ProjectLoft conversion with rear dormer and new bathroom12 Example Street, London · 1 document · this is A
Example · the free Quick Check, as you would see it
Example Building Co.
estimate · £73,500 inc. VAT · valid 30 days · 10 weeks
This is a three-page estimate for a rear dormer loft conversion with a new staircase and an en-suite, priced at £73,500 including VAT over a ten-week programme. It covers structure, windows, first fix and decoration, with the sanitaryware, tiles and floor finishes left for you to supply.
The whole number — where it stands
Builder’s quote, as written£73,500
Soft money inside it — provisional sums, allowances, re-measures£13,100 · 21.4%
Costs this quote leaves out — consents, finishes, the second budget
The uplift most projects meet — likely final cost
Two of the four lines are read from your document today. The other two are what the Deep Analysis works out for your address and your project.
- Builder
- Example Building Co.
- Addressed to
- Mr & Mrs Example
- Property
- 12 Example Street, London
- Document
- estimate, valid 30 days, 3 pages
- Price
- £61,250 ex VAT · VAT £12,250 · £73,500 inc VAT
- Arithmetic
- Sections add up to the total · VAT correct at 20%
- Sections
- Preliminaries · Structure · Windows and doors · Stairs, first fix and finishes · Decoration and making good — 16 priced lines
- Programme
- 10 weeks
- Payment terms
- 10% deposit on acceptance; then fortnightly valuations; final 5% on completion
- Contract
- warranty: 12 months on workmanship
- Insurance
- Public liability £5m
- Variations
- Variations agreed in writing before work proceeds
Exclusions and qualifications, as written
- Structural engineer's design and calculations excluded
- Building Control fees excluded
- Party wall matters excluded
- Sanitaryware, tiles and floor finishes supplied by client
- Asbestos survey and removal if required excluded
These lines decide disputes. Every one of them is a cost that sits outside the price above, or a condition on it.
Assumptions the builder has made
- Existing roof structure sound and free of rot
- Unrestricted access via rear garden for scaffold
Scope of work in your own words
Structural work — walls out, openings, extension, loft
Budget, inc. VAT
Ideal start date · living in during the works
What your answers changed in this report
Every element the job needs — priced firm, assumed away, or not there
Like-for-like adjustments, every assumption stated
Included / excluded matrix across all quotes
Builder-supplied finish materials, itemised
- As written
- Example Building Co. · insurance: Public liability £5m
Companies House — status, age, directors, accounts
County court judgments
Reviews, with sample sizes
Accreditations verified, not just mentioned
Insurance verified in writing
Steel is an allowance, not a price
Ask what happens to the £4,500 if the engineer's design calls for heavier or longer beams, and who pays the difference.
“Steel beams as per engineer's design (allowance)”from the quote
Finishes are a second budget
Sanitaryware, tiles and floor finishes are yours to buy, so ask for the quantities the builder has assumed and add your own figure before comparing totals.
“Sanitaryware, tiles and floor finishes supplied by client”from the quote
Three consents sit outside the price
The engineer, Building Control fees and any party wall work are all excluded, and each is a real cost with its own lead time — ask which of them the builder expects you to arrange, and by when.
“Structural engineer's design and calculations excluded”from the quote
The rest of the technical questions for this scope — from a library checked by people who build
What each answer should sound like, and what it means if it does not
Planning permission or permitted development
Building Regulations — full plans or building notice
Party Wall Act — notice periods up to two months
Conservation area · listed building · Article 4
Leasehold — Licence to Alter
Your budget vs the quote as written
Finish materials — the second budget, itemised
Where the gap is, and what closes it
£13,10021.4% of the price is soft
About a fifth of the price is placeholders that will be re-priced once the design is settled, so the final figure is more likely to move than the total suggests.
- Steel beams as per engineer's design (allowance) — £4,500
- Dormer window, uPVC (provisional sum) — £2,400
- Tiling to en-suite — allowance — £2,400
- Contingency — £3,800
The uplift this kind of project usually meets
Likely final cost — one figure, with the reasoning
✓ answered · ◐ partly · — not covered, ask
- —1. What is your company structure — who is on site, who supervises?ask
- —2. References — two or three comparable past projects we can contactask
- —3. A live project site visit — ideally with the homeowner presentto arrange
- —4. How many projects do you run at once — and how many right now?ask
- ✓5. How will you get rid of the waste?skips or disposal priced in the quote
- ◐6. Dust and damage control — what is your plan?protection or site management priced; the plan itself is not described
- ✓7. What is your payment schedule?10% deposit on acceptance; then fortnightly valuations; final 5% on completion
- —8. Do you work to any special methods, standards or technical maps?ask — this question reveals more than any other
- ✓9. How do you handle variation orders?Variations agreed in writing before work proceeds
- ◐10. What are your assumptions for this job? (water pressure, condition of floors, walls, ceilings…)2 stated — a builder who states assumptions is showing you where the risk sits
Builders' answers attach here in your workspace, and the rating re-runs
Days 1–3 — the unanswered questions, ready to send to each builder
Days 4–10 — consents, surveys and the professionals you actually need
Before you sign — the contract, the payment schedule, the protections
—/100
- Completeness of scope
- Contract and protection
- Price transparency
- Value
- Company credibility
Already in its favour
Payments follow the work
A 10% deposit, fortnightly valuations and 5% held to completion is a fair and conventional structure that keeps you paying for work already done.
The Deep Analysis would level this against your other quotes, price the excluded consents and finishes into one likely final figure, check the builder's public record, and give you the questions to ask before you sign.
Your turn
Upload your builder’s quote — the Quick Check is free.
A PDF, a Word or Excel file, or photos of the pages. Your email is where the result is sent; no card, no password. About three minutes.
What the full report adds — for the same estimate
The Deep Analysis, in four excerpts
The full report reads every quote for your project against your answers and your address — the questions take about five minutes, and every answer changes something. These are four parts of it, for the estimate above. The figures are worked out by the same code that works out yours.
The verdict
A sound estimate with a second budget outside it
The estimate is itemised, adds up and pays for work as it is done. What it leaves out is the money: the engineer's design, Building Control and an asbestos survey sit outside the price, the steel and the dormer window are placeholders until the design exists, and the bathroom's finishes are yours to buy. Counted in — all but those finishes — the likely final cost is about £80,500 to £84,300, against £73,500 on the front page. Nothing here is a verdict on the builder: every point is a question they can answer this week.
First Appoint the structural engineer — the steel and the dormer cannot be priced firm until the drawings exist.
1
The whole number, worked out
The Quick Check fills two lines of the ledger. The full report fills the rest: what the estimate leaves out, priced in so quotes compare like for like, and the movement jobs like this usually meet.
The whole number — Example Building Co.
Builder’s estimate, as written£73,500
Structural engineer's design and calculations — excludedA nominal £1,500 + VAT for a loft conversion with a rear dormer, so the estimate carries the item it leaves out.+ £1,800
Building Control fees — excludedA nominal £750 + VAT for a full-plans application on a loft conversion; the council's actual fee table decides.+ £900
Asbestos survey — excluded, expected on a pre-2000 houseA nominal £400 + VAT for a refurbishment and demolition survey of the loft and bathroom areas.+ £480
Levelled — like for like£76,680
The uplift jobs like this usually meet — 5 to 10%The steel allowance and the dormer provisional sum will be priced again once the engineer's drawings exist; the contingency is visible and sized at about 6%.+ £3,834 – £7,668
The likely final cost£80,514 – £84,348
Not in it yet: the new bathroom's sanitaryware, tiles and floor finishes, which are yours to buy — a second budget outside the contract. In the report every figure is an assumption you can change, and the totals follow.
2
Every finding, with the words that prompted it
The technical questions for the job, from a library checked by people who build — each one tied to the line in the quote that raised it, with what a good answer sounds like.
Steel priced as an allowance · critical
What does the steel allowance cover, and what happens when the engineer's drawings show more?
The estimate prices the steel as an allowance before any design exists; the final figure comes from the drawings, not the estimate.
- A good answer
- The allowance is for X tonnes at £Y a tonne fabricated and fitted; anything over is priced from the drawings at the same rate.
- A poor one
- "It is usually about that" — no rate, no basis.
“Steel beams as per engineer's design (allowance)”from the estimate · Structure
3
The message to the builder, written for you
Every question the report raises for this builder, gathered into one numbered message in your voice — 25 of them for this estimate (scope and price 6, method and technical 9, the standard questions 7, about the company 1, permissions and consents 2). Copy it, email it or share it; untick what you do not want to ask, and tick them off as the answers come.
Subject: Questions about your estimate for 12 Example Street, London
Hello,
Thank you for your estimate for loft conversion with rear dormer and new bathroom at 12 Example Street, London. Before I decide, could you help me with the 25 questions below? Short answers are fine — and where a question refers to a line in your document, I have quoted it so we are looking at the same thing.
SCOPE AND PRICE
1. My scope includes the new bathroom's sanitaryware, tiles and floor finishes, and I could not find it in your estimate. Is it included — and if not, could you price it? The new bathroom's finishes are yours to supply — a second budget outside the contract.
2. Your estimate leaves out structural engineer's design and calculations — could you confirm that, and give me a price for it? Your document says “Structural engineer's design and calculations excluded” (Exclusions).
3. Your estimate leaves out Building Control fees — could you confirm that, and give me a price for it? Your document says “Building Control fees excluded” (Exclusions).
4. Your estimate leaves out asbestos survey — could you confirm that, and give me a price for it? Your document says “Asbestos survey and removal if required excluded” (Exclusions).
5. For the dormer window, quoted as “Dormer window, uPVC (provisional sum)”: could you tell me make, profile and glazing spec, U-value, opening type, colour — and whether the sum includes the internal reveals and trims?
6. For the internal doors and ironmongery, quoted as “Stairs, first fix and finishes”: could you tell me the door type (fire-rated FD30 on a loft conversion is usual), the ironmongery range, and the paint finish?
METHOD AND TECHNICAL
7. Who inspects the steel beams once they are in, and will anything be boxed in before that inspection? Your document says “Steel beams as per engineer's design (allowance)” (Structure).
…and 18 more questions, then the sign-off.
4
The Omnisum Rating — the quote as written
Five things scored with a published method — scope 25%, contract 25%, transparency 20%, value 15%, credibility 15%. Never the workmanship, and never a recommendation to hire or avoid anyone.
Example Building Co.
70/100
- Completeness of scope 7
- Contract and protection 7
- Price transparency 7
- Value 7
- Company credibility 7
- Completeness of scope
- Covers the loft, dormer and bathroom labour; leaves out the design, the consents and the finishes.
- Contract and protection
- Payment schedule stated, 5% held to completion, variations in writing; no retention or defects period.
- Price transparency
- Itemised with allowances marked and a visible contingency; sections add up.
- Value
- A fair price for the scope as written, once the items it leaves out are counted.
- Company credibility
- Insurance in writing; not yet verified.
To raise it: Name the retention and defects period, specify the dormer and the steel rate, describe the dust plan. Realistic ceiling: 84.
Also in the full report
- Every quote for the job levelled side by side — what each includes, excludes and leaves to you
- The builder’s public record — the company register, reviews with their sample sizes, the trade bodies they claim
- The permissions for your address, from the government’s planning data — and the notices with their lead times
- Your budget against the likely final cost, and the finishes that are a second budget
- The next two weeks, day by day — and, when they arrive, the contract before you sign and each invoice before you pay
Your quote next
The Quick Check is free. The full report is £79, once, for the project — every quote you add, now or later.
You read your Quick Check first and decide after. Your documents stay in your account and are never used to train AI.