Remodeling your house is a viable alternativeto simply packing up and purchasing an ideal home. However, remodeling is not always cheaper; simple planning mistakes or poor contractor selection can lead to disastrous emotional and financial results. Organization and thorough research are your two biggest weapons against avoiding the common pitfalls of a home remodel. Use them!
Your garage, your kitchen, and your bathroom are three great places to begin your home remodeling project. However, before you begin work, you must ask yourself many questions. The most important question isn’t too tough, but you must answer honestly: how much can you really afford to spend? When considering a remodel, you should be financially realistic. Unless you’re very careful during the bidding stage, your house remodel will most likely cost 20% 30% more than estimated. While you have many possibilities for remodeling, this article will only focus on three different rooms: the kitchen, the garage, and the bathroom.
While there are limitless possibilities for remodeling your home, this article is going to focus on the remodeling of the most important rooms: your bathroom, kitchen and your garage. For most everybody, the bathroom serves as a private sanctuary. Where else can you lock out the world and soak up a soothing bubble bath or stand under a hot shower? When planning your bathroom remodel, you really need to consider where you spend most of your bathroom time: looking in the mirror or soaking up the suds. The answer to that question is where you should focus your design ideas. Did you know there are such things as heated flooring and towel warming racks? And it is always recommended that you spend a little extra when it comes to bathroom fixtures. Investing a little money on the extra bells and whistles can easily transform an everyday bathroom into a mini at-home spa.
It is a fact that over 50% of home owners do not park their car in the garage. Instead of a place to park a vehicle, their garage is nothing but a big storage unit. Have you become one of those people? If so, you might want to remodel your garage. A remodeled garage can increase your storage space, increase the usable square footage of your house, or it may allow you to park a vehicle inside of it.
In addition to extra storage space, a garage can be transformed into an elaborate work room, a laundry room, a home gym, or even into extra living space such as a spare bedroom or play room for the kids. If you want to transform your garage into extra living space, you need to factor in the additional construction costs for heating/cooling, and electrical. And if you would like to add a bathroom or some other form of water supply, you will also need to add in plumbing costs which can be expensive.
A kitchen remodel is the most complicated (and usually the most costly) house construction project you can begin. It is a huge undertaking; don’t take it lightly. It is always advisable to hire a qualified contractor than to try to perform your own kitchen remodel. If you accept bids from several contractors – which you should, your scope of work must be extremely specific regarding the different materials that are to be used for the remodel (detailed proposals allow for a more accurate comparison). Not too mention, if you aren’t specific in regards to materials, there is a strong chance you will get materials either inferior or too expensive than what you wanted in the first place.
Designing the layout of your kitchen is the most important part of your kitchen remodel. Every aspect of your design should meet with your approval before you begin construction. You also need to consider the down time; how long can you handle not having a kitchen? The more expansive your remodel, the longer you can expect to be without a working kitchen.
Buy kitchen window treatment sets to finish the look of your new kitchen remodel. A beautiful new set of window treatments can help finish any kitchen, large or small. Of course if you are handy with the sewing machine try creating your own kitchen curtains.
Outside of hiring an experienced, licensed contractor for your project, it is also recommended that you hire an independent consultant that can oversee your contractor’s quality of work and overall job progress. Most people couldn’t tell the difference between galvanized steel piping and ductile iron piping, but an independent consultant certainly can. He or she will notice if your contractor attempts to take any shortcuts.
Your family’s overall happiness and livelihood are closely associated with your house. Be thorough in your remodel planning and preparation and your remodeling experience will most likely be a successful one.