Vetted UK builders.
Bidding for your job.
Sealed-bid auction. One winner. No flood of cold calls — and you only deal with the builder who won the right to your project.
Find your verified builder
- Verified trades
- Free for homeowners
- No flood of cold calls
- Insured & accredited
- 1,240+Verified builders
- 3Launch regions
- £0To list
- PublicVerification IDs
Builders we accredit hold memberships in
- FMB
- NHBC
- TrustMark
- Gas Safe
- NICEIC
- FENSA
01
Start your project
Describe your project to access verified trades people.
02
How Compare Builders works
Three simple steps. Two minutes to submit your project. One trusted builder — never a flood of cold calls.
Tell us about your project
Trade, postcode, rough budget, timeline, readiness. Two minutes — no sign-up wall, no contact details until the end.
One verified builder bids
We send your brief to a shortlist of Verified Premium builders. They submit sealed bids; the winner gets exclusive access — no race to be first to call.
Pick with confidence
Review the builder's portfolio, ratings and references. Verification number is publicly addressable — anyone can independently check their status.
03
Why Verified Premium
A verified badge that isn't maintained is just marketing. We check eight things before a builder is accredited — then publish the result, re-verify every year, and instantly suspend the moment standards slip.
Before the badge · Eight checks
Every Verified Premium builder passes the same eight independent checks.
- Companies House — active company, no recent dissolutions, no director disqualifications.
- Public liability insurance — minimum £2m, certificate verified directly with the insurer.
- Trade-body membership — FMB, NHBC, TrustMark, Gas Safe, NICEIC, FENSA where applicable.
- VAT-registered status — verified with HMRC.
- Photo-verified portfolio — minimum five completed projects, site-visited for new applicants.
- Two written references from previous customers — contacted directly by our team.
- DBS check on the principal where work is in occupied homes.
- Annual re-verification — accreditation is not a one-off.
- Companies House
- £2m insurance
- Trade-body member
- Annual re-check
- Public /verify page
After the badge · Three mechanisms
Most “verified” badges decay between annual checks. Ours don’t.
The model only works if standards are enforced after onboarding, not just at it. Three mechanisms — written into the code, not the marketing — keep the standard honest.
Publicly verifiable
Every accredited builder has a CB-XXXXX number that resolves to a public verification page. Eight checks, current status, full audit trail. Anyone can audit any builder, any time.
Re-verified annually
All eight checks repeat every year. Reminders fire at 30, 7 and 0 days. Lapsed builders go red on their public page, then go offline — not quietly tolerated.
Suspension is instant
Suspended builders are excluded from every future auction the moment status flips — a hard rule in our matching code, not a soft flag. Zero invites until the issue is resolved.
Most platforms measure visibility, not credibility. Pay-to-list directories favour spend, review marketplaces favour volume — both can be manipulated. A maintained, publicly auditable verification is the only thing that can’t.
04
Why both sides win
The category problem in a sentence: Checkatrade is a directory, Bark is a lottery. We're the curated marketplace that does the heavy lifting on trust so you don't have to.
Verified builders only
Each one passed our eight-stage accreditation. Annual re-verification keeps it honest.
Free for homeowners
Always. We make money from builders winning leads, not from you submitting them.
Reviews are real
Every review on a Verified Premium profile is from a completed job, contacted by our verification team.
05
Popular projects & guides
Real guides for real budgets — what jobs actually cost and how to sequence them.
What a loft conversion really costs in 2026
A clear, regional breakdown of dormer, mansard, hip-to-gable and Velux conversions — including the bits builders quietly leave out of an opening quote.
Read the guide →
The seven planning pitfalls that delay home extensions
Single-storey rear extensions and side-returns mostly fall under permitted development. Here's the short list of things that quietly knock you out of it.
Read the guide →
Why sequence matters more than spec on a whole-house renovation
Strip-out, structural, first-fix, plaster, second-fix, decoration. Compress the order at your peril — sequencing is what separates a smooth renovation from a disaster.
Read the guide →As seen in
Good work speaks for itself
“One verified builder, a fair price, and no army of cold-callers. Exactly what was promised.”
Keith · HX2 — Loft conversion · 6 days ago
“The budget tool put us in the right ballpark before we even spoke to anyone. No nasty surprises.”
Deborah · BR2 — Kitchen extension · 6 days ago
“Could check the builder's verification number myself. That transparency is why we went ahead.”
Vincent · M8 — Full renovation · 8 days ago
“Refreshing to deal with one professional who already had the full brief and turned up when they said.”
Natasha · E11 — Bathroom refit · 9 days ago
“Comms were great throughout. The whole thing felt curated, not a free-for-all.”
Elliot · PR6 — Garden landscaping · 9 days ago
“Two minutes to submit, then a verified builder came back with a tailored quote. Done.”
Lee · SA1 — Single-storey extension · 11 days ago
92% of builders reviewed scored 9.5 / 10 or above last year
06
Explore before you commit
No sign-up needed to do your homework. Get a real local budget, browse verified builders by trade and area, and see exactly how trust is enforced on both sides.
A budget from your postcode, not a national average
Build your project room by room. The headline range is adjusted to live local build costs for your postcode via PropertyData — not a one-size-fits-all figure.
Browse verified builders by trade & area
See who’s accredited near you before you submit anything. Every profile links to its public verification page.
Verified homeowners. Verified builders.
Homeowners are SMS- and ID-verified so builders bid on real projects. Builders pass eight-stage accreditation with a public page at /verify/CB-XXXXX anyone can audit.
Project Cost Tool
Know the number
before you brief a builder.
Build your project room by room. We anchor the headline range on live local build costs for your postcode via PropertyData — not a national average — so you walk in with a realistic budget.
Whole-project range
£38,500 – £61,000
3 spaces · mid estimate £49,000
Illustrative · postcode-adjusted via PropertyData in the live tool.
Compare Builders app
Coming soonQuotes & bookings,
on the move.
Track your auction, message your matched builder and manage the project from your pocket.
Run a building business?
Stop paying for cold leads.
Bid for verified jobs.
Free to apply. £29/month once verified, plus your winning bids. No per-lead minimums; no charge on losing bids.
Two minutes, one builder, no faff
Build it the
right way.
Verified Premium builders. Sealed-bid auction. One winner. Free for homeowners — always.