Are you feeling really nervous because you are planning a major home renovation? If you have never done it before, it is natural to feel anxious and excited at the same time. Besides, your mind will also be occupied by the expenses involved.
No doubt, a home renovation is one of the most critical decisions you’ll ever take in your life, but if you plan well and can take some precautionary measures, you can ensure home renovation delivers returns according to your expectations.
Before you jump into the renovation job, consider analyzing yourself and your needs. Create a list of reasons that prompted you to think about renovation in the first place. Some common motivations could be to expand your space, improve your standard of living, fix inadequacies of your home or add to the value of your investment.
Now, take a look at the following steps that will help you prepare for your home renovation.
1. Fix Your Budget
Before you embark on your home renovation journey, assess and fix your budget. Ask some sensible questions to yourself.
· How much could you actually spend?
· How many years do you plan to live in the renovated home?
· What will be your source of expenditure?
· If not savings, what will be the interest rate at which you plan to avail a loan?
In most cases, projects end up costing more than what you plan initially. Such incidents happen due to sudden increase in material pricing or delays caused by natural hindrances. You should always plan a realistic budget, which is affordable. And, do keep extra cash in the bank which will provide you with the much needed headroom if renovation costs go beyond the designated budget.
2. Plan Your Project
Spending considerable time in planning the entire project and pre-construction evaluation is mandatory for successfully carrying out the renovation. Start by assessing your locality. Check with the local building inspection department and know the basic rules, such as restrictions on height, setback, zoning and grading.
Go through the title report of your house. This will provide you with all the necessary information including the property’s plot plan, covenants and easements. Any modification that you plan to make should comply with the legal body’s regulations. Failing to check with them could result in heavy losses and will delay the renovation process.
There is nothing like too much time spent in planning because the more time you spend, the easier the task will be.
3. Prepare Your Family
When a major renovation is in progress, there’s going to be a lot of practical difficulties that you and your family members will face. While using a product like Zipwalls is a great way to prevent dust during renovation, it will still bring a meager amount of dust into your living space.
Make sure you have completely blocked hot and cold air transfusions between the construction areas and living spaces. Prepare your family to face a lot of noise, and I am talking about a LOT of noise! If you work from home, it’s time you find a temporary office space because it’s going to be loud when workers are at their jobs.
Save up your energy and galvanize your family members because it’s going to be hectic with so many people walking in and out of the house every day. There will be plenty of bills to sign and tons of questions to answer. Expect the unexpected – because annoying surprises are going to happen at one point or the other.
Hiring a professional contractor is an ideal way to avoid stress. NewStart is a reliable company that has served hundreds of people in Australia and offers renovation, remodeling besides other building services. Associating yourself with such a contractor will ensure your home renovation comes good on your expectations.
Being the property owner, you should be extremely cool headed when a major renovation is in progress. Writing four digit checks every day will actually put a lot of pressure on you, even when things are happening within the planned budget. Keep ten to twenty percent of cash in excess so that you don’t feel the pinch.
All the hassles, anxiety and lack of privacy that you put up with, will be well worth the effort when you finally get to enter your beautifully renovated home.
