Exterior refit and small bathroom - pricing

$75k-$120k.

Just got a first rough price range.
$15-25k for a nice front porch added on.
$6-10k for replacing 10 windows.
$30-60k for bumping out a 5'x8' area and turning a half-bath into a full-bath (and changing the master closet a bit in the process).
$20-30k for new roof (nothing special 25-year stuff), soffits, fascia, siding (hardiplank), gutters.

1800 sq. ft. house, single story - seems high to me. I was hoping for $50-80k ranges.

 

yeah, thats a big jump from 75K up to 120K, and you can guess which number the end price will be closer to. i'd continue to ask around. good luck and post some pics.

 

are you going to live there while the renovation is going on? -MAJOR pain in the ass if you do. I'd ask if the contractor has alot of other jobs going on and if he does is there someway to ensure he doesn't spend one day at your job, then the next at another ,and so on. It makes your job go very slow.

 

You should get some mighty fine vinyl, easily accessible for cleaning windows for that price. I got one for $375 ten years ago, and I thought that was high.

 

Yes, we're living in the house, they're only touching one bathroom inside the house...

Even at your 10-year old price for a window with no labor, that's $3750 for 10 of them.

What I'm questioning most is the siding and roof work.

The bathroom range is HUGE, but we're pretty sure we'll keep it on the low-side of that, and it has to be huge as we hadn't selected anything yet, just defined the space. I'm not one for designer toilets and funky $65/sq. ft. tiling and such...

 

Stay on top of the siding work, because there are many places that workmanship and material can be scrimped; e.g. insulation covering only part of the walls, and hard to see crevices.
re: roof When it comes time to reshingle I'm going to look into a metal roof. just saying

 

Using online estimators, pricing posted by people in their blogs, etc.

Windows seem to be $200-500 for quality vinyl stuff, even anderson or those big names (less for Pella and other decent names). So the window costs are probably reasonable - their could be rot around them since they're original and therefore 65+ years old, so padding it a bit is fine to accomodate that.

Hardiplank siding AND windows on a similar sized house was $20k, painted, and it was a 2-story house.
Roof estimates on the high side (for 25-year asphalt shingle with sheating replacement) seem to be about $10k, not sure if that included gutters, which I'd guess are $3k new on the high-end if not.
Fascia and soffits are possibly included, likely not, not sure what they'd be.

Bathroom estimates, without having to do the bumpout, come out around $15k given it's small and we won't go crazy-high-end. Factor $10k for the bumpout (new foundation, walls, roofline), and the low-end of the bathroom estimate is probably accurate.

I believe the porch estimate of $10-15k.

That means the low-end of the estimate is fairly accurate for what I SHOULD pay, around $75k.

I'm aware of the stuff to be cautious of, been through one remodel with some stories to tell. And, when we were considering a whole house teardown or adding a second story, I actually read the building codes and some guides the gov publishes on building good enough and good building, two very different things... using metals in certain places causes condensation buildup in bad places, etc. There's a lot of ways a bad builder can hose you that you'd never know about...

 

You are definitely right - gotta be on top of ALL of the work. re: roof, A friend of mine has a metal roof and I greatly dislike it, as does he. It makes noise and it's VERY slick so a lot of people (gutter installers) won't even work on it. Plus it just looks odd, and there are plenty of zero-maintenance long-life options other than metal...

I'm not doing this work to stay in the house forever either, we're getting ready for resale, and improving things in the off chance we stay for another few years. Figure $75k invested will turn a house that needs work into an instant sale like 2 others on our street that sold within a week (while others linger), moving up $150k in sale price... 1.5 baths is nothing like 2 baths, and having new HVAC, electrical, bathrooms, kitchen, siding, roof, windows, yard cleaned up, and a money porch to chill on...

 

re: metal roof
Good to know stuff.
Anyhow, the noise shouldn't be that bad if it's laying flat against the roof. Your friend doesn't live in a barn does he? just kidding I've got an attic, then ceiling to boot.

 

He's got the same . Not a barn, just a normal house with an attic. Rain is bad, HORRENDOUS when there is hail or the like. And no one will work on the roof.