Bathroom Renovation in Mallorca
A bathroom is the one room designed to get wet, and almost every expensive problem in one is water that went somewhere it was not sent. Describe the property and the work, and we pass the request to renovation and building companies on the island that take on that kind of project.
What decides whether a bathroom lasts
Two things, and neither is visible once the room is finished. The first is the waterproofing under the tiles, which is a system rather than a product and only works where it is continuous, taken up the walls in the wet area and sealed at every junction. The second is the fall to the drain, which has to be built into the screed rather than corrected afterwards.
Get either wrong and nothing happens for a while. Water finds the gap, travels along the structure, and appears somewhere that looks unrelated: a stain on a ceiling below, a skirting lifting in the next room, a smell nobody can place. By then the repair is not the bathroom, it is the bathroom and whatever it drained into.
The other constraint is where the waste can go. Moving a shower is usually simple, moving a toilet rarely is, because a soil pipe needs a fall to a stack and the stack is fixed. On a flat that stack is shared, which turns a layout change into a conversation with the building as well as with the builder.
What a bathroom renovation request usually covers
- How many bathrooms, and whether the layout is changing
- Where the soil pipe and the water supply run now
- Waterproofing, and how far up the walls it goes
- Falls to the drain, built into the screed
- Ventilation, and whether there is a window or a duct
- Underfloor heating, where it is going in
- Electrical work, and what may be installed in a wet room
- Tiling, and what the substrate behind it is
- Sanitaryware, taps and screens, and who supplies them
- What is directly below the bathroom, and what a leak would reach
How a bathroom renovation usually runs
The parts that decide the outcome are all finished before anything is tiled.
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01
Survey and scope
Someone establishes where the waste and the supply run, what the floor is built of, and what is underneath the room.
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02
Layout fixed
Positions agreed before the first fix, because the pipework is built to them.
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03
Strip out
Everything back to the structure, which is when the condition of what is behind the old tiling becomes known.
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04
First fix
Soil, waste, supply, electrical and any ventilation duct, set out to the agreed positions.
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05
Screed and falls
The floor built to drain where it is meant to drain, before anything covers it.
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06
Waterproofing
The tanking system applied as a continuous layer and left to cure. This is the step worth asking a company to describe.
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07
Tiling and second fix
Tiling, then sanitaryware, screens, taps and the electrical fit out.
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08
Handover
Testing, snagging and the certificates the installations need.
Often part of the same project
Apartment renovation
How your request reaches a company
Mallorca Renovation is a comparison service. A request for a bathroom renovation goes to the renovation and building companies on our list; they quote the work and carry it out, and any agreement is between you and the company you pick.
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01
Describe the job
Tell us the property, roughly what you want and where it is. Photographs and a rough plan help, though neither is required.
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02
We match it
The request goes to companies that work in your area and take on this kind of job at this size.
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03
They quote you
Each company contacts you directly with its own price, timing and approach. We do not set any of it.
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04
You compare and choose
Put the quotes side by side and take the one you want, or none of them. Using the site costs you nothing.
Can the toilet be moved?
Sometimes, and it is the hardest fixture to move. A soil pipe needs a continuous fall to a stack, so the distance and the direction both matter and the stack does not move. A shower or a basin is usually far easier. A company that has opened up buildings of the same age will say quickly which case yours is.
What is tanking, and do I need it?
It is a waterproof layer applied to the floor and the walls of the wet area before tiling, sealed at every junction and around every penetration. Tiles and grout are not waterproof on their own. It is worth asking any company quoting the work to describe what it uses and how far up the wall it goes.
How long does a bathroom take?
The honest answer is that it depends on what is found at strip out and on how long the waterproofing needs to cure, and a company that has seen the room can tell you. Be wary of a programme that has no curing time in it at all.
Can a bathroom be renovated without retiling?
Occasionally, for a fixture swap that does not disturb the tiling or the waterproofing behind it. Anything that moves a pipe or breaks the tanking means the wet area is opened up, and once it is open, retiling is usually the cheaper decision.
What about the room below?
Worth raising early. What sits under a bathroom decides how bad a failure would be and how much protection is proportionate, and on an upper floor it is also what the community or the neighbour will care about.
Get comparable bathroom quotes
Describe the bathroom once and let several companies price it against the same brief.