What Should You Buy Before Demolition Starts?

Order everything with a lead time longer than four weeks before demolition: kitchen units, windows, steels, bespoke joinery, stone worktops and tiles. Order the rest after first fix, when the measurements are final rather than nominal.

The dividing line is not price or importance, it is lead time versus measurement certainty. Anything made to measure should be measured after demolition; anything with a factory queue should be ordered before it.

Why order before demolition rather than after?

Because the factory queue runs in weeks and the demolition takes days. A kitchen ordered after strip out adds six to ten weeks of nothing to the programme.

The exception is anything measured from the existing building, which cannot be ordered until the old material is gone and the substrate is exposed.

Which items have the longest lead times?

Bespoke kitchens at ten to sixteen weeks, windows and doors at eight to sixteen, steel fabrication at four to eight, stone worktops at five to ten from template, and imported tile at six to twelve.

Add two weeks to every figure for a bespoke finish or a non-standard colour. The factory schedules do not flex.

What should not be bought early?

Anything measured on site: worktops, shower screens, made-to-measure wardrobes, stair parts and glazing. Ordering these from a drawing rather than a measurement is how a 5mm error becomes a remake.

Tiles are the awkward middle case. Buy them early for the batch match, but confirm quantities after the setting-out is known.

How do you protect a long-lead order?

With a written delivery date, a penalty clause if possible, and a deposit paid against an order confirmation that names the specification. Keep every document.

Delivery dates move. Confirm in writing two weeks before, not on the morning of.

What about storing materials on site?

Only where they are secure and insured. Kitchens and tiles stored in a damp garage for six weeks arrive swollen or stained.

Ask the supplier to hold delivery until the week it is needed. Storage is cheaper at the factory than in your front room.

How much should be ordered as spares?

Ten percent extra on tiles, five percent on flooring, and one extra of any item that will be discontinued. Breakages and cuts consume the margin quickly.

Matching a tile three years later is usually impossible. The spare box in the loft is the cheapest insurance in a renovation.

What does the builder need on site on day one?

Skips, protection boards, dust sheets, a site toilet if there is no other, and the drawings. Materials come later; access and protection come first.

A job that starts without protection spends the first week repairing damage to the route from the door.

Should the electrician’s materials be ordered by the client?

No. Cable, back boxes and consumer units are trade stock with trade pricing, and the electrician will specify what the installation needs.

Client-supplied electrical goods are a different matter: buy the appliances and the light fittings, not the cable.

What about sanitaryware?

Order the suite early if it is a specific model, because colours and ranges are discontinued without notice. Confirm the waste and trap compatibility before ordering.

Wall-hung pans need the frame and the carrier ordered with them. Buying the pan alone is the most common sanitaryware mistake.

How do you handle a kitchen order?

Sign off the final plan, pay the deposit, book the delivery for the week after plaster, and confirm the appliance dimensions against the cabinet plan before the order locks.

Once a bespoke kitchen is in production, changes cost a percentage of the order value. That percentage is the reason to decide before signing.

What is the right order for the whole procurement?

Steels and structural items first, then windows, then kitchen, then tiles, then sanitaryware, then worktops after template, then decoration last.

Each item is ordered at the point where its measurement is both known and needed. That is the whole rule.

How does procurement affect cash flow?

Deposits land before any work starts, which is why the first month of a project is the most expensive. Plan the cash accordingly.

Spread deposits across two months where possible. A project that needs 40 percent of its budget in week one is a project that can stall at the first surprise.

What if a delivery is late?

The trades behind it wait, and the programme slips by the delay plus the remobilisation. That is why the delivery date matters more than the price.

Have a fallback for the two most critical items. A temporary worktop costs a few hundred and saves a fortnight.

Can materials be bought at auction or secondhand?

Yes for some items: bricks, timber, radiators, doors. Check dimensions, condition and quantity before bidding, and assume a percentage will be unusable.

Secondhand is a false economy for anything structural or any item where a certificate is needed.

What about a contingency stock of fixings?

Keep a box of the screws, plugs and sealant used on the job. Matching a fixing two years later is harder than it sounds, and the spare box costs almost nothing.

The same applies to paint. Keep a labelled tin of each colour with the room name on it.

How should deliveries be scheduled?

For the day before they are needed, not the week before. A kitchen on site for six days is a kitchen in the way for six days.

Confirm access: a pallet of tiles needs a hard standing and a route, and a 3m worktop needs a stair or a crane.

What is the most expensive procurement mistake?

Ordering a measured item from a drawing. Worktops, screens and wardrobes ordered before the walls are finished are the three that most often need remaking.

The second is ordering the kitchen before the appliance schedule is fixed. A 2mm discrepancy in a cabinet run is a week of delay.

How should the procurement list be managed?

One table with item, supplier, order date, deposit paid, confirmed delivery date and who is responsible. Review it weekly with the programme.

The list is the only way to see, two weeks ahead, which item is about to become the critical path.

What should be bought locally rather than online?

Anything heavy, anything fragile and anything that might need returning: tiles, sanitaryware, timber and appliances. Returns on a pallet cost more than the saving.

Buy online for fittings, lighting and ironmongery, where the specification is exact and the parcel is small. The guide on comparing quotes covers how procurement assumptions distort a tender.

Procurement is where the programme is won or lost, and it is decided before the first skip arrives. The guide on overruns shows how a late order becomes a late project.