Property renovation in France

Costs of property renovation - How much should you pay for the property

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1) estimate the cost per square metre of a renovated house in your chosen area - ideally for several and take an average

2) estimate how many square metres your renovated house will have of internal floor space

3) From the above calculate how much the renovated property might be worth

4) Now deduct the purchase price from this figure

5) The balance tells you a maximum you should spend on renovations for the property

6) Divide this balance by the square metres of the property, to see how much you can spend per square metre.

We cover costs per metre in more detail below, but for the moment assume that you need 150 euros per metre for a general refresh, 500 euros for a major refitting and 750 euros per metre for a complete build or build from a ruin.

If the figure you calculated in (6) exceeds these figures by a decent margin the property may be worth considering. a very general guide i know but it is important not to pay too much for a house in need of a lot of work.

 

A Brief Guide to Renovation Costs

The best I can do here is list the approximate costs of one of our own renovation projects. The project consisted of taking a barn, with a floor area of about 250 square metres from 'barn/animal' condition to a state in which we are all now please to live in the barn. They should provide at least an indication of the costs involved. I did a lot of the work myself - you will need to add at least 50% to the total if you do not plan to do this.

These prices are for what I would consider to be a 'normal' standard of finish. If you specify the best quarry tiles possible, marble kitchen surfaces, limited edition sinks, reclaimed oak floorboards etc etc you can very easily come to a figure very much higher than those given.

All costs are in euros (approx 1.5 euros = £1)

Task	Price in euros
Laying new concrete floor, 150 square metres	7,000
Flooring / tiling	2.500
Roof including insulation 250 square metres	27,000
Roof (Velux) windows * 4	1,000
Inserting openings in walls - 6 windows, 1 french door, in old stone walls	7,000
Doors, windows, shutters - 2 french doors, 10 windows, 12 sets of shutters	8,000
Staircase - poured concrete	1,250
Pointing walls internal and external - materials only, mason price per quare metre 25-40 euros	2.000
Rebuild 50 square metres of colombage wall	2,500
Central heating - oil based, in part used some old radiators from another building. No underfloor heating	11,000
Build mezzanine floor - 80 square metres, supported on  new timber joists	8,000
Plumbing and sanitary ware - bathroom, showerroom and WC room	4,000
Complete wiring	3,000
Kitchen - IKEA (fitted myself)	3,000
Complete new septic tank / drainage field system	5,000
Other materials - including all plasterboard for walls and ceilings, metal structure for internal walls, cement for 75 square metres of screed in the kitchen, woodstrip flooring and insulation for 80 square metres of mezzanine level, paint, timber etc etc These were the main tasks that I did myself. If you are paying for these to be done or fitted for you I would assume more like 40,000 euros total. (Say, internal walls 30 euros psm, floor tiling 35 euros psm and screed 15 euros psm, as a rough guideline)	10,000