County Longford
House Rewires in Longford. The job rarely stops at the house.
Longford has 15,623 homes and 7,246 of them, 46.4%, predate 1991, so rewires here are common. What differs is the property type. 56% of the county's recent new homes are one-off houses, and the older stock sits the same way, on its own site with a yard behind it. A full rewire of a three-bed semi runs €7,000–€12,000 including VAT and the Safe Electric certificate. That is indicative, not a quote, and it covers the house only.
The Yard Counts Too
In Longford the installation runs past the back door
Longford is the smallest county we cover at 15,623 homes, and 7,246 of them, 46.4%, were built before 1991. Age on its own does not make the work different here. Type does. Of the 343 new homes built in the county over three years, 192 were one-off houses, 56% of the total and the highest share on our patch. The older stock follows the same pattern: farmhouses and bungalows on their own sites out around Granard, Ballymahon and Edgeworthstown. Completions back that up, with Longford on 122, Granard on 118 and Ballymahon on 104.
On that kind of property the installation runs well past the back door. There is usually a submain out to the yard, outbuildings wired at different times by different hands, and a pump for the well with its own pressure vessel and control gear. Each of those needs its own protection, and each is a place a fault can sit for years without anyone noticing. The board in the kitchen is not just protecting the kitchen. It is protecting the whole holding, and in a house built before 1991 it was rarely put in with that in mind.
So we test the house and the yard together, then quote them separately. A fault people have chased indoors for weeks, a trip switch that goes at night or after heavy rain, is as likely to be in a shed or in the run out to it as anywhere in the house. Testing both at once finds it. Pricing them as two jobs means you can do the house this year and the outbuildings next, without paying twice for the same first fix or the same certification visit on one building.
Longford In Numbers
When Longford's houses were built
| Built | Homes | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Before 1961 | 3,133 | 20.1% |
| 1961 – 1990 | 4,113 | 26.3% |
| 1991 – 2010 | 7,369 | 47.2% |
| 2011 onward | 1,008 | 6.4% |
Source: CSO Census 2022, table FY033A, period of construction of occupied dwellings in County Longford. 15,623 homes in total. Data pulled 2026-08-05.
The submain out to the yard
In the 3,133 Longford houses built before 1961, the yard was rarely wired in one go. A cable was run to a shed, then another to a second shed off the first, often in whatever was to hand at the time. A proper submain is one armoured cable from a dedicated way in the house board to its own small board in the outbuilding, with a main switch and trip switches of its own. That gives you a supply you can isolate without killing the house, and it means a fault in the yard does not put the kitchen in the dark. It is tested and certified to IS 10101 the same as any circuit indoors.
Pumped water needs its own protection
If the house is on a well, the pump keeps working whether anyone is home or not. It starts and stops all day as the pressure vessel cycles, so the cable and the switchgear feeding it take more punishment than any circuit indoors. On a rewire it gets a dedicated circuit, protection suited to a motor rather than a socket, and a means of isolation at the pump house instead of only at the kitchen board. If your trip switch tends to go in wet weather, that is the first thing worth testing. Site services on a new build, the treatment plant pump and the connection run, are set out on our Wexford new build page.
Quote the house and the yard separately
A full rewire of a three-bed semi is €7,000–€12,000 including VAT and the Safe Electric certificate. That is an indicative range rather than a quote, and a Longford farmhouse is rarely a three-bed semi. Room count, how the walls are built, how far the cable has to travel and how many separate buildings you want covered all move the figure. What we do is price the house as one job and each outbuilding as its own line, after we have tested what is already there. You then pick the order. Plenty of people take the house first and the sheds the following year.
What a test day covers on a holding
We test the house and everything fed from it in the one visit: every circuit indoors, the submain to the yard, each outbuilding board, and the pump circuit if there is a well. You get the results written down, with the items that are dangerous now kept separate from the ones that can wait. On the 7,369 Longford homes built between 1991 and 2010 the house side often reads well and the yard does not, because the yard was added later. That split is the point of the report. It is what lets you spend money in the right order instead of rewiring everything.
| The job | Typical range | What moves the price |
|---|---|---|
| Fuse board upgrade, sound wiring | See the fuse board page | Ways, board position, surge protection |
| Partial rewire, targeted circuits | Quoted from test results | How many circuits actually fail |
| Full rewire, 3-bed semi | €7,000 – €12,000 | Walls, making good, occupied or empty |
The figures above are indicative ranges for guidance only, not a quote and not an offer. Wall construction, making good, and the condition of what is already behind the plaster all move the number, and none of it can be judged from a photograph. Jamie gives you an accurate fixed price in writing after the installation has been tested.
Who You’re Dealing With
Why this job is safe with us
J Cowman Electrical Contractors is based in Wexford and covers Longford as part of our Leinster service area. Same crew, same registration, same certificate on completion.
Safe Electric registered
Registration A6700
Verifiable on the public register
Public liability insurance
Up to €6.5M
Cover in place on every job
Crew size
10 electricians
Trading since 2021
Fixed-price quote
Within 48 hours
WhatsApp replies within the hour, Mon–Fri
Rewires in Longford: what we get asked
Does a rewire include the sheds and the garage?
Not automatically, and it is worth asking before you accept any quote. A house rewire price normally covers the house only. On a Longford property that often leaves out the part of the installation doing the hardest work: the submain to the yard, the boards in the outbuildings and everything fed off them. We test all of it either way, because you cannot certify a house properly without knowing what is hanging off the board. Then we price the house and each outbuilding separately so you can see what you are buying. Of the 343 new homes built in Longford over three years, 192 were one-off houses, so this is the normal shape of a job here.
How much does a house rewire cost in Longford?
A full rewire of a three-bed semi is €7,000–€12,000 including VAT and the Safe Electric certificate. Treat it as an indicative range and not a quote, because it is the figure for a standard semi and a lot of Longford's older stock is nothing like one. A farmhouse with thick walls, long runs and three outbuildings sits differently. What moves the number is the room count, how the walls are built, the distance the cable has to travel and how many separate buildings you want covered. We give you a written price after we have walked the house and the yard, not before.
Why does my trip switch go when it rains?
Start outside. A trip switch that goes at night or after heavy rain is very often water getting into an outdoor circuit rather than anything wrong indoors. The usual candidates on a Longford property are a buried cable to a shed that was never armoured, an outside socket or light with a failed seal, or the well pump and its control gear. Because they all sit behind the one board in the kitchen, the symptom shows up indoors and people spend weeks looking for it there. Testing the house and the yard in the same visit is how you find it in an afternoon.
We are on a well. Does the pump change the job?
Yes. On a well the pump is a motor that cycles every time somebody runs a tap, so it needs its own circuit, protection suited to a motor rather than a socket, and a way of isolating it at the pump house instead of only at the kitchen board. It also has to be tested as part of the installation, because it is fed from the same fuse board as everything else in the house. If you are building rather than rewiring, the site services side, the treatment plant pump and the connection run, is set out on our Wexford new build page.
Can we do the house now and the outbuildings later?
Yes, and that is how a lot of Longford jobs run. We test the whole installation in one visit, then quote the house as one job and each outbuilding as its own line. You can take the house this year and the yard next, or do a shed first if that is where the danger is. The one thing worth avoiding is splitting a single building across two visits, because the first fix and the certification are done per building and you would be paying for the same work twice. The house is certified when the house is finished. The yard gets its own paperwork when it is done.
Our house was built in 1998. Do we need a rewire?
Probably not a full rewire. Longford has 7,369 homes built between 1991 and 2010, 47.2% of the county, and a house from that period usually has cabling and earthing that are still sound. What it often does have is an older fuse board without RCD protection on every circuit, plus a garage or yard supply that was added at some point since. So the honest answer is usually a board upgrade and work on the outside circuits rather than a rewire. A test tells you which, and the results are written down so you are not taking anyone's word for it.
Do you actually cover Longford, and who certifies the work?
Yes. J Cowman Electrical Contractors is based in Wexford and covers 13 counties across Leinster and the south east, Longford included, from Granard down to Ballymahon. Jamie Cowman is Safe Electric registered and all work is certified to IS 10101, the national wiring rules. At the end of a rewire you get a completion certificate for the works issued through Safe Electric, along with the test results for the circuits. If we have tested outbuildings as well, those carry their own paperwork so there is a record of what was covered and what was not.
Where to go next
Written and checked by
Jamie Cowman, Registered Electrical Contractor
Jamie runs J Cowman Electrical Contractors and holds Safe Electric registration A6700, which is what allows a Completion Certificate to be issued on this kind of work. Everything on this page reflects how the job is actually priced and sequenced on site, not a generic specification.
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