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hey all... I am just wondering is anyone in the process of converting/ or converted an old farmhouse! At the min H2B and I are looking into the conversion of a derelict property and I was hoping someone on this site could give me some advice on the whole undertaking!

Some friends of ours took on a similar renovation and they how have a fabulous house. The downside is it took them 2 years of constant work every evening and all their holidays were spent building. If you don't do it yourself you can count on the builder costing a fortune. It'd cheaper and easier to build new than to renovate, of course you get a very different house. A derelict building can throw up alot of surprises, what you probably have is just a shell. I recall they had to newly render the walls and wrap the whole house in sackcloth at one point. Still, you might love it!

Some friends of ours took on a similar renovation and they how have a fabulous house. The downside is it took them 2 years of constant work every evening and all their holidays were spent building. If you don't do it yourself you can count on the builder costing a fortune. It'd cheaper and easier to build new than to renovate, of course you get a very different house. A derelict building can throw up alot of surprises, what you probably have is just a shell. I recall they had to newly render the walls and wrap the whole house in sackcloth at one point. Still, you might love it!

OK, so we did this ourselves and it took one and a half years and a whole lot of blood sweat and tears. Firstly, I'd say you should get an engineers report to see if the building is structurally sound, as banks will not give you a mortgage on any property that is not. Also, depends on how old the property is, I know many places won't insure anything over 100 years old, mine is almost 300 years old! If it is sound, then you start the fun part, ripping it out and starting again. Depending on how good or bad it is, we ended up with floors down to the dirt and put in DPC and poured new floors, new stud partitioning and plastering, entirely new plumbing and electrics, timber ceilings..... aargh it was so much effort, but I now have a house that is totally unique and that has a real "wow" factor, it is so worth it, but if you are not going to do the lions share of the work yourself, it can be expensive, I am lucky H2B is into restoration.

Thanks for the replies girlies! we changed our minds about buying the house in the end though. We have a site and are mid way into designing our home (H2B is drawing d plans) In the end we decided that we would go with our original plan of building on our site, rather then restoring, and maybe when we are finished our own house then take on a project like a farmhouse as an investment and sell it on then. We might regret not building our dream home to our own specifications