Renovating a home is a complex and costly project. It is all too easy to make mistakes during the home renovation process. If you’re thinking of renovating your home, you’ll want to take the following common mistakes into consideration and be proactive about avoiding them:
- Working with an unlicensed or otherwise unqualified tradie
While most tradies are good and honest, there are unfortunately some shady tradies about. It is wise to diligently check credentials before you trust a tradie to do work on your home. If possible, seek out recommendations from people you trust before you sign a contract to have any work completed.
- Failing to properly plan the renovation workflow
There are many details to consider when you’re implementing a home renovation. There’s a certain order that you’d want to follow when executing each detail. For example, you’d want to paint the walls early on in the renovation process; in particular, it’s wise to paint before you install any costly permanent surfaces. You’d want to install new carpeting or flooring towards the end of the renovation process, because a mishap with paint could damage the new carpet or flooring.
- Implementing the wrong home design trends
On one hand, it’s important to consider the major design trends when you renovate. In many cases, it would be a mistake to decorate using last decade’s trends instead of the most current ones.
On the other hand, it is also critical to consider your home’s actual history and architectural style and reject any trends that don’t actually complement the home. People frequently make the mistake of choosing fixtures or furnishings that are on-trend, but all wrong for the particular home they are decorating.
People also sometimes make the mistake of choosing the wrong materials because they are trendy or pretty, without taking practicality into consideration.
For example, copper sinks have been trendy in recent years, but they are notoriously challenging to keep spotless. Unless you want to spend a lot of time scrubbing your sink with vinegar, skip the copper sink. Instead, opt for a classic stainless steel sink in a minimalist style, like the ones that BuildMat sells.
Another recent trend was dark-coloured flooring, which looks lovely but tends to easily show spots and dust. Many of the homeowners who adopted that trend lived to regret it, as it demands significant amounts of effort to keep a dark-coloured floor looking well-maintained.
- Underestimating the importance of lighting
There are many facets to designing a comfortable living space, and some of them are all too easy to overlook. One of the most common home renovation mistakes people make is ignoring their lighting. Lighting is one of the most important elements in any decorating scheme, because it has the power to influence the ambience and mood of every room.
If possible, it’s ideal for every room to have options for both natural and artificial light. It’s also ideal to have at least one overhead light, like a chandelier, in each room. Beyond that, you want to make sure that there is adequate task lighting that will illuminate every activity intended to take place in that particular room.
These aren’t the only 4 mistakes you could potentially make when undertaking home renovations. However, these are 4 of the most common costly mistakes that people have been known to make when renovating their homes. Being aware of these renovation mistakes can help you to avoid them and get the best possible results for the money you spend on your next renovation project.