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Just interested on people's stories on bathroom renovations and what sort of costs were involved.

Ive got on ensuite which has a toilet, basin and shower with serious work needed as the shower basin was jack hammered up when I last had termites and another bathroom that is just a shower and bath that probably both need a complete renovation or at lest 50%.

Any stories, any idea on costs, any recommendations on companies, etc?

I got a full bathroom renovation done a couple of years ago. I think all up, including a new cieling it cost about $13,000. Included new vanity, toiet, floor and cieling tiling (i was advised to get tiling done up to the cieling and i agree this is the best way to go), also new bath tub (no separate shower - ie need to stand in the bath tub when showering). Also for the window i got some glass bricks/tiles put in, they add to the overall look.

The company who i went through i think was Prime Bathrooms. Overall pretty happy with the job they did, although now i'm starting to get a bit of mould between where the vanity joins the wall (tried to clean it but not sure of the best way to do so). The other thing i thought was pretty poor was that some of the workmen left brown caked on "s***" in my vanity basin, they didn't clean it up, and became quite caked on. "Fortunately" there was a problem with the basin thingy (fault of the manufacturer) which meant it was easy for me to get them to replace it. So thats one thing to look out for.

Another thing is that sometimes you need to allow for the fact that there may be more costs on top of the intitial quote once the tradesmen start working on it and discover other problems that need to be fixed.

GWW wrote:The other thing i thought was pretty poor was that some of the workmen left brown caked on "s***" in my vanity basin, they didn't clean it up, and became quite caked on.

Couldn't they have used the toilet for that?

Hehe they should have for sure mate.

I wasn't sure of the best way of describing it.

We are getting quotes now for a full renovation of our bathroom - $17,000! After getting that shock, a tradesman suggested a cheaper way to go would be to get a plumber out to quote on the plumbing side of things alone, and then find a tiler once the plumber has been. When you go through the renovation companies, all they do is co-ordinate the plumber, tiler and sparky so you may as well do it yourself and save one level of cost. I'll post again once we get a plumber out to quote.

We had our bathroom renovated 2-3 years ago at a cost of around $10-11,000. Our bathroom was very small and was in original 1975 decor.Seeing the room was so small we decided to do away with the bath completely and relocate the shower to the other end of the room.The shower space now runs the full width of the room and features a semi frameless screen and door.Like you GWW we replaced the window with glass bricks and as that wall is part of the shower and the glass blocks are only 1 brick thick we were left with a ledge about 150mm wide which is perfect for shampoo bottles etc.We are extremely pleased with the effect these blocks give,plenty of light and no worries with privacy.

We saved a few dollars with me doing all the demolition including ripping up the floor,which wasn't particularly difficult as it had no reo in it.The hardest thing was removing the bath which was cast iron and weighed an absolute ton and was a proper pig to get out of the house without ruining our floor coverings.A mate helped me put a new ceiling in at a cost of around $150 including a gyprocker from the Grey Army who charged me $38 to put up the cornices after the tiler was finished.I did the demolition over a few weekends and managed to keep the shower usable up until the day before the workers arrived to pour the new floor.
We had the walls tiled to the ceiling and the result is very clean and modern looking.
They poured the floor on Monday and we were able to use the shower the following Sunday which to me was a very reasonable down time.

We had several quotes,from both small and large operators.The big players were far and away the most expensive and sort of awkward to deal with as they came out and would not give a price on the spot but rather went away and posted a fancy folder to us a week or so later and invited us down to the showroom to select taps etc that had yellow stickers on them.Any selection that had a different colour sticker required them to recalculate the price and while this doesn't sound much of hassle it really started to give me the shits.
In the end we bought all the materials and just looked for someone to put it together for us.

Some of the smaller concerns didn't endear themselves to us either with one bloke quoting $18000 without setting foot on our property.Asked him if that included tiling up to ceiling and his reply "Doesn't matter.$18000, we work between 9 and 2.30 and you will be without your bathroom for 3 weeks."

The bloke who ended up doing the job was very good,organising and coordinating all the trades for us.Work never stopped due to lack of tradesman,only for glue to dry and such.
There were no hidden costs or nasty surprises,he even retiled the toilet to match the bathroom at no extra cost.If anybody would like his contact details,pm me and I will give you his mobile number.
He is from the northern suburbs so don't know if he would be any good to you Wedgie.

My advice based on the above,buy everything yourself rather than as a package.
The big outlets often have discontinued/remnant tiles at much reduced prices.
Vanities are ridiculously expensive for what they are and seem to vary considerably in price from shop to shop.
Find someone who will coordinate everything to save hassle and keep your bathroom downtime to a minimum.

Good luck

Routleys on Unley Rd have an excellent bathroom display to peruse. I never knew how many different toilets there were to choose from!

Getting a tiler to do a bathroom could be a challenge as like most tradespeople they often prefer big jobs to smaller ones. The Grey Army could be a very good option.

Squawk wrote:Getting a tiler to do a bathroom could be a challenge as like most tradespeople they often prefer big jobs to smaller ones. The Grey Army could be a very good option.

Anyone looking for a tiler, I have a mate who likes the smaller jobs.

A few tips:

1. Do the demo yourself
2. Buy the bath, toilet, taps, etc yourself from a wholesaler like NPS or Reece and tell them you want trade prices as you are buying it for a buider - this will save you heaps
3. Learn how to tile - it's not that hard, the hardest bit is starting off correctly. Get the right tools and if you can master this you will save at least a $1000. Places like Beaumont tiles have DVD's to show you how its done.
4. Do the painting yourself.
5. Do the dirty work for the plumber yourself. They hate the dirty work and are only to willing to let someone else do it so they can do the easy stuff.
6. Pay CASH to your tradesmen. This will get them to the job quicker and their price will be 20 to 30% cheaper.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the tips guys, fully appreciated.

Wedgie, I know of an apprentice tiler who plays in the ressies at North, likes a drink too so something could be arranged also OL is right in some aspects do most of the demo/hard yacka yourself will save you time and know that it is done properly as you did it yourself. on the santiary fixtures front if you say that you are buying it for a builder they usually ask for their name so that they can charge it to that builder's account as the more frequent buyers may have different rates of discount.