In Calgary’s current housing market, we are seeing a lot of client’s lean towards spending money to improve the properties they live in, rather than invest in new homes. This has some major advantages, including raising the “monetary value” of your current home, as well as increasing the “family value” of your current home. This strategy is sound, as long as you take the time to really weigh in on the major components of facilitating your exciting project.
Does my budget reflect my expectations?
If I had to put a number on it, I would say 75% of our prospected clients have a very skewed vision of cost versus expectation. In my opinion this is driven by unfamiliarity with the industry, unrealistic DIY television shows, the excitement of the project causing the scope of work to run wild, as well as a huge number of intangible reasons unique to each situation.
The actual cost of a project can be a devastating realization, especially when faced with having to omit or scale back portions of the renovation. Making sacrifices for the sake of budget can be a very hard pill to swallow, but a necessary evil if you want to have a successful and low stress renovation. Sounds like an easy solution to a simple problem, but time and time again we see our clients struggle very hard to come to terms with this issue.
Am I talking with a professional?
This is most definitely a huge contributor to one of the biggest mistakes we see some consumers make when deciding whom to hire. Hiring an under/un qualified contractor because they have shown the lowest price up front, or made unrealistic promises is very common. The majority of major issues we find when “project rescuing” are related to major mistakes, and corner cutting by un‐qualified contractors. These situations are almost always a direct result of “Low‐Ball” bids.
Not every lowest price contractor is un‐qualified not by a long shot!! But the majority of consumers are blinded by pricing and forget to ask a very important question, “what am I getting for this price?”. More often than not you will be limited to a very small selection of products, and high priced change orders. In this scenario the most common outcome is “sticker shock” at the mid-way point or at the end of the project.
Do I understand the costs of materials?
To combat this problem, I believe it is very important to pre-plan like crazy when thinking about renovations. Head out to showrooms, flooring stores, cabinet suppliers, and research different qualities of products to determine what you are comfortable with. Make a list of priorities when discussing renovations, what is the “must haves”, what are “wants”, and what are the actual “wish list” items. This way when you engage a contractor they will be able to better guide you in terms of what fits your budget, and if something must be cut from the list you will have better piece of mind!