What Makes A Home Renovation Project Great?
1) First is proper and thorough project planning– It is imperative to plan a project well in advance. No corners cut. Even if the planning takes hours, days, weeks, months. A stark difference is always noticeable & apparent between a well planned and an ill planned project. We can’t obsess enough about this. Plan, Plan, Plan! Involve your home renovation contractor or architect during the planning phase to gauge the extent of renovation possible & the budget.
2) Being comfortable with constraints- Unlike in a new residential home construction project, in a renovation project we work with a lot of constraints. Presence of existing columns, beams, plumbing & electrical lines introduces a lot of limitations to our planning. So, here it becomes necessary that the homeowner is comfortable to work around and along those constraints. For example, we want to install new flooring without taking out the existing one to save some hassle, but the existing door height is just 6 feet 6 inches. Installing new flooring over the old one will reduce the door height even further.
3) Limitation of the existing structure- A renovation project means that we are tweaking the existing floor plan or designs of the house. Here it becomes important that we acknowledge these limitations of the existing structure. For example, it may not be a good idea to build a new level in an old home where the existing structure is weak, or reuse the existing plumbing lines just to save some costs.
4) Contingency- Assuming in a renovation project, the house has been built at least over a decade back- it will have a lot of mysteries. For example- Are the walls load bearing? Or where are the electrical lines passing through? What is buried under the flooring here & there? No one has answers to these questions, not even the homeowner, until the time the work begins and Bam! A bunch of electrical wires have been cut or a plumbing line has been damaged. People like to think that no bad thing can happen on their renovation project but that is their vanity speaking. Hence, earmarking a contingency budget for any renovation project is crucial. We recommend 10% – 25% of the overall project budget depending on the scope of renovation works. Ofcourse, larger the scope & more the budget- lower the recommended percentage.
5) Clarifying the extent of renovation from the contractor- Home Renovation can range from replacing flooring to redoing the kitchen to renovation of a couple of bathrooms to changing everything inside the old house. In a renovation project each task is a separate project in itself since it will entail removing the existing work & installing the new one. We are constrained here not just by budget, but also by time, hence, it is recommended that homeowners clarify the extent of the renovation that can be taken up.
6) Comfortable about short-term discomfort- I can not stress this enough, renovation is very different from building a new home. Depending on the extent of renovation, it might entail relocating to a new location during the period of renovation, paying rent, commuting to and fro the project site to check on the work & progress. In case there is no relocating, then there are a lot of hassles faced by the homeowner owing to the accumulation of debris & dust, smell of paint, etc. With workers also constantly coming in & going out, safety & security also becomes important. Having said all this, the best way to overcome these discomforts is by taking it one day at a time and focusing on the beautiful outcome that lies ahead.
At Limpid Construction, we build homes that are built to last. On average, homes built by us today will typically last for 60-70 years. This is because of our refined construction practices, use of top notch products, and truly remarkable workmanship. Every work executed goes through rigorous product & workmanship quality checks.
We also take up custom home renovation projects for veteran homeowners. There is no fixed budget- we provide custom quotes depending on the scope of work. With our team of seasoned experts and vastly experienced professionals, we assure you of the best services- everytime!
In our last blog, we spoke about Interior Designing. Please go through it to know more Interior Designing Services.
Author- Sarbojit Dutta
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Civil Constructions, Home Interiors & Renovations!
To know more about our team and our services, please click here
To read more of such interesting blogs, please click here
