The people you need, vetted before you need them.
Every company here has been checked by the mentors who advise on these builds every week. You see what they do, what they have built, and what it costs to involve them — before you make contact.
Three ways in
The network does one job for each of the people who use it.
Building or renovating
Find a company that has done it before
Search by trade and by where your plot is. Every profile shows real projects, not a logo and a phone number.
Already a partner
Your page, kept current
Projects, video, specification detail and the enquiries that come from it. See an example profile.
Thinking about joining
What membership costs, in full
Published rates by category, what you get, and what we expect from you in return.
Why vetting matters more than a directory
A self build is a series of decisions made once. Choosing a frame supplier, a window company or a mortgage is the kind of decision you cannot easily undo at second fix.
Every partner here has been checked on the things that go wrong: lead times they actually hold, who does the survey, what happens when something arrives damaged, and whether the price at order is the price at delivery.
Who you are dealing with
Two companies, the same people behind them, and a deliberate line in between.
Self Build Mentor
The advice
Allan and five Resident Mentors, paid for by you, by the session or by the month. They are not paid to recommend anyone, and they will tell you when you do not need a partner at all. They do not run this network.
Self Build Network
The partners
This site is run by The Self Build Network Ltd. The companies on it pay an annual membership and a contribution when an introduction becomes an order. Both amounts are published on every profile.
The line between them is the point. Advice you pay for stays advice. If the two ever pull in different directions, the advice wins — that is what the independence rules are for.
Founding partners
The first ten
Ten companies across seven categories, each one working with self builders already. More than one company per category, on purpose.
Who can help with your build
Initially twenty companies, hand picked across seven categories. Filter by what you need, and by whether they are a founding partner.
Partners pay to be in the network, and that is disclosed on every profile. It does not change the order they appear in: the list is alphabetical within each category.
The people who do the recommending.
A self builder makes the most expensive decisions of the whole project in the first ten weeks, usually with nobody qualified in the room. Six named experts put someone in the room — paid for by the client, and selling them nothing.
When a partner on this site is named to a client, it is one of these people doing the naming. None of them is paid for it, and none of them runs the network — that is The Self Build Network Ltd.
Allan Corfield
Everything self build
A Chartered Architect with more than 600 projects behind him, a regular contributor to Homebuilding & Renovating and a speaker at every national show. Twenty years of self build, turned into a platform.
Allan delivers the first session with every client. The roadmap that comes out of it is where the specialist sessions — and any partner introductions — come from.
| Covers | Self build and renovation, Passivhaus, design and modern methods of construction |
|---|---|
| Homebuilding & Renovating | Monthly magazine articles, and all eight shows across the year |
| Projects | 600+ behind the brand, over twenty years |
One mentor per specialism
Not a list of names to choose between. Each of these is the named voice in their field, chosen for reputation rather than for anything they sell.
Mockup note — David Hilton and Mark Stevenson are still a best guess from the files supplied. Confirm or swap those two before this goes anywhere.
MarieAnne Messenger
An award-winning designer with a distinctive approach to spatial transformation, working across interiors and landscape so that inside and outside are designed as one thing. A regular speaker at the Homebuilding & Renovating shows.
Tim Phillips
Turns a budget into a cost plan, and a cost plan into a tender that builders can price like for like. Contracts and cashflow. A contributor to Homebuilding & Renovating who puts people at ease on a subject most find difficult.
David Hilton
Independent on heat pumps, fabric, MVHR and solar, in a market where almost nobody selling them is. Knows how these systems integrate into a fabric-first home rather than treating each as an isolated technology. Running costs and net zero.
Mark Stevenson
Builder selection, programme, site management and procurement — the site experience a self builder cannot read their way to. Deep across off-site manufacturing, and straight to the point whether or not the client wants to hear it.
Tom McSherry
Mortgages, staged drawdown and funding structure — the gap between what a project costs and what a lender will release. Oversight of the whole market, and a view on which products suit which kind of project.
The strategy session first
Every client starts with Allan. What comes out of that is a roadmap that says where specialist advice is worth paying for — and only then does a specialist session get booked. Nobody is sold a session they do not need.
If you are thinking of joining
This is what you are actually buying.
Not a listing. An introduction from one of six people a self builder has already paid for advice, at the moment they are making the decision.
They are paid by the client
Sessions are bought and paid for by the self builder. No mentor receives any part of what a partner pays The Self Build Network Ltd, and none is paid for a recommendation.
They will say you are wrong for the job
That is the point. A recommendation only carries weight because it is sometimes withheld — including from partners who pay us.
These are the headline points of an Independence Charter still being written. The full version will be published before the first partner page goes live, and reviewed every year.
Partners pay us. Here is exactly how.
The mentors give the advice and are paid by the client. The Self Build Network Ltd runs this network and is paid by the partners. They are separate companies, but the same people are behind both — so the rules below exist to keep the first from being bought by the second.
The five points
Say the amount, before you choose. Every profile carries the membership fee and the contribution on an introduced order.
No category is exclusive. Competing companies sit side by side — initially six superstructure suppliers and three glazing companies, on purpose.
Paying more does not move you up. Listings are alphabetical within a category, and founding status does not buy position.
Connected partners pay the same. Two glazing companies are owned by shareholders, and one design practice was founded by the managing director. All three are named, pay the published rate, and get no extra lead flow.
Complaints go to an independent chair, not to the managing director.
Still to settle in the full version: who the independent chair is, how a partner is removed, and what we publish in the annual review.
Tell us about your company
We check three completed projects and speak to those clients before a place is offered. It takes about three weeks.