Home Renovation Contract Checklist for UK Homeowners (Printable)

Builders rarely set out to rob anyone. What goes wrong is duller: the quote said 'supply and fit new kitchen', and nobody wrote down who paid for the plastering, the electrics or the fortnight it overran. Six weeks on, two honest people have two honest recollections and a £4,000 gap between them.

A contract isn't distrust, and a domestic job doesn't need a solicitor. It must answer four things in writing: what is being done, for how much including VAT, paid when, and what happens when something changes. Here is the checklist we use with clients, stage by stage.

This costs nothing but time. Two steps people skip: ring the broker on the insurance certificate to confirm the policy is live today, and look the company up at Companies House. Directors who have dissolved two similar firms at the same address is the most reliable of the contractor red flags to avoid.

• •Legal trading name, company number and registered address, not a mobile and a van livery
• •Public liability of £2m minimum, £5m preferred; employers' liability £5m if they have staff
• •Scheme registration: Gas Safe, NICEIC or NAPIT for notifiable electrics, FENSA, OFTEC, HETAS
• •Two references from similar-value jobs finished 12-24 months ago — recent work always looks fine
• •VAT number, and whether the price includes VAT at 20%
• •The building control route: council or Registered Building Control Approver

A quotation is a fixed offer; an estimate is a guess with no legal weight. Above roughly £15,000, a lump sum with no breakdown by work section isn't a quote, it's a starting position.

The split on a typical UK refurbishment runs 45-55% labour, 35-45% materials and 10-20% preliminaries, overhead and profit — though plastering is about 85% labour, a rewire 70-75%, and a fitted kitchen 60-65% materials. Expect £200-£300 a day for a general builder and £280-£400 for an electrician or plumber, London 25-40% above.

Sanity-check against the median of three quotes, never the lowest. More than 20% below the middle price almost always means missing scope — scaffolding, skips, making good, VAT — and 35% above is a polite refusal. Our method is in how to compare contractor estimates; the wider picture in how to budget for a home renovation.

• •Preliminaries priced separately: scaffolding £900-£1,600 for a rear elevation, an 8-yard skip £280-£450 (£650 in London)
• •Fees listed, not assumed: structural engineer £450-£900, building control full plans £500-£1,000, party wall surveyor £1,100-£1,800 each
• •Provisional and PC sums flagged, allowances stated in pounds, plus an explicit exclusions list
• •A stated contingency: 10% for straightforward work, 15-20% for anything pre-1930 or structural

You don't need a bespoke document. The JCT Building Contract for a Home Owner/Occupier costs about £40 and covers almost any domestic job; the FMB and RIBA publish equivalents. All of this must appear somewhere.

• •Scope referenced to dated drawings and a specification — 'as discussed' is worthless
• •The exclusions list repeated in the contract, not just the quote
• •Total price, whether VAT is included, and the rate applied
• •Payments tied to completed and inspected work, never to calendar dates
• •Retention: 5% held for three months from practical completion
• •Start date, target completion, and what happens if it slips
• •Variations: no extra work without a written, priced instruction you signed
• •Who supplies what — client-supplied tiles cause the most arguments
• •Working hours, access, waste removal and the skip permit
• •Insurance, including who covers the works in progress
• •Building control and planning responsibility, named
• •Defects liability period, usually 12 months, and how you report one
• •Dispute route: mediation or a trade body scheme before court
• •Your 14-day statutory cancellation right, waived in writing if work starts sooner

Cash flow is where clients lose money. A deposit is only justified against goods actually ordered — bespoke joinery, a specific kitchen, made-to-measure windows — at 10-25% of that item's value, with the order confirmation attached. 'I need £8,000 on Monday for materials' from a firm with a trade account is a request to fund someone else's overdraft.

Pay in arrears against work you have inspected; never let more than a fortnight's work sit unbilled. Pay the deposit by credit card: under Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act, purchases between £100 and £30,000 make the card issuer jointly liable if the trader fails to perform.

One American idea to discard: there is no lien waiver here and no mechanic's lien over a British home — an unpaid subcontractor has no contract with you. The real risks are merchants reclaiming unfixed materials under retention of title, and advance payments vanishing in a liquidation.

No clause makes unlawful work lawful, and liability for unapproved work stays with the property, meaning with you when you sell. The regimes genuinely differ: England and Wales work to the Approved Documents with notice before work starts, while Scotland requires a building warrant granted before a spade goes in the ground. Check locally, then read when you need planning permission.

Tell your home insurer in writing before works begin. Most policies require notification above £25,000-£50,000 of work, or any structural alteration, and become void otherwise. Keep the acknowledgement with the contract; it is the first document requested when you file a home insurance claim. The Party Wall etc. Act 1996 also needs two months' notice for party wall work, one month for excavation within three metres of a neighbour's foundations.

Most overruns are visible weeks before anyone admits to them. A fixed rhythm catches nearly all of it.

• •Daily (2 minutes): photograph anything about to be covered — pipe runs, cable routes, damp-proof course, insulation
• •Weekly (15 minutes): walk the job, log the week's variations, confirm next week's programme by email
• •At each stage payment (30 minutes): inspect against the schedule before releasing funds, with dated photos
• •At every building control visit: get the inspector's name and outcome in writing — foundations, drainage and pre-plaster matter most
• •Monthly (10 minutes): reconcile spend against the contingency
• •Any change: written instruction, priced and signed, before work happens — including the £200 items

Practical completion is not 'they've gone home'. Walk the job with a torch, agree a written snagging list with dates against each item, and hold the 5% retention until the defects period ends. Collect certificates before the final payment leaves your account: Building Regulations completion, Electrical Installation Certificate, Gas Safe or FENSA notification, structural sign-off, warranties in your name. Chasing a firm already paid is an unpaid hobby.

Twenty minutes before signing, do these five and accept the rest of the risk knowingly. The longer version is in our questions to ask a contractor.

• •Confirm the company is real and the insurance live — one call each
• •Total price in writing, with the VAT position stated
• •Deposit capped at the value of goods ordered, paid by credit card
• •Who is responsible for building control and planning, written down
• •One line: no extra work is chargeable without written instruction