Bathrooms for a village where four in ten are over 65
At the 2021 census Middleton-on-Sea had just under five thousand residents. Almost 40 per cent were 65 or over, a fifth were 75 or over, and more than three hundred were 85 or older. Over half of the homes were owned outright. That is the background to most of the bathroom work we are asked to quote in the parish: owners who intend to stay, and a bathroom that was fine at sixty and is less fine at eighty.
The commonest brief is a bath replaced by a walk-in or level-access shower. The next is a ground-floor shower room in a house where the only bathroom is upstairs. And because nearly one Middleton home in five is a purpose-built flat, the third is a bathroom refit in a flat, which comes with its own rules.
Level access: decided at the survey, not on the day
A step-free shower depends on the floor. On a concrete ground-floor slab, the falls to a linear drain are formed in a screed above it and the doorway threshold is designed so there is nothing to step or roll over. On a suspended timber floor, the falls are built between the joists and the waste runs within the floor depth. Each is straightforward. Neither can be changed after tiling. We decide which your house wants at the first visit, and write it into the price.
The grant route, and getting it in the right order
If the bathroom is being adapted for a disabled person, Arun District Council's Disabled Facilities Grant can pay up to £30,000, means-tested for adults. It covers wet rooms, walk-in showers and downstairs bathrooms among other works. The process starts with a West Sussex County Council occupational therapist, reached through OT Connect on 01243 642121, and the council will not approve a grant for work that has already been done. So the order is: occupational therapist, recommendation, grant approval, then builder. We are happy to price to an OT's written recommendation.
Bathrooms in Middleton's flats
A flat bathroom is a small room with a lot of neighbours. The soil stack is shared, the waste may run through a void that belongs to the building, and the floor is the ceiling of the flat below. That means three things for us. The lease and the managing agent's consent come first, especially if anything is moving. The floor is built with sound insulation and a proper waterproof layer under the tiles, because a leak in a flat is somebody else's ceiling. And extraction has to vent to outside without crossing a wall the lease says is not yours. None of it is complicated. All of it is easier to sort before the job than during it.
Hard water, every day
Portsmouth Water supplies Middleton from the chalk, at 267 to 315 milligrams per litre across its zones. In a shower that means limescale on glass and heads and, over time, a thermostatic cartridge that sticks. We choose valves with cartridges serviceable from the front, heads with flexible nozzles, coated glass and wet-room drains with lift-out traps, and for older users a valve with a maximum temperature stop.
Old village and thatch
Middleton's listed buildings include Flint Cottage on Sea Lane, Rose Cottage, which is flint and thatch, High Kettle Cottage on Elmer Road and, at Ancton, Manor Farmhouse and Ancton House. A bathroom in a listed building needs listed building consent for any change to the historic fabric, and the services are routed through later parts of the building wherever possible.
What it costs
On our price guide, all including VAT: a like-for-like swap is £4,800 to £10,800, a full refit £9,600 to £21,600, a wet room or level-access shower £8,400 to £21,600, and a new en-suite built from scratch £7,200 to £18,000. Middleton is quoted on the same rates as Bognor Regis, and being five minutes from our unit does not change that in either direction.
The trade is under bathroom fitting; nearby are bathrooms in Felpham and bathrooms in Bognor Regis. The village is on builders in Middleton-on-Sea.
Tell us whether it is a house or a flat, and who the bathroom is for, and James will tell you what the floor and the lease allow before anything is drawn. Ring 07470 078236. Written itemised price, two years' guarantee on our workmanship.