How to prepare for a full home renovation

How To Prepare For Home Renovation Project?

Last Updated: 2021-08-12By

Deciding and finding time to renovate your home can be a whole lot of enormous decision, and it should never be taken lightly. After all, it will take a whole lot of invested funds, and in most cases, a lot of money.

So, never jump into such a project without first critically following these given guidelines that’ll undoubtedly assist you in renovating your home as smooth as possible.

It’s very rare to meet someone who has just concluded a full home renovation without complaining that it took so long, but I can assure you that if you follow these tips critically below, you’ll not only renovate your home smoothly, but you’ll also reduce your project timeline greatly.

  • Know The Exact Scope Of Renovation Work
  • Set Your Budgets
  • Find A Renovation Company
  • Storage For Furniture
  • Rental Space For The Time Of Renovation
  • Be Ready For Delays
  • Document Everything

Of course there will be other problems on the way that we cannot predict how to prepare for home renovation, but staying cautious always helps to manage with issues.

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1. Know The Exact Scope Of Renovation Work

It is first important to understand the scope and extent of your home renovation. Here, you decide whether you will renovate the entire home or just a few parts first. How long this renovation project will take, where you are starting from, and your expectations after the completion of the renovation.

Also, you need to decide how extensive you want this renovation project to be, plus your remodeling goals. If you need a large space, cleaning out the entire house is the best way to start. You throw out anything you no longer use, don’t need, or that has expired.

In this case, you must clearly define why you are renovating. The truth is, is essential that you prioritize your intention for your renovation. Generally, there are 2 categories. The first category is that you want to improve the value of your home.

This kind of renovation demands careful evaluation. Here, you decide what you want to alter, how much you’ve budgeted for this renovation project. Also, you decide on the materials and supplies you want to use, are they really universally appealing? In most cases, you’ll always want to avoid materials that are too cheap or too expensive.

On the other hand, if you want to renovate your home simply because you want to improve your home and create a bigger space, then your choice needs to reflect your desires, your wants, and your needs 100%.

2. Set Your Budgets

For every renovation, it is essential that you clearly budget for the present and beyond. Whatever your budget for your renovation is, ensure you add a buffer of, at least, 25% percent as this will greatly help you to cover unforeseen expenses, circumstances, and some other challenges that may happen during the renovation. Just keep this amount set aside specially to cover unexpected expenses along the way.

To achieve a smooth full renovation project, set a realistic budget for your renovation. Also, determine how you’ll fund your project. Is saving, loan, or credit card? This tip on how to prepare for home renovation is to expect spending a whole lot of money for the job.

Preferably, make a list of everything you’ll need for your renovation: flooring, cabinet, fixtures, sinks, appliances, toiler, disposal, knobs, tubs, and many more.

3. Find A Renovation Company

Find a renovation company to deal with

Interview with contractors for home project.

Find time to research your contractor or professional renovator. Choosing a good and professional renovation company is paramount. Ideally, you can get contractors through word of mouth, and research. Perhaps, a friend, or a neighbor, or even a friend of a friend had can recommend a professional renovation company to you.

Contact them and ask them about their experience and their previous renovation projects, and find out why they would recommend them for you. And if you have anyone who can refer a contractor for you, then ask potential contractors to offer you referrals from their previous clients and follow up on them.

Also, make sure that they have liability insurance. Another great way to get the best is to visit a site they are currently working on, and from there, you can learn so much by just watching and observing how they work and organize the site works. The far most important part of how to prepare for home renovation is actually finding the company who will do the job.

A good, tested, and trusted renovation company can be found through internet or suggested by friends/family. You can contact On Point Remodeling for more advise and suggested professional renovation service.

4. Storage For Furniture

This is one of the things that you must settle during the planning process. Here, you determine how you want to provide storage for your furniture. How are you packing furniture? Where are you storing them? How long do you want to store them, and which of them storage companies will provide storage for your furniture, and how much? These are critical questions you must have settled during the planning process.

The truth is, the whole storage process is sometimes expensive based on the volume or the sizes of items you want to store.

So, if you wish to store the furniture with some other items, then hiring a professional storage company will help, at least, to handle and store your stuff for you.

5. Rental Space For The Time Of Renovation

Plan for a rental space for the time of renovation. Truth is, you’ll experience a serious discomfort of your living space during the renovation process. So, it is advisable that you rent a space with a token for a few weeks until the renovation is completed. Alternatively, find a neighbor or friend to stay with during this period.

Ideally, if you have, at least, one or two rooms in your home and a bathroom that are untouched refuges, then you’ll really feel so much discomfort during this period.

6. Be Ready For Delays

If you plan to stay home during the renovation process, then ask everyone to be considerate and patient. The truth is, your project may experience delays like supplier late deliveries, city permit delays, and correcting deficiencies.

The bottom line is, just discuss them with your contractor and give you the full idea of all possible difficulties that could arise in the process. Discuss these difficulties with your contractor and monitor them to get them done on the negotiated deadline.

Never make major changes to your lay down plans during the renovation process or you’ll end up delaying your renovation.

But always prepare for unexpected delays and inevitable inconveniences that may arise during the project. The good thing about a reputable and professional renovation company will give you the full meal-deal on every possible difficulties and challenge that could arise.

You may want to fully understand what you are getting into so that you can prepare and properly adjust your life and expectations

7. Document Everything

Document everything with contract

Construction contract with detailed scope of work.

All the work that goes at your home should be documented for reference. Many companies do not take notes on completed tasks and end week without taking pictures throughout. This becomes your due diligence as home owner to protect yourself.

First of all On Point Remodeling recommends keeping a log of work completed for each day, week or month. Have images or even vidoes of each step and process of home renovation. Not only this helps from scamy contractors trying to do lazy job or use wrong materials, but also can speed up the process.

Document your communication and materials selected for your home. Simple word or excel document sheet can be made to write down what material was selected or purchased for each work.

Conclusion on Preparation for Full Home Renovation

We have listed 7 steps of preparation for home remodeling project, but you will always have to be on your toes protecting you home and money. If you want to be relaxed with completely trusted company for your project, contact us for referrals.

On Point Remodeling team has list of contractors and companies we and our partners work with on regular basis.

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Each building has some sort of driveway or at least should have. The main reason is for vehicles to come closer without need to walk all the way. Some homes are residential with small driveway for their car to come in and park before garage or front entrance, and others can be large commercial buildings with loading docks, delivery entrances and casual parking entrances. On Point Remodeling was asked for suggestions on residential driveway for new home construction, and we decided to write detailed article for all our readers. Using this guide you can select the material for your driveway and see what works for your budget. Here are the materials for driveway we will be discussing in our guide:
  • Asphalt
  • Concrete
  • Paver Stone
  • Crushed stone
  • Brick
  • Seashell
  • Gravel
To find good contractor for your driveway, you can either ask our team by email or try to find someone local that worked with neighbors or nearby buildings.

Installation process of any material surface on your driveway

a) Demolition and Excavation – Before anything is done, your contractor will get heavy machinery and scratch off old layer of driveway. They need to go down at least 5-6 inches to insure proper layering before your final layer of material is installed. b) Material Purchase and Delivery – At this point your contract is signed and you already know how the surface will look. Contracting company purchases necessary materials and delivers them to site. Double check if material is correct and not damaged. c) Preparation of Sublevel – Whatever you place as final material, it cannot just be installed directly on top soil. Gravel is the first choice of material that goes down at this stage. Other preferred material is screen sand that can go on top of gravel and works better with stone and bricks. d) Compaction of Ground – To prevent your driveway from moving and changing shapes, all the layers from bottom up have to be properly compacted. Do not leave any spot untouched while doing this or you can get small holes and cracks in driveway after installation. E) Final Installation – This is when all the magic happens. After all preparations and dirty work the final installation is made literally within hours and you can enjoy new driveway. Stone and brick is set up by hand, while other materials require some sort of machinery with manual labor to even out surface.

1. Asphalt

Probably the most used material for road top surfaces as well as driveways is asphalt. This is a mix of gravel and sand that is mixed in and combined by asphalt cement with crude oil. Pros of Asphalt Driveway
  • Very popular and easy to find materials/contractor
  • Completed in 1 day and you can drive on it after
  • Patches and small holes can be fixed fast
Cons of Asphalt Driveway
  • Easy to damage and cracks appear in few years
  • Almost everyone else has same surface
  • Oily surface and chemicals used in mix
Prepared for asphalt driveway will cost you around $5 per square foot to finish. The contractors that take care of entire process from taking out old driveway surface, install subsurface and compact the ground with new asphalt on top, will charge on average $5500 per regular size driveway at single home property.

2. Concrete

What we call concrete is a mixture of Portland cement, aggregate as well as sand with gravel. Suggested thickness of concrete for driveway is 6 inches. The mixture needs to cure without being touched or driven on top for several days. Pros of Concrete Driveway
  • Durable material for large weights
  • Long lifespan if installed properly
  • Winter and summer friendly
Cons of Concrete Driveway
  • Has marks and stains over time
  • Hard to repair without replacement
  • Super hard to DIY
To hire contractors for concrete driveway it will cost around $7-$9 per square foot. This will include site preparation with gravel spread and new concrete installation. They will order full truck of concrete (or several for larger driveways) to pour inside forming. Smoothening and curing is required after installation.

3. Paver Stone

The most luxurious material that you can use to create driveway path with is paver stone. It is made out of natural stone with uneven rough shapes that have different line patterns. Paver stones are very heavy and are perfect for weights on top of them. Almost every city in Europe has roads and walks made out of stone that were installed centuries ago. Pros of Paver Stone Driveway
  • Creative designs can be done
  • Personal looks, can match the house
  • Can replace single stone in minutes
Cons of Paver Stone Driveway
  • Weeds growing through
  • Stone can move over time
  • Most expensive material
There is wide selection of stone that can be purchased for your driveway. On average we recommend settling with $17-$20 per square foot for stone with installation included. Working with this material is very intense labor and we recommend hiring professionals that do this type of work every day.

4. Crushed Stone

Our readers sometimes mistake crushed stone with gravel, but this is not the same material. Crushed stone material is achieved when machine is mechanically crushing larger pieces of unused stone for this specific purpose. It is larger than gravel and can have smooth finish. Crushed stone can also have a mix of colors, which is much pleasant to eyes than gravel. Pros of Crushed Stone Driveway
  • Low maintenance required
  • Fits rural area style
  • Can be reused for other purposes
Cons of Crushed Stone Driveway
  • Gets very hot during summer
  • Can be messy after many drives
  • Hard to remove snow and ice
Buying crushed stone and installing it on your driveway is as easy as it gets. Similar to other rough materials discussed in this post, only small tools like shovels, dolly and buckets are required to spread it on the road. The cost of crushed stone driveway is between $4 and $6 per square foot from professional local contractors that can finish the job in several days.

5. Brick

The same brick we see being used in wall construction can be installed as top driveway surface. Brick is manufactured by compressing clay with plastic mass. It is heated to extreme temperature and dried up to become as solid as you know it. Pros of Brick Driveway
  • Variety of selections in shapes and shades
  • Bricks are recyclable
  • Slip resistant with rough top part
Cons of Brick Driveway
  • Needs regular maintenance
  • Change color over time
  • Old fashion looking
Installing brick on driveway costs $10 per square foot, which is not too far from masonry brick laying as part of the wall. To save money you can use or purchase old brick, that was part of a wall before. Do not mix these two jobs and contact landscaping professionals instead of masonry contractors that work with bricks.

6. Seashell

This material is popular on the coast line where shells can be found near the water. Construction companies use seashells to add in other materials as well as spread them on driveway in rough condition, without adding anything else. It usually comes in white or pearl color and darkens within year because of mixing with sand and dirt. Pros of Seashell Driveway
  • Environmentally friendly
  • Has natural drainage
  • Creates worm vibe of beach house
Cons of Seashell Driveway
  • Break and crack under light weight
  • Sharp and very hard to walk on
  • Gets stuck in shoes and tires
To deliver and spread seashells on driveways costs below $4, which is only slightly more expensive than rough gravel. As you go further from coast line, cost of material increases due to delivery. This material is elegant and very soft. We recommend adding edge lines with darker color landscape material to create visual path.

7. Gravel

This material is used in other construction mixes and underlayment systems. It’s literally fragments and small crushed stones that are put on top of soil. It is easily spread out by hands and anyone can do it. Pros of Gravel Driveway
  • Cheapest of them all
  • Easy DIY Job
  • Can install another material on top
Cons of Gravel Driveway
  • Needs to be graded very often
  • Will mix with dirt and leaves
  • Washes up with heavy rains
It is rough material and can be purchased in bulk (by metric tons or cubic meters). The cost of driveway with gravel should not exceed $3 per square foot, but you can save tons of money by purchasing materials and doings installation by yourself. You do not require specific tools or heavy equipment for the job and delivery of gravel can be arranged directly to your project.

Conclusion

To properly finish any and all of these driveways requires skills and experience. There is no way you can complete any of these projects without heavy equipment and tools that regular home owner’s just store in their garages. Most of those who will read this post will prefer to install asphalt driveway, because of its popularity and low costs. We want to encourage home owners to go for personal preference and what matches your house, rather than getting the most affordable and popular items. Driveway jobs have to be completed fast; otherwise you will need to park elsewhere while the project is running. To not overpay, ask us for quotation sample on material you prefer in specific region where the work need to be done and our team can provide some numbers.

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