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Our house needs to be rewired and we just had a quote from an electrician at £5-7k, possibly rising to about £10k if we have it done next year. Seeing as there is absolutely no chance whatsoever that we are going to find seven grand this side of Christmas, it looks like it will be sometime in 2009 (at the earliest) before we can afford to get this done.

Is the price realistic? I know rewiring a house is a big job (been told it will take about two weeks to complete), but £10k?! We live in a 3-bed, terraced house.

Without knowledge of this, I would make a couple of points.

A house I moved in to, had just been rewired. I later found they had packed the old light switches with newspaper, as the new fittings didn't match!

If you don't know about electrics, then a reputable company is a MUST. Do you know anybody in the area that has had rewiring done, or extensions built? Even extensions need someone to wire them in, so ask about their builders. cheapest doesn't mean best, nor does most expensive. Find out from people you know, then get quotes from them.

Unless you don't mind finding electrical fittings stuffed with newspaper!

Had ours done this year by a reputable guy. It tokk 3 of them about a week to do. Cost was close to 5k. We've got 3 bedrooms, bathroom, toilet, loft, lounge, dining room, kitchen, conservatory, and garage.

That's Sheffield prices so the cost "down South" will probably be a bit steeper. Rewiring is a bit of a 'mare and costs a fortune, but the alternative is unthinkable. Last house we had the electrician said we were lucky not to have gone up in flames. Mind you some engineers have just said the same thing about our coal fire. Avoiding going up in flames is quickly becoming a theme with me. Until I spontainioulsy combust on my 2010 Christmas special that is.

Darrel, I'm going to ask a couple of our neighbours as I know they had some work done on their houses recently.

Paul, the electrician I spoke to this morning also mentioned a fire risk, which is worrying to say the least. We're going to have this done in the new year. What was the extent of damage like after they had completed the work? I'm assuming it's going to cost a lot to redecorate after the rewiring has been done, so have to figure this into the overall cost. Unless the guys will also redecorate the house afterwards, which I seriously doubt.

depending on the age of your house the wireing will have a degree of insulation on the wires, in older houses this is thiner and as the copper degrades can cause heat build up and possibly a fire.
added to that, the phasing and overall power transmited to houses thease days is considerably higher you need more insulation on your wireing to bring it up to code, plus older wiring can cause your earth-leakasge-circuit breakers to go off due to induction in the wireing.
if youv'e ever tried to run a new arial cable to another room you'll apreciate that its time consuming and a pain to do, now multiply that by the whole house and add sockets and switches that may not be able to handle the new wireing and the cost mounts up.
I understand that 2009 will see further health and saftey requirements on insulation and such and so will incure more cost, hense the price increase, the quote seem averadge for the job quoted.

Careful when asking about redecoeating needs also. It could mean they tell you no problem, just to put unsightly trunking in instead. Also found, by accident, that they had moved a lightswitch when they had rewired. Instead of taking it down from a wiring point, they had taken it around a couple of walls at plaster depth. Luckily, I found out before I hammered a couple of nails in to hang pictures from. ( That is why I checked the rest and found the paper!)

Point is, make it clear and in writing what they will be doing and how they will be achieving this.

Damage done to existing decoration depends on how old and who did the wiring you have.

If it is in trunking, there will be less damage. If it is the very old wiring, no trunking/sunk in plaster, then you will have more damage. Redecorating existing walls is easier than rebuilding burnt down walls though.

Also, make sure they rewire the house in total. Again, I moved in to a "partially rewired" house. In fact, the old wiring was perished rubber and not safe, whereas the new wiring was just unsafe because of the reasons I mentioned plus more! If you want to sell in the future, only a full rewiring would make sense. (Let alone safety and worry factors.) Glad you are asking neighbours. Having worked in peoples houses for years when I was younger(not as an electrician) I know the importance of doing a job well and getting recommended that way. Worth spending a bit more time and money on finding the right person.

My father-in-law knows someone who can do the work and do a good job at a fair price. He's a family friend so I know he won't make a hash of things and drive off into the sunset, never to be seen again.

We intend to have a full rewiring done; no point in setttling for anything less, seeing as the house is going to be wrecked anyway, might as well go the whole hog. We also want a few extra power points round the house (mainly in the kitchen) and possibly a security light for the front of the house and also one for the back garden, if they will do it.

There shouldn't really be any need to totally wreck the house. If the rewiring is going to follow the same basic layout that you have already, all you may have is ripped wallpaper and some exposed plaster around where new sockets and switches are put to replace old ones. The real unsightly bits will be where new sockets or switches are placed as they will have to put new trunking in to connect those switches/sockets to the electrical supply.

It isn't as bad as people make out, but you will have to think about redecoration or at least some "patching up" afterwards.

In most situations they shold just be able to pull the new wiring through as they pull the old wiring out. A decent sparkie should be able to give you an estimation of this before they start.

The quote of £5K now and up to 10K next year now sounds very much like desperation in trying to get you to do it now as they're short of work and money for Xmas.

I'm with Dat on the cost escalation although he could be planning on working more on the olympics though with the property industry taking a nose dive there will be an abundance of tradesmen available

Replicant wrote:My father-in-law knows someone who can do the work and do a good job at a fair price. He's a family friend so I know he won't make a hash of things and drive off into the sunset, never to be seen again.

On the other hand, if they do make a hash of it, how would you handle the complaint?

I know someone whose brother-in-law did some building work for him. The guy did a bad job and my friend considered shopping him to the taxman anonymously, because the family connection made it hard to go down the usual complaint routes.

dat8962 wrote:The quote of £5K now and up to 10K next year now sounds very much like desperation in trying to get you to do it now as they're short of work and money for Xmas.

That was my initial thought until I realised that the guy who gave me those figures didn't actually have anything to gain from it, seeing as we are not hiring him for the job. Judging by the responses I've had from this and other forums, it appears we are looking at around £5-6k, all in.

Thanks to everyone for your input and to Tenko for the very helpful PM. If anyone else has further advice, please feel free to post. Thank you.

Part-Timer, I know where you're coming from, but this guy is good and has done a few minor jobs for us over the years. He's also done some major work for my dad-in-law; they're actually putting an outside loo in his garden as we speak (or as I type). He's a decent guy and I know he does quality work.

Oh, he also put a new kitchen and bathroom in for us at our previous flat.

(I'm sure this guy and my friend, who is a mechanic, have saved me a fortune over the years!)

If you're happy with him, and know the quality of his work, that's fine. It's just that sometimes asking a family member or friend can be more trouble than it's worth.

An update for those who care...

We've got a quote for £2,600 which we'll be going ahead with; we've given him a list as long as your arm for all the things we want doing. It's considerably less money than I was initially told it would cost (between £5k-£10k!) It means we'll be living at the in-laws for a week or so, though.