by: Mark Brinkley
Topics include:
Book Description:
The Housebuilder's Bible is one of Amazon's best selling DIY titles. The Sixth edition was published in November 2004 and is packed with useful tips and down to earth advice. This book is ideal for anyone looking at any residential building project whether you're extending, renovating or doing a complete newbuild. It contains a mix of down -to earth information and advice as well as detailed yardstick costings. It's an ideal companion for anybody, selfbuilder or professional, who wants to know more about building well and on budget.
The author is an experienced housebuilder and renovator and much of the detail in the book is drawn from trade experience. It's very much an insider's guide and experienced construction professionals have expressed amazement at the amount of detailed information in the book. Yet it's accessible - many readers who have never been involved with building before have used this book to successfully build their own homes. The sixth edition has been fully revised, expanded and updated to reflect recent changes in prices and legislation and it includes sections specifically for renovators and converters.
Mark Brinkley, 49, lives and works in the house he built for his family in Cambridgeshire. He worked as a carpenter and a housebuilder for 15 years before he wrote this, his only, book which has now established him in a new career as a writer. He is a regular contributor to the selfbuild magazine, Homebuilding & Renovating and an occasional contributor to many more.
Reviews:
Selfbuilders - If you do nothing else - buy this and read it: It's very simple - do not attempt to start planning the self-build or major renovation of anything more than a broom cupboard under the stairs (and it's probably worth the cover price for even that!) until you have bought this book and read it from cover to cover at least twice. I have half a dozen other "home building" books and this is the one I always go back to. Not for nothing is it called the Housebuliders "Bible". It doesn't set out to tell you how to project manage building a house. HOWEVER, it's written in such a way that I learnt enough from an earlier edition of this book to do exactly that. It DOES tell you how much it might all end up costing and how to keep control over the costs when you are project managing - or more importantly - someone else is project managing the work. By dissecting each part of the build process from planning all the way through to putting up curtains it gives you an excellent idea of what's involved when you build a house and as I've said controlling the single most important issue which is cost - and trust me on this - controlling costs IS the number one issue you will face.
The book you should read BEFORE commencing your SelfBuild: This is probably the first book purchase that any SelfBuilder should make. I speak form experience - I bought the last 2 versions of it. This title may mislead you to think this is a practical book, it isn't. However it is an excellent book, it has tables which allow you to work out the material and labour costs for just about every individual task involved with building a house. Rates are given in PC sums or as square or cubic metre rates. I have prepared the detailed costings for my build using Marks tables, and it brings out many things which might have slipped by in my calculations. The cost per lightfitting to the charge per linear metre for scaffolding. There is a fair amount of background detail to various stages of the build and to who does what and how to organise things. With plenty of examples of the various methods of achieving the results i.e. drylining costs and plastering costs are detailed. It does take some getting used to, you need to look at the front example build find the relevant chapter and look at the breakdown and then find the relevant table to see the full breakdown of material & labour costs. I know Mark is a member of this list, and we even communicated regarding building topics on a previous building web site (now defunct) So I hope he does not take offence. A very good book and a must if you want to know what you should expect to pay. I now have the 98/99 version and the book although not greatly changed remains an indispensable item for those who are Selfbuilding rather than just taking a turnkey package from a company. Still a little lean on timber frame details, but at least some data in this version. I can honestly recommend this book for anyone interested in carrying out a Selfbuild.
An absolute god-send: If you're thinking of doing a self-build, then you simply have got to get this book. It can potentially save you hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds. At the very least, you'll know for sure whether someone in the trade is trying to rip you off! A cracking book that has made my project 100x more likely to keep on budget - and I'm sure it can do it for you to.
The Homebuilders Bible. Great book for people thinking of selfbuild,renovations and modernisation.It covers most issues you will come across doing any build work and its a great book for any one wanting to update their house. As the book gives a lot of information written to 2002 specs you could add alot of modern features to your house without doing any drastic build work and if you are wanting to sell obviously this will help.Altogether this is a good book its full of information mainly written for the selfbuilder but if you are wanting the know how of how a house is built from top to bottom then this is the book for you but the book is not a diy guide but its absolutely full of information.