UFH
TV.radio distribution amp Every TV works flawlessly
Enough cat 5 around to have phones and computers wherever you want without
using silly DECT ond WiFi.
Doorphones instead of doorbells
Sepearrte switched and possibly dimmed circuits for lights, incldng 5A
sockets for 'occasional' lighting - standard, desk and table lamps.
LV spots if spots are what you want. Never ever use mains halogens. In
laws have riopped them all out after months of expensive bulb
replacements. I hardly have had to replace any LV bulbs at all.
Alarm cables laid in to feed sensors, bells etc etc.
A couple of wet rooms where we can shower the dog amd clean wellies.
Slate floors in the busy areas to take the mud that country living
involves.
Outside electrical sockets, and hose places for watering the garden,
washing mud off wellies, and running the odd power tool and gardeing
implements.
Designed in patios, walls, steps, car parking, etc etc. Including a way to
get vehicles into the back garden for log cutting, and general tractor and
digger access. Note that some car toyts are 1/48 scale, and many drawing
are done at 1:50. This allows you to practice reversing in your drive
without building it. It sounds silly, but it helped us enormously to
utilise the space we had for vehicular access.
Rainwater runoff vectored into a pond.
Mains pressure hot water. With a BIG hot water tank.
Water softening.
Outside lights at every door.
Single glazed lead lights. These are gorgeouus, and we never get
condensation, except in the bathroom in the coldets weather, and the fan
soon clears, and heavy grade thermally lined curtains make them better
than double glazed, when drawn.
Aga. A style decision.
Working open fires of massive proportions. With underfloor vents to feed
air to them.
Insulation to teh highest possible standards.
Re routing overhead 11KV to underground, an repalcing a patheric pole
mounted transfrmner with a huge one in the garden corner. Ugly brute, but
no more dimming lights when the microwave comes on.
Fully boarded loft space, with storage racking. And lights. makes it easy
to use for stirage, and easy to get to teh pipeworlkifnecessary, but al
pipes are now enclosed om wooden ducts packed with rockwool.


Things I didn't get quite right

Lighting. Could use more switches, and more lights.
UFH upstairs. It was almost impossible to install there (almost zero floor
depth), but I wish I had made the effort However the wet fan blown
convectors work very well and are less ugly than radiators.
Chimneys. I ended up with smoke hoods. Not my fault but the builder whom I
mistakenly trusted.
I would have put even MORE insulation under the floor than the regs
wanted.
I would have paid FAR more ettention to micro draughts had I known how
much diference a little gap in a piece of celotex made.
Solid wood flooring rather than engineering laminate. I thik it would have
been possible with UFH, if it were done with that in mind. We may one day
remove the lot and go parquet...
Pay to have the telephone feed undergrounded.
Even bigger (than 22mm) water pipes everywhere. In a big house even thse
lead to some flow reduction on CH and hot and cold water. Likewise a
bigger bore than 22mm water softener. Its OK, but not quite as massive a
flow as before I fitted it. Circulation systems for 'instant' hot water
are a balance beytween how much heat you lose and how much water you
swaste. Do the sums. I am unmetered on water.
Even MORE detailed plans of layouts etc. Especially of things like utility
rooms, and bathrooms and showers. Moving a bog post drainage installation
is hugely difficult. Likewise when She wants the bed where the phone
point and bedside light points are not, its a bit of a rewire..
A slightly more sophisticated and zoned heating controller. And more stats
even than I have. Not hard to retrofit though.
Even more built in storage than exists.
Electricity in the garage. And maybe water too,
A custom built workshop.
A place for garden machinery that is thief proof.
Some way to have cat flaps without draughts.
Ditto a letter box.

That's given me even more to think about. I'm a bit confused by this Cat 5
cabling, what items can it be used for, surely if its just for computers as
I thought then you would only want it in say an office and maybe bedrooms.
As someone has mentioned what's the need of running two Cat5 cables to each
point? and will there be a central point, say a cabling cupboard where you
could have a broadband modem then have the cables running from this point to
all the rooms where the cable terminates (Would that require a router) sorry
if this is slightly of topic.

With something like speaker cable in say lounge, would it be best to install
cable and how would you decide on positions.. Also are there terminal wall
plates for speaker cable.