7 Things You Must Do Before Renovating Or Building

7 Things You Must Do Before Renovating Or Building

If you have decided to take on a building or renovation project, you are faced with a challenging endeavor. Still, it will be incredibly rewarding if you do it right.

The difference between building and renovation is that, with the renovation, you don’t work from scratch.

The process of renovation is complex in a completely different way than building, so in order to avoid unnecessary expenses and problems, you need to have a clear plan.

There are things you need to consider whether you are renovating or building to spare yourself a lot of headaches, so make sure to follow these tips:

1. Make a strict schedule

It’s important you come up with a schedule that everybody needs to stick to. Otherwise, the whole process will turn into a nightmare.

Tradespeople can overlap, while jobs that could have been done at the same time will happen at different times, costing you time and money.

The schedule should include all the works that need to be done and the order in which they should be done. It’s also very helpful to break the whole project into several phases and make a specific schedule for each of the phases.

2. Pay attention to damp

In case you are renovating, watch out for any signs of damp. Causes are various, and some of them will cause big expenses.

Water stains are the most obvious signs, but condensation on windows and walls is also an indicator. Leaking gutters or blocked drains can lead to damp, as well as poor interventions like concrete floors.

Luckily, these are not as expensive to fix.

3. Ordering insufficient amount of material

It is a logical step not to order too much stuff that you won’t actually need, spending an unnecessary amount of money.

However, it’s even a bigger mistake to order too few materials. You will end up with having to delay the works because you are missing a couple of tiles.

As most material come in standard packaging, so they need to be rounded up. They usually include bricks and insulation. So, it’s actually cheaper to order more than needed.

4. Look for rot

When renovating, you need to pay attention to rot, as it can destroy timber.

It usually appears in poorly ventilated places, especially under the roof or the floor. If you notice cotton masses and intensive smell when you look under the rug, that’s a clear sign of rot. 

5. Spend too much money on unnecessary work

While renovating, you could easily get excited and pay attention to the visual results like a fabulous bathroom and luxurious kitchen. That’s the quickest way to spend too much money without paying attention to the important things.

It’s also easy to underestimate the amount of work needed to improve the existing systems inside the property.

Many things inside the house are cheaper to fix and upgrade than to replace.

6. Opting for the cheapest builders

It’s hard to find reliable builders, especially if the offer is rich.

It is understandable that the cheapest offer can be very tempting but there is usually a very good reason why they are cheap and ready to start the work in just a few days.

The usual reason is that their sums are wrong or they forgot to include a certain factor.

Either way, you will end up spending more money than it was originally planned. And if the builders decide to give up in the middle of works, you will have to pay a much higher price to find a suitable replacement on such a short notice.

Remember the saying, “If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional, try hiring an amateur!”

In other words, i’s better to go for builders that offer a medium range of price.

7. Buying without having a survey

If you decide to buy an old house and renovate it, the biggest mistake you could make is to buy it without properly checking it.

There are a lot of issues that could be hidden in the house that could cost you later on. You need to be informed on the property as much as you can.

It’s not something you can do on your own, so find a reliable quantity surveying professional. They can tell you what type of a construction it is and what materials were used. They will also detect any defects in the house, as well as how much the repairs would cost you.

Final comment

Whether you are planning to renovate or to build, it’s highly important to get your facts straight before the actual work starts.

The better you are informed about the important factors, the more successful your project will be.