What actually drives up the cost of a bathroom renovation

The position of the drain and water pipes decides a great deal

If the shower, toilet and washbasin stay roughly where they already are, the plumber reconnects to existing pipework and the job stays close to the base estimate. Moving a toilet even half a metre, or turning a bath into a walk-in shower on the other side of the room, means cutting into the floor slab, rerouting the soil pipe at the right fall, and making good the concrete afterwards.

In a Soviet-era panel block this is more involved than in a new development, because the drain stack is often shared with the flat below and the slab is thick reinforced concrete rather than a screed you can cut through in an afternoon. In a 1930s wooden house in Kalamaja the floor structure is different again, and moving pipework usually means opening up joists rather than slab.

As a rough guide, keeping fittings in place adds little to a job priced from 3 500 €. Relocating a drain or moving a stack can add a four-figure sum in labour and floor repair alone, before tiling starts again. Plumbing itself is billed from 45 € an hour, and this is where those hours accumulate.

Waterproofing is not the place to save money

A membrane painted on under the tiles, properly lapped up the walls and sealed around every pipe penetration, is what stops water reaching the neighbours below rather than just the grout looking damp. It takes real time to do properly: several coats, drying time between them, and careful work at corners, the floor drain and the shower mixer.

Cutting this stage short does not usually show up as a lower quote, because it is measured in hours rather than materials, and a competent job simply takes what it takes. Where it does show up is later, as a leak claim from the flat below or a floor that has to be opened up again within a year or two.

This is one part of the job where 24 months' guarantee on our own work matters: it covers the waterproofing and tiling we did, not a botched job done cheaply by someone else beforehand. If a quote seems to skip past this stage quickly, ask what it actually includes.

Tile size and layout affect labour hours, not just the material bill

Large-format tiles, anything from 60x60 cm upward, need a dead-flat substrate, careful handling so they do not crack, and often a second pair of hands to set them. Small mosaic or hexagonal tiles are cheaper per square metre to buy but slower to lay, since each piece is set and levelled individually and the grout lines multiply.

A herringbone or brick-bond layout, a feature wall in a second colour, or a border strip all add cutting and planning time on top of the plain grid you might picture when you imagine a bathroom. None of this is visible in a price list of tiles per square metre, only in the hours the tiler bills.

Tiling is priced from 35 € per job depending on area, layout and tile size, and this is usually where a budget worked out from a shop's per-square-metre price starts to drift from the final invoice.

• Standard rectangular tiles, straight grid: closest to base labour estimate
• Large-format tiles (60x60 cm and above): need a flatter base, more careful handling
• Small format or mosaic: cheap per tile, slow to lay, more grout lines
• Herringbone, brick-bond or diagonal layout: more cutting and measuring
• Feature wall or border strip: extra planning and precise cuts at the edges

Made-to-measure furniture versus a factory set

A washbasin cabinet, tall unit or vanity bought as a boxed set from a hardware store is designed for a standard bathroom shape and a standard set of pipe positions. It is the cheaper route and, in a bathroom with an ordinary layout, works perfectly well.

Bathrooms in older Tallinn buildings rarely have standard proportions. A narrow room, an awkward corner, a boxed-in stack, or a radiator that cannot move often mean a factory unit simply does not fit, or fits but wastes usable space. A joiner-made cabinet built to the exact measurements costs more, but uses the room properly and can be finished to match the rest of the fittings.

The honest answer is that a factory set is money well saved if your room is a regular rectangle with pipes in sensible places, and money spent for a worse result if it is not. Bring the room's actual measurements to the quote stage rather than deciding this in the shop.

What a quote normally covers, and what usually sits outside it

A fixed quote for a full bathroom renovation, from 3 500 € for a typical Tallinn flat, is given after we have seen a description or photos of the room, and it is what you pay, valid for 30 days. It normally covers demolition of the old surfaces, waterproofing, tiling, fitting the sanitary ware and basic plumbing connections, and making good around them.

It usually does not include the tiles, sanitary ware or furniture themselves unless we agreed to buy them, in which case a 10 % handling fee applies on top of what we paid for them. It also does not include underfloor heating installation, moving a radiator, or structural changes, since we do not touch load-bearing walls and any such work is quoted and, where needed, referred to the relevant specialist.

Electrical work such as a new light circuit or an extractor fan connection is carried out by a qualified electrician and is priced separately from the plumbing and tiling. If your building is run by a korteriühistu, check whether any planned changes to the drain stack or wet areas need the association's sign-off before work starts, since that is a separate step from our quote.