I just bought a house, which is about 12 years old. Don't like the kitchen unit so just took this down, and saw that underneath there's no tiling. Same with under the washing machine.

I get that they cut down on 2 square metres per house, so in the whole area will save them quite a bit, but is it worth it?

by kdnguyendl

31 comments

  1. That’s not just new builds, that’s fairly common generally.

    If you think that’s the biggest issue with new builds, you’ve got some surprises coming your way…

  2. If you were going to put new flooring down, would you pull out all your kitchen cabinets to put the new flooring under them?

  3. Thats normal because its not part of the floor area.. because its under a cupboard.

    If you tile it be prepared to spend your days wondering why your kitchen feels like its too high all the time.

    You dont need to tile or carpet under something that wont get used, so dont do it yourself.

    Edit: I am surprised they actually applied skirting board behind it though.

  4. I’m just surprised there’s no building waste/crap there tbh. Maybe they put it all under your bath tub.

  8. This is standard, unless you have a kitchen that requires the ground to be level. 

  9. We have an old build and there’s no flooring under our cupboards

  11. Fairly normal even in older builds. Mine is not a new build – the lack of tiling under the oven was to make it level with the rest of the countertop.

  12. Yeah pretty standard, that’s extra time and money wasted if you tiled an area that’s going to be completely covered up.

    And I know what you’re thinking, what if they want to take the bath out later? We’ll anyone installing stuff like this is operating with the mindset of “that’s someone else’s problem”

  13. That’s normal. I’m sure if you go round the rest of the house you can find some stuff that is actually ree-dicker-less though

  14. My partner is a kitchen designer and says that if you put your appliances and cabinets on top of the floor material – especially if using a wood floor – you’ll create pressure points that can lead to slight warping, creaking and other things. As others have said, this is standard practice. Probably a cost thing too when using vinyl or whatever else, but I reckon you’ll get it no matter what.

  15. Industry standard I’m afraid, why do work that costs extra time and money that won’t be seen

  17. New builds don’t come with flooring as standard. Flooring is an extra or, as we did, we paid an external company to put our flooring down after we moved in.

  18. If they’re hard fixtures and fittings, then yes. Why waste materials where a counter is bolted to the wall and unlikely to be removed except when a renovation comes along?

  19. It’s not standard “for new builds” it’s standard full stop

  20. my work colleague lives in a new build and they found 83 snags! some were big things, some small but…. its only a 3 bedroom semi detached house, not exactly a mansion. the garden had no top soil under the grass, the front door didn’t fit, the kitchen cupboards weren’t level, the shower tray wasn’t connected so it flooded… list goes on lol. david wilson homes house bought in 2023!

  21. This is the approach for all new builds. 2 square metres of tiling at say £40 per square metre labour and materials is £80. If you’re building 500 houses a year, that’s £40’000. Do those small cut backs with every trade and it starts to add up into the hundreds of thousands pretty quickly. This is the mindset of the large house building companies. For the most part they are just thrown together to look good on the surface until you start to scratch a little deeper.

  22. That’s the color of my bedroom! Be warned, it does make the room look dark (which I like but may not be for everyone)

  23. My best friend got her first heating bill a few months after moving in and it was absolutely massive despite it being the summer. Turns out they’d plumbed hot water into her toilets. New builds are notoriously shoddy.

  24. Just wanna say I love the paint colour you’ve chosen for the walls 😊

  25. Mine isn’t a new build but we’re currently ripping up the laminate because it’s blown. When we moved in we found instructions for all the appliances that were installed. The first bit of laminate I took up (where it had blown) I found the fitting instructions and how to clean it underneath. Gave me a chuckle.

  27. Units put in first, then tiled around. Not great, but it happens

  28. Tbh this is really good for a uk new build. Check the lawn. 1 cm of turf depth then rubble.
    I found an electric fan stuffed underneath the bathtub.

  30. Yeah. My gate only opened 20* cos they built the decking right up to it. Asked them to fix jt and they just sawed the bootom off. So whenits closed i could just walk under it (hyperbole)

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