Felpham runs from private beach estates to ordinary post-war family housing in the space of about a mile, and the difference between those two addresses is the biggest single variable in a Felpham price.
On the estates — the Beach Estate, the Summerley Estate — the houses run to multi-million-pound beachfront properties, and the briefs match: architectural extensions, structural work to open up the plan, timber cladding, glass balconies, full remodels. A few streets inland it is 1950s and 60s family homes and classic seaside bungalows in quiet cul-de-sacs, where the work is garage conversions, bungalow extensions and knocking a kitchen through.
The owners are wealthy retirees, affluent families and people who have sold up in London for the sea. They expect the site left clean, protective covers over driveways and neighbours spoken to properly, and that is a fair standard to be held to.
The estate rules are the real story
Working behind a private estate gate is not the same job as working on a public road. There are weight limits on delivery vehicles. There are restricted working hours, with no noisy work at weekends or over holidays. There are requirements to protect private tarmac and grass verges, and the damage deposit conversation that goes with them. Materials often have to be shuttled in from the main roads in a smaller vehicle, and that transport is written into the tender rather than absorbed and resented later.
Salt air and wind do the rest. A4 marine-grade stainless fixings, powder-coated aluminium bi-folds and windows, and a high-performance silicone render system are the specification, because standard exterior ironmongery on a seafront elevation will not see out three years.
Arun District Council decides planning here, and for a general extension it is a straightforward authority to deal with. The part people miss is that private estate road associations frequently run their own design committees and restrictive covenants alongside the council's process. That approval has to be cleared before materials are ordered, not after — a rendered finish or a glazing colour the association will not accept is an expensive thing to discover on a delivery note.
A job of ours on the Summerley Estate
A first-floor extension over an existing garage, with a glass-balustrade balcony facing seaward, and full external acrylic render. Deliveries were held to an 8am to 5pm window enforced by the estate gate association, so the programme was built around it. Dropping glass units meant watching the wind and standing the lift down when it got up. Sixteen weeks.
£144,000 inc. VAT as contracted. Anything we quote you now includes VAT.
Where to start
Felpham now has its own page for every job we do: loft conversions in Felpham, house extensions in Felpham, renovations and refurbishment in Felpham, kitchen fitting in Felpham, bathrooms and wet rooms in Felpham and carpentry and joinery in Felpham. Related work: garage conversions. The nearest town set is builders in Bognor Regis, a few minutes west.
Tell us the estate and the elevation it faces, and the quotation will include the logistics rather than leaving them out. Send us your drawings or ring 07470 078236. Building here since 2008, insured for £2m public liability with employers' liability alongside it, quotations itemised line by line.