Has anyone any experience of using architects for a house extension and if so, how much did they charge? We've just had a quote for nearly £6k which seems a bit steep.
We had a one story extension and we paid £900 and £600, so £1500 for planning. Hope that helps. Better to go to a stand alone person than a larger company.
Is it just for drawings? Are they hand holding through planning and sign off? We paid about £3k (inc vat) 4 years ago at London rates which included through to planning approval and managing party wall consents. Had permissions about a decade before that and for drawings only through to planning approval, thats was about £1k but the guy was quite young and just starting his own practice, but I'd say it was comparable with the more recent ones. £6k as a standalone fee does feel a bit steep. I'd always recommend getting multiple quotes for a project.
That's for getting us through planning and building regs. Surveys, drawings, plans. But as we'd have to get a structural engineer in as well as he's only a "technologist". Further quotes needed.
We’ve just gone through this process. Our architect has done drawings, gone through the planning application and is project managing the builder quotes. This is for a roof conversion of about 2500sq feet. Fees to date are £4300 to the architect and £3k to the structural engineer.
Went via White Agus Partnership in Barnsley earlier this year for a 2 storey extension and cost me under 2k for it all sorting. Think their fee was about 900 quid and the rest on structural engineer and application fees to Barnsley council etc...
We built a large extension across the back of our hourse 7 years ago to extend the kitchen and add another room behind the lounge. We had 2 quotes for architects. One just provided the drawings for around £1500. One wanted to PM the whole thing through planning permission and quotes etc and quoted around 5k. Given that it was covered under permitted development as a single storey extension within the right size limits, and given that it was being built by our son in law, that was excessive. So we went for the drawings only option.
Actually, just looked back through the spreadsheet I kept at the time to monitor costs and the architect was only £500 for drawings only, I was massively overplaying it. Memory not what it was. Plus around £600 in building control fees.
The thing is, this day and age, I've found that most architects opt to send the drawings via email. By the time you've printed them off, it's quite difficult to make out vital measurements.! I once did an extension for a couple who drafted up their own plans. It was basic, with standard recommendations such as 100mm cavity etc. Barnsley Council just then advised where they had gone wrong, or pointed out certain matters, and they just corrected the issues.... the Building Inspector was bang on too.
That seems steep. I paid £4k for full house build, structural calcs, planning submission etc that said I can see how a conversion may be more complex than a blank canvas
