7 ms·

I bought a house that was sold as "uninhabitable" in Amsterdam, pulled out all the interior walls, applied insulation, then taught my self plumbing and did the

by tinco 3y ago

I bought a house that was sold as "uninhabitable" in Amsterdam, pulled out all the interior walls, applied insulation, then taught my self plumbing and did the plumbing, redid the wiring, installed the gas heater, laid radiant heating. I built new interior walls and did all the interior finishing except for plastering downstairs and pouring cement over the radiant heating, which I had professionals do. Coolest single thing I built in the house is probably the kitchen peninsula which I somehow aced the oak waterfall on (thanks to Festool I guess). Sounds kind of cool listed out like that but it was a shit ton of work, it's still not fully done and as I was an absolute beginner with limited time a lot of things are half-assed or have to be redone at some point. I quit my job shortly after buying the house (for unrelated reasons) and took a year long sabbatical but it still wasn't long enough enough time. People warning you about renovations like this should be taken seriously. If instead of buying this house cheap and doing this renovation, I probably could've just taken a job at a bank or some big tech co in Amsterdam and afforded the same or even nicer a year or two later. Though, with the housing market being as it is the timing was super favourable for me financially. It's also kind of neat to live in a turn of the century house with all sorts of modern amenities like radiant heating, thick insulation and HRE balanced ventilation.

soco 3y ago
If I was an absolute beginner (which I am) I would be definitely very wary to do by myself the electrical wiring or the gas connections... while half-assing the rest can only look bad, those can kill you and your loved ones (neighbors need not apply).
- irrational 3y ago
  Gas? Yes. Electric? Eh, if you are smart enough to program a computer, you are smart enough to read and learn how to do electric properly.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - bombcar 3y ago
    They're all pretty safe if you read up on them (and how to test them afterwards) - often, the person you hire ends up having about a week's more training anyway. But if you're uncertain, find a trusted friend or hire someone. Plumbing waste water is the one that skeeves me out.
  - wpietri 3y ago
    I knew a very smart guy with an attitude like that. He decided to run the electric wiring for an artist's co-op he made out of surplus shipping containers. When the city inspectors eventually popped by for a surprise visit, it was so far from code compliant that they pulled his electric meter on the spot. Being very smart, he was sure he was in the right, so I hear he fought with the city for years over it, in the meantime layering on his home-grown solar and biomass gasification generator. I'm not sure if he ever got back in compliance. I would encourage anybody going this route to have early discussions with a licensed electrician. A lot of code compliance stuff is non-obvious. It's what you get when you start with smart people and then add a hundred years of experience.
    - irrational 3y ago
      Hopefully you are reading and learning from the same place licensed electricians are learning from. Sounds like this guy didn't go to the right sources.
      - wpietri 3y ago
        A lot of their learning is from experience.
        wpietri 3y ago
        Which, I should add, is true of most professions, including software development. If a non-developer jumped in to make an app, it would be miraculous if the app and the code base were up to the standards of a seasoned app developer.
  - Freak_NL 3y ago
    There was a comment here claiming that doing your own wiring is illegal in the Netherlands, but it was (rightly) deleted. It is completely legal to do. I do my own wiring too; it's not hard to do this safely in most of Europe.
    - tinco 3y ago
      If I'm not mistaken about a year after I installed the gas heater it became illegal to install your gas heater, so they weren't completely wrong.
- fsckboy 3y ago
  as homeowner to several places certified to have been habitable and built by professionals, let me tell you, that shark fin headed toward you is plumbing.
- tinco 3y ago
  I had the gas heater checked by a professional who agreed to do the yearly maintenance. The electrical wiring you shouldn't do if you're not serious about electrical safety, and not reverent to the industry standards. I read the Dutch standards for electrical wiring, but it's actually hard to do it wrong if you have a small house and no complications like solar panels because building stores don't even sell wrong materials. I agree with the other person, the plumbing was definitely more error prone. Who knew that PVC glue has a (very) limited shelf life after opening?
  - avar 3y ago
    > I read the Dutch standards for electrical wiring Aside: Do you have a handy link to those standards? > it's actually hard to do it wrong [...] building stores don't even sell wrong materials. It's quite easy to get it wrong, e.g. buy stranded instead of solid wire, then plug it into a wago connector.
    - tinco 3y ago
      So the core standard is called NEN1010 and it costs money to get it. The way I got it is they had just built an app for reading the standards and they were offering a trial of the app. So I got the trial, dumped the entire NEN1010 and some accompanying docs and read them at my leisure. I don't think I've seen stranded wire at the Hornbach. Of course you could do it wrong if you buy your wire in entirely the wrong section, and don't even bother to read the instructions of the wago connectors. I meant it's hard to do it wrong if you're trying to do it right. Hopefully that makes sense :p
      - avar 3y ago
        > So the core standard is called NEN1010 [...] If you still have it & don't mind sharing my email's in my profile... :-) > I meant it's hard to do it wrong if you're trying to do it right[...] This example came to mind because a friend of mine (we're also both in Amsterdam) got this specific thing wrong, then asked me and a couple of others about melted connectors. I agree it's generally quite easy, and yeah the "installation" section tends to be separate from where you buy bulk extension cables. But there's a bunch of small things like that, another common one (which even professional electricians seem to screw up half the time) is reversing which side of the socket live and neutral are on. For plumbing probably the most common pitfall is knowing which types of connectors should or should not get teflon tape applied.
s5300 3y ago
>> I probably could've just taken a job at a bank or some big tech co in Amsterdam and afforded the same or even nicer a year or two later. Yes, but now you know how to fully renovate a previously-deemed-uninhabitable house. Many, especially people that make large $ in tech may disagree, but I find this to be extremely valuable knowledge & experience. Tangent, but I experience second hand humiliation & embarrassment when I see an adult paying hundreds into thousands of dollars for something that can be fixed in well under an hour with basic tools.

by tinco 3y ago

soco 3y ago

If I was an absolute beginner (which I am) I would be definitely very wary to do by myself the electrical wiring or the gas connections... while half-assing the rest can only look bad, those can kill you and your loved ones (neighbors need not apply).

irrational 3y ago
Gas? Yes. Electric? Eh, if you are smart enough to program a computer, you are smart enough to read and learn how to do electric properly.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- bombcar 3y ago
  They're all pretty safe if you read up on them (and how to test them afterwards) - often, the person you hire ends up having about a week's more training anyway. But if you're uncertain, find a trusted friend or hire someone. Plumbing waste water is the one that skeeves me out.
- wpietri 3y ago
  I knew a very smart guy with an attitude like that. He decided to run the electric wiring for an artist's co-op he made out of surplus shipping containers. When the city inspectors eventually popped by for a surprise visit, it was so far from code compliant that they pulled his electric meter on the spot. Being very smart, he was sure he was in the right, so I hear he fought with the city for years over it, in the meantime layering on his home-grown solar and biomass gasification generator. I'm not sure if he ever got back in compliance. I would encourage anybody going this route to have early discussions with a licensed electrician. A lot of code compliance stuff is non-obvious. It's what you get when you start with smart people and then add a hundred years of experience.
  - irrational 3y ago
    Hopefully you are reading and learning from the same place licensed electricians are learning from. Sounds like this guy didn't go to the right sources.
    - wpietri 3y ago
      A lot of their learning is from experience.
      - wpietri 3y ago
        Which, I should add, is true of most professions, including software development. If a non-developer jumped in to make an app, it would be miraculous if the app and the code base were up to the standards of a seasoned app developer.
- Freak_NL 3y ago
  There was a comment here claiming that doing your own wiring is illegal in the Netherlands, but it was (rightly) deleted. It is completely legal to do. I do my own wiring too; it's not hard to do this safely in most of Europe.
  - tinco 3y ago
    If I'm not mistaken about a year after I installed the gas heater it became illegal to install your gas heater, so they weren't completely wrong.
fsckboy 3y ago
as homeowner to several places certified to have been habitable and built by professionals, let me tell you, that shark fin headed toward you is plumbing.
tinco 3y ago
I had the gas heater checked by a professional who agreed to do the yearly maintenance. The electrical wiring you shouldn't do if you're not serious about electrical safety, and not reverent to the industry standards. I read the Dutch standards for electrical wiring, but it's actually hard to do it wrong if you have a small house and no complications like solar panels because building stores don't even sell wrong materials. I agree with the other person, the plumbing was definitely more error prone. Who knew that PVC glue has a (very) limited shelf life after opening?
- avar 3y ago
  > I read the Dutch standards for electrical wiring Aside: Do you have a handy link to those standards? > it's actually hard to do it wrong [...] building stores don't even sell wrong materials. It's quite easy to get it wrong, e.g. buy stranded instead of solid wire, then plug it into a wago connector.
  - tinco 3y ago
    So the core standard is called NEN1010 and it costs money to get it. The way I got it is they had just built an app for reading the standards and they were offering a trial of the app. So I got the trial, dumped the entire NEN1010 and some accompanying docs and read them at my leisure. I don't think I've seen stranded wire at the Hornbach. Of course you could do it wrong if you buy your wire in entirely the wrong section, and don't even bother to read the instructions of the wago connectors. I meant it's hard to do it wrong if you're trying to do it right. Hopefully that makes sense :p
    - avar 3y ago
      > So the core standard is called NEN1010 [...] If you still have it & don't mind sharing my email's in my profile... :-) > I meant it's hard to do it wrong if you're trying to do it right[...] This example came to mind because a friend of mine (we're also both in Amsterdam) got this specific thing wrong, then asked me and a couple of others about melted connectors. I agree it's generally quite easy, and yeah the "installation" section tends to be separate from where you buy bulk extension cables. But there's a bunch of small things like that, another common one (which even professional electricians seem to screw up half the time) is reversing which side of the socket live and neutral are on. For plumbing probably the most common pitfall is knowing which types of connectors should or should not get teflon tape applied.

s5300 3y ago

>> I probably could've just taken a job at a bank or some big tech co in Amsterdam and afforded the same or even nicer a year or two later. Yes, but now you know how to fully renovate a previously-deemed-uninhabitable house. Many, especially people that make large $ in tech may disagree, but I find this to be extremely valuable knowledge & experience. Tangent, but I experience second hand humiliation & embarrassment when I see an adult paying hundreds into thousands of dollars for something that can be fixed in well under an hour with basic tools.