2213 Geometra in Tuscany

will

sorry i cannot help in reallity with your problem... but if its not taking the thing off subject too much it provides an interesting case study...

if you dont mind me asking why on earth did you buy a house with so much to do on.... would be my first point... how do you think you will manage this from the uk.... and what do you think the costs will be...

i ask these questions because you seem to be fairly reasionable and sensable... and i find myself curious as to why people decide to buy houses wih no obvious livable benefits...

in reply to your question in a genearl sense... you will be best to approach a geometra who is also registered as an engeneer... a higher level geometra if you like... his percentage charges will be higher... because he can technically qualify the restruction work on your house...

the basic thing is he/she will view the property and the changes you require... will draw up plans and costs which if you approve will get submitted to the commune... by using a local geometra he will have the planning specs of that commune and will submit plans that will pass.... and will know the local planning officer too... the plans will have to be to regulated national standards with local variances... ie the basement will need to have the correct volume and light...will also require to have a damp test to make sure that it can be habitable... the excavation of the floor will require a depth below the living floor area to be excavated and some sort of suspended system... to allow air to circulate... the stairway if not a sort of open plan system will be required to be built of armoured cement to conform to seismic regulations... and knocking out a window ...will depend on how close the gap is to the corners of the walls... no opening can be within a certain distance of the corners... if there is not enough space to allow the window to let in enough light to make the room conform as regards light measurements it cannot be regarded as a habitable area...

in no way should you allow any builder to commence any work without all the necesary planning permisions in place... and also required is a safety plan alongside all the normal plans.... as anyone undertaking work here has also to submit alongside the required building plans a safety plan that protects the workers and the site of work.... in all this is why all work here regarding reconstruction or new builds is highly unlikely to fall within the competance of any diy enthusiast... and any work undertaken without all the plans...director of works...insurance/assurance plans in place is not considered legal....

sorry to use your thread as an example of the difficulties.... but i really am interested to understand why people buy houses that they cannot live in and why do they think they can renovate them at a reasonable cost here.... would be interested to hear if your agent gave you an estimate of the costs...

having depressed you enough i guess... sorry .... i hope you dont take offence... it would just be interesting to follow a sort of case study through...

apart from all that ... i bet the place is your dream ... and dreams are made to be lived and i hope it all goes well... would love to read the progression

"if you dont mind me asking why on earth did you buy a house with so much to do on...."
Because it was in a beautiful location, it was one of the only places within budget which had land and the renovations will be in budget.

"... how do you think you will manage this from the uk.... and what do you think the costs will be..."
I am moving to italy in febuary (staying about 40 minutes away), so i wont have to manage from the uk. I believe the total left to spend will not exceed e35000.

"i ask these questions because you seem to be fairly reasionable and sensable... and i find myself curious as to why people decide to buy houses wih no obvious livable benefits..."
There are hidden ones.

Thanks for your advice,
Will

"if you dont mind me asking why on earth did you buy a house with so much to do on...."
Because we dont want a ready-made house, we want to restore a beautiful old one just the way we see it.

Is there such a thing as a ready made dream home? We sure looked long and hard and though we did see things we would have loved that didn't require work, they were not within our budget or there were other disadvantages such as too remote. Anyone who has been to Bagnone cannot help but fall in love with it. We make a point of visiting it while we are over at our place and we therefore totally understand where Will's coming from.

[QUOTE=Will Bialey]...........Because we dont want a ready-made house.......[/QUOTE]

Right on Willy-O! Ignore the head, go with the heart!

We did, we loved it ;)

Stick with it & if you need assistance, gizza a PM

ok... i seemed to have upset some people....

i guess my questions are a bit direct.... however its the thoughts behind why people do things that interest me....

most probably will is right...he did not mention that he had already been quoted an estimate for the work....in the first post... which indeed makes a purchase more reasonable if you know the house price plus e35,000 is going to be the total....

...its just that sometimes when you see things like excavating cellars as minor reconstruction work.... that you sort of want to ask the question...why not get a house with a cellar already done... the reason i use this example is because to excavate a cellar here is not that easy....

...the process for an old detached building is something like this... you get a geometra and a technical engeneer... plus most probably a geologist.... you take soundings of the walls ....and the damp in the ground.... you then design the project based on these details...ie when you remove the ground inside the walls because there are very little foundation works will the whole house collapse....because the walls will tend to be pressured inwards and the ground inside has a purpose of supporting the walls... ...will there be an outside wall that will have the ground level low enough to allow air flow under the new floor level.... if not you have to excavate away some of the outside ground.... at this stage you are looking at at least one wall with totally new foundation work because you have removed both inner and outer ground....
...so ok ... these are just thoughts... but thats how complicated it gets here.... and yes some people can afford to follow their hearts ...but some find that if they bought a house with no structural survey before ...and no clear quote from a geometra/architect of the complexities of what they want to do...then they end up with a place they cannot afford to live in...or to reconstruct how they want..... if the house happens to be attached to another or two then it all gets more complicated... as you have to assure the other buildings do not get affected

will has his estimate in place... so has used his common sense

i would be interested to hear once all the plans have been submitted and the work costed and approved if it falls within the quotes...

its just lots of people talk about buying houses here and yet not many seem to.... or once they do dont offer much in the way of information on how they went about things....... or some just get on with it themselves and do it all illegaly or semi illegally.... will seems to be advocating the legal route... so i am interested in that sense as this would be a good example say ... of quotes offered whilst in the purchasing stage and the reallity of those quotes and how the work progresses....
ie the weather at the moment being quite cold and snowy will obviously effect building work...and the schedule... ...

anyway ..will.. as i said before ....we all need to follow our dreams... and sorry if you felt my questions to invasive or direct.... again i hope it all goes well....

As we're following the same route after we bought a house in piemonte, that must be restored following things became clear:
according our Geometra: You need " a person" Architect/geometra to do the paper work and secure the project when you are abroad.
Generaly speaking you must have:
a- building permit according local/national regulations cost approx E 1500,-
b- Report idrogeologica cost E 1500,-
c- structural report (concrete works etc) E 1600,-
d- Isolation report (Legge 10/91) E 1200,-
e- Safety report (legge 494/96) E 2500,-
So at least E 8000,- for paperwork, and than some more...
And if i was not mistaken it doesn't matter if you (re)build a garage or house.
Some things the geometra will not do himself but a specialist "engineer".

So we are also still wandering in the dark,;) however we passed the darkest period.

Adriatica's posts are invariable pesamistic but invariably true and I also would be interested to hear more stories of how long, how much etc etc peoples projects have taken. From the information gained from here and else where I have my doubts that Will's project will have started by February knowing how long it takes for plans to be pased and he hasn't even got them drawn up yet. I do hope Will that you can prove us wrong and that all goes as you plan. Good luck and dreams are worth all the time and effort in the end, thats what matters.

i hope people who have renovated reply to this thread.i am one of those people hoping to buy but not yet successful.the places i like seem to need a lot of work and every agent says -it will cost 900 or 1000 euros a metre to add an extension or renovate.even when one agent asked a builder to give an oral estimate,he came back with 1000 euros a metre-this must be the magic figure regardless of what needs to be done.please reassure me with some real experiences

the e1000 is an under estimate because for a start they quote without vat which is plus 20 % and then with proffesional fees...ie geometra/architect...geologists...structural engeneers etc you add aprox 15 % and then you have to pay communal taxs /permissions... so the actual total is around e1400 per sq metre... these are the facts of it....

thanks john,your welcome realism always brings me down to earth with a bang.

red tulip

sorry didnt want to depress but in reallity restored buildings go for less than the e1000 per sq m...thats why in a sense its something of a false economy...unless you like to do the work yourself and are capable... ie here there are houses for sale restored and ready to live in from e 40,000 for a two bed village house of around 120 m sq...or say a larger house at e250 m sq and 4 hectares of land for e270,000 and others in between... ok you will find houses at similar prices throughout italy.... i am not suggesting you buy here... but if you buy ruins of the same size and work out the costs then you come up with much higher figures especially when you have to pay for the ruin in the first place...
and besides you can then also live in it straight away...hope that un depresses you a bit

Unfortunately John is right - that is the sad reality of why the Italians tend to stay away from restoration and build (and buy) new houses even beside beautiful old ones that are falling down. And the figure of around 800 - 1,000 euro is also realistic as a ball park figure. We are buying a flat to be restored in Florence and this is the figure we have also been given. There is also very little room for "mark up" ie by the time you have spent what you need to it will be worth what you paid + renovation costs. Re the builders it is very difficult for them to be more precise without going to the property and providing a complete breakdown - if you ever get it! Of course the middle way is to find some land where you are allowed to build (but I can't even get into that!) and build a new house but make it look old!
Lisa

Hi all,
just thought id let you know whats going on with our cantina.
Some sad news unfortunately (who saw that coming?!) despite our first geometra telling us it would be no problem. The architect has been in and has said that although there wouldnt be a problem with the work itself, the windows need to be 1/8th the size of the floor to let in sufficient air flow and light in order to make it legally (and more importantly sale-ably) habitable. Why you cant just install a fan and a few extra light bulbs is beyond me, but Im looking on the bright side... at least it means we'll have money to make the rest of the house and garden top spec : )
Will

[FONT="Book Antiqua"][SIZE="3"]John.. we would definetly fall into your 'mad' catergory of Italian House Buyers..but to use an English phrase here were talking 'horses for courses' arent we? reading your other posts I can tell that you and your wife are concentrating on the very practical aspects of a house in the way that most Italians do...but among us Brits there are a number of (admitably mad ) people who see an old run down property and want to restore it in way that is not very practical but make a beautiful and historically 'trueful' property.

We cannot do this in the UK because most of the old hovels have been sold already and if not they are on the market at ridiculous prices so we look to old houses in other countries.

Our reasons are all of the above but also practical too.The liveable houses we saw were so awful (to our eyes ) in their decoration and design we would need to rip everything out and start again which would cost even more money!!! If you dont care too much about such things then its ok but if you do living with someone else's idea of 'nice' decor is torture !!

I think that there is a huge satisfaction in taking an old, abandoned house and making it beautiful again,almost like giving birth .Not very practical but man does not live by bread alone we need to feed our hearts too!!

Becky[/SIZE][/FONT]