The Replacement Dwelling
“No obstacle was going to beat me.” Andrew Theasby is reflecting on his self-build odyssey which has presented its fair share of highs…and lows.
But six years after buying a plot of land, 36 year-old Andrew, his partner Becky and children Liam, 5, and Megan, 14, are finally in their dream home.
If he’s feeling exhausted or weary, his pragmatic tone of voice doesn’t convey it. You have to admire his sheer tenacity and vision when it comes to building his family home from scratch.
It all started in 2013 when Andrew purchased land and embarked on an ambitious project to build his property with the help of his dad Peter, a former electrician.
With another baby on the way, finding a bigger home to accommodate their growing family was becoming a matter of urgency. Andrew and his partner Becky searched high and low for a house to suit their needs but it proved impossible.
Andrew says: “I always wanted a big garden for my children just like I had when I was young. But when we were searching for a new home we couldn’t find anything that we had in mind or within our price range.”
But it wasn’t until a dilapidated cottage with a large garden in the village of Cliffe in Selby came on the market that Andrew realised the full potential of building his own home from scratch.
The plot, which lies next to the A63 trunk road from Selby to Hull, was familiar to Andrew who had passed the spot for many years.
He explains: “We initially thought we would renovate the old cottage but we discovered it had bad subsidence, damp and rot - it was beyond economical repair.”
The 0.25 acre triangular site featured the old house “jammed in the corner”, says Andrew, and the rest of the site, formerly used for market gardening, had become overgrown.
“It was difficult to see the full potential until we took measurements and made basic drawings as you just couldn’t even define the edges of the plot. Some of the hedgerows had grown to about four metres wide. It was very dark and dingy. There was only one thing for it – build it ourselves,” recalls Andrew.
He explains: “We knew the former owner who lived in the house and his niece was selling the property on Rightmove. We explained that we wanted to build our own home on the site and begged them to sell the house to us. They liked our story and caved in!
“My dad was retired and happy to get involved with the project. My family inspired me to self-build – we’ve always been a fairly hands-on family when it comes to DIY and home renovations so it just seemed like a natural thing to do. We thought it would only take two years in total.”
The site was purchased by tapping into the equity of their existing home – a bungalow they owned very close to the new plot site. They also had savings in the bank to tackle the project.
Andrew says: “We had to find the capital to purchase the new plot and this was our only option. We stayed at our home during the build, which was convenient due to its close proximity to the site.”
But it wasn’t plain sailing from the start.
Hidden costs
Andrew explains: “It started off pretty badly to be honest. After buying the land without planning permission and reassured that it wouldn’t be a problem as we wanted to knock down an existing dwelling, it soon became apparent that this wasn’t going to be a quick or cheap process.
“Weeks went by liaising with the architect to produce countless drawings as he wanted to add his own variation onto everything after we'd discussed it. We finally agreed on a drawing set and submitted them for planning. Our plans to build a garage took ages as we had to adjust planning permission and designs were changed too.
“The amount of red tape we then had to jump through was unbelievable. We were spending hundreds and thousands of pounds on ticking boxes and consulting specialists. It wiped out every bit of savings we'd had ready for starting the build and left me working overtime to cover the costs as we had no mortgage in place at this stage.
He adds: “The various surveys and reports the council needed were relentless and costly - these are the hidden costs we didn’t plan for.”
The couple ended up spending between £500-£1,000 on each survey, some of which included topography, environmental impact, an acoustics survey, a bat survey and a drainage assessment.
The unsettling start to their self-build project did not deter Andrew as he continued to push ahead.
Andrew selected traditional brick and block – otherwise known as modern masonry construction – to build his home. He submitted his plans to create a four-bedroom family home with a garage to the right of the new dwelling.
The house was erected from brick and block spanning 10.3m x 8.5m and took five weeks to complete the shell after Andrew hired bricklayers.
Money for old bricks
Brickwork, fireplaces, doors, old joists, flooring and a staircase were salvaged from the previous cottage – earning the couple more than £5,000 – a significant sum to get ahead with their mortgage stage payments.
Andrew explains: “The money raised paid for the foundations. Nothing was reused in our house although most of it stayed local. I placed a sign up so passing traffic could stop off.
“Nothing was put in a skip! The old joists and floorboards were treated for woodworm and used to build a log store for a friend. The staircase went into a local barn and we sold the doors and fireplaces to a nearby house undergoing refurbishment.
The enormity of the task ahead didn’t cloud Andrew’s vision. He knew, with the help of his dad, that they could overcome the red tape. They completed it all - fitting plasterboards, underfloor heating to the wiring, plumbing and even designing and installing a mechanical ventilation system with heat recovery to ensure optimal air renewal.
Clean air
Andrew advises other self-builders to think about the best system needed to achieve a high rating on Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs). These are needed whenever a property is built. An EPC shows information about a property’s energy use and typical energy costs and recommendations about how to reduce energy use and save money.
An EPC gives a property an energy efficiency rating from A (most efficient) to G (least efficient) and is valid for 10 years.
Andrew explains: “I’m very pleased with my rating, I just missed out on an A rating, but it is a requirement to perform an air permeability test. We scored 2.81 on the first try, which was quite a good result for a brick and block built house with dot and dab plasterboard. There are other methods of construction that can achieve better. The lower it is, the more energy efficient your house is, and my advice would be to seal everything you can as you go along. I bought expanding foam and silicone by the box load and got through gallons of the stuff, but I think it’s worth it in the long run. The house is a comfortable constant temperature - nice and fresh with filtered ventilation and heat recovery.”
Around the clock
Andrew worked around the clock, while holding down his job as a shift mechanical operator for Saint-Gobain Glass in Eggborough.
Andrew says: “I had no choice. I couldn’t stay still. There were certain aspects of the project which I needed help with. A friend of a friend did the skimming on the plasterboard which took around 20 days."
"A joiner helped with some jobs too. I would have preferred to employ more tradesmen to speed up the project but I didn’t have enough money for labour bills. Looking back, I wouldn’t change a thing as I’m very proud of what me and my dad have achieved.”
The house, located next to a busy main road and a nearby railway line meant that the property needed soundproof glazing. Andrew sourced an acoustic laminated safety glass (Stadip Silence) from Saint-Gobain glass. As an employee of Saint-Gobain, Andrew was able to source products from IDS for the bathroom walls and the insulation from Isover and Celotex. He used a number of building merchants to find his supplies along the way.
Raising the roof
But the lows of taking on hard labour as a self-builder reached its pinnacle when it came to erecting the roof in late 2014.
Andrew recalls: “I remember it was 10pm on New Year’s Eve and it was blowing a gale. My dad and I were still putting tiles on the roof in the pitch black. We had to get the roof covered as the wind was trying to rip the roof membrane to shreds too. I remember at one point reaching for a hammer from my dad, while perched on the slope of the roof on a couple of tile laths, and it started snowing. Thankfully we got the job finished with no accidents or anything getting damaged.
But the list of challenges didn’t stop there.
With multiple vehicles accessing the site it soon became a mud pit.
Andrew adds: “The site was used for market gardening so the soil was not very compact at all, as well as being very sandy underneath and not well drained. We started the groundwork during the winter months so the site soon turned into a mud pit, with lorries constantly getting stuck. One even collapsed an old drain and could have tipped if we hadn’t have been lucky enough to have a friendly farmer neighbour to pull him back out.
“Another concreting nightmare was when I installed the storm water attenuation tank. I already knew it was a tall order to dig a three-metre-deep hole (2.5mx2.5m) with straight sides in running sand, well below the water table, but that’s what we had to do. A day was chosen, the digger booked, tank delivered, and concrete ordered.
The digging and lowering of the tank was a success but disaster almost struck when Andrew realised he had ordered too much concrete and the tank floated in the wet concrete.
He says: “It popped out like a beach ball floating on a pool - but this was a 4.5 tonne beach ball. I couldn’t believe how buoyant it was - no amount of piling paving slabs and other weights on top of it was going to get it back down again. We allowed it to set and returned the next day.
“I still ended up with about two inch of fall from my fixed point to the inlet of the tank so we'd got away with it. I needed to get it fully buried to keep it into the ground forever more.”
The results
Andrew and his family finally moved into the property in April 2019 and are delighted with the results. The 2,000 sq ft property lends itself to a modern, comfortable family home – complete with a 32 sq metre garage and workshop.
Inside, the ground floor features a shower room with a steam cabin and jacuzzi bath. Off the hallway is a well-appointed living space with an open plan kitchen and dining area, as well as a study area off the lounge. Upstairs, the three bedrooms offer ample space for family living with a games room and family-sized bathroom. Andrew used materials from IDS to create an aesthetically pleasing modern bathroom perfect for the family’s needs.
The garden is unfinished but work continues to create another workshop, a 6.2x3.3m conservatory space and a zip line designed by the children. The existing fruit trees and shrubs were retained set against farmer fields in the backdrop.
“It still hasn’t really sunk in yet. This project has been my life for six years and while I love the end result I still can’t fully relax until we finish the last few jobs in the garden, finish renting out our bungalow and complete the paperwork backlog,” says Andrew.
“Some of the highest points have been when the kids have visited the site. I’ve missed a lot of time with them but when they came down, drove around in the diggers and climbed mountains of soil they loved it - and it kept me motivated.
“It’s became a standing joke ever since the first Christmas we started work that we’d be finished and moved in by the following Christmas. I can’t believe how hard it has been to estimate how long things take. The reality of it is that you really can spend endless hours just finishing off jobs.”
Andrew is full of reflection and advice for other self-builders.
He ends: “Would I recommend self-building to other people? If you have a perfect plot with planning permission, then it’s a great opportunity to make something amazing but it’s a huge amount of effort and takes over your life. I do think you should dream big, push yourself as far as you dare. If you have the patience and commitment you can make anything work.
“I’d say, just jump right in and seize the opportunity. If I had stopped to plan it out thoroughly I would have scared myself out of it. I still don’t quite know how I’ve managed to pay all the bills along the way and juggle credit cards, mortgages and loans but it all worked out in the end. My top tip would be to look at all new technologies that are coming in if you’re able to.
“My partner was like a single mum for four years while we worked intensely on the build. It’s done now and we’ll have it to enjoy for the rest of our lives.
“I’m so thankful to my dad, close family and good friends. I owe them so much. I would never have finished without them. Calling on their assistance with concreting, plastering, borrowing tools, and even helping with paperwork and cooking meals – I have no idea how we would have completed this mammoth task.”
Andrew's top tips for self-builders
Create a self-build build budget planner
Make a spending plan and stick to it. I had absolutely no idea how much things cost when I started so I found a budget template online and used this to plan how much I could afford to spend on foundations or roofing materials, for example.
Keep on top of paperwork
The most important thing I think I have learnt was to keep on top of my paperwork. Thankfully, my mum, sister and cousin came to the rescue spending hours preparing my VAT forms.
Don’t forget to plan for making mortgage payments
As you draw down your mortgage, the monthly payments obviously increase in addition to paying the mortgage on the property where we currently live. I didn’t realise until it was too late that we had over run our initial discounted period on both mortgages within a couple of months of each other, which meant that both mortgages nearly doubled and we were stuck unable to re-mortgage as the self-build wasn’t quite complete (so we couldn’t obtain a normal mortgage, and re-mortgaging to another self-build meant tying in again at a high interest rate). We also didn’t want to re-mortgage the house where we lived as tying in again would incur big fees when we come to selling it. It was a tough few months with huge payments to make, which was stressful.
