland launched a home renovation fund of €75 million in support of the Government home renovation tax incentive scheme.

However not all buyers have an appetite for doer-uppers. In Russell’s experience, “it’s usually people in the trades,” or, “you find that someone has a brother in trade or a relative who is a surveyor who is able to advise them .”

While some buyers do consider taking on renovation jobs, they often “shy away in the end when it comes to the crunch,” says Russell, and those that do go ahead will usually “bring in someone they trust to make the call on how much it will cost and how long it will take”.

The complexity of the work has implications for what professionals you need to take on board. If you are fixing up a place, by redoing the electrics and possibly plumbing and putting in new kitchens and bathrooms, you will probably be able to get away without an architect.

But the laws surrounding "self-building" have tightened in Ireland. For instance, with new builds and extensions over 40sq m, you need to submit a commencement notice with the local authority; your builder must have a certificate of compliance with building regulations; and you need to show how you will meet building regs (through drawings and so on) and appoint an assigned certifier (a registered architect, engineer or surveyor ) to inspect and certify the build (for more see environ.ie).

Also, in projects with more than one contractor or lasting longer than 30 days, you will need to appoint a health-and-safety supervisor. The Government has talked of introducing a register of builders by 2015, and the Construction Industry Federation of Ireland has established a Construction Industry Register in line with its remit to “separate competent construction companies, sole traders and builders from those who have given the industry a bad name”. Word of mouth is also a very good way of finding a builder.

When you and the builder have discussed the work that needs doing, get an itemised quote for the work; this way you can add and subtract things from the list before or during the build as needs change, and understand all the implications. While all of this helps you to stick to the budget, it is advisable to have about 10 per cent of the value of the work in a contingency fund for unforeseen events during the build.The builder will be able to give you an idea of how long the work will take; this is greatly dependent on a schedule involving which of the “trades” work on site and when. For instance, the builders may go in first and take down walls or put up partitions, then the electricians will do the first fix, putting in sockets and so on, then the plumbers may come in. During this time the builders will be off-site, but orders for, say, windows will have been put in so that these can be delivered when the trades have left and the builders go back on site, and so on. Any delay by anybody, or in deliveries, will therefore hold up the process.

You will help the work run smoothly if you plan ahead, for instance, choosing where the sockets will go, buying flooring, the bathroom and kitchen and so on.

When deciding on what renovation work to do, “a key message is that spending on home improvements should be proportionate to the size, style and location of a property to optimise the chances of recouping the investment when it comes to selling,” says Gemma Shah of estate agent Savills. Bling items, such as swimming pools, will rarely add value in standard houses, she has found.

When doing up a home, look at it as a whole and make sure the colours, patterns and styles flow from room to room, otherwise you’ll end up with a disjointed look. But don’t have a very strong theme as it can date the whole home.

While natural materials may cost more, they improve with age – think patchy leather, worn stone steps, and wood polished and grooved by years of human touch. Man-made materials, on the other hand, can look tatty after a while – think chipped veneers and scratched plastic.

New kitchens and bathrooms are good investments. “In this market, the improvements that are likely to add most value are either to redecorate or to add a new kitchen or bathroom,” says Alex Horne of Savills, who estimates they will increase the value of a four-bedroom home by between five and 12 per cent, depending on location.