Getting Your New House Ready For Remodeling

Congratulations on buying a new home! Whether large or small, it’s common to have some renovation planned for a new abode. And while prior to moving in is an ideal time, paying two mortgages means the more quickly you can get it done, the more you’ll generally save.

Strip Out The Work Areas

Depending on the degree of your remodel, prepping the work area can mean a huge range of things. If you’re living in the space, it means clearing out the furniture first before stripping down or demo. If you’ve bought a “fixer-upper” home, this could mean extra work - for example, if the house you purchased previously had a fire, you’ll need to do smoke damage cleaning before building anything back.

Similarly, if there’s any water damage in your new spot, you may need to take your walls back to the bare brickwork and reapply some plaster and drywall.

Upgrade All Electrical Wiring And Connections

If the house you bought has been rewired relatively recently, you can most likely skip this step. Otherwise, seriously consider upgrading all your electrical wiring and connections. Here’s why:

Electrical Safety

If you have no idea when the electrical wiring was last updated in your home, the chances are high that it was probably done a very long time ago.

Getting the electrical wiring and connections updated, will give valuable peace of mind, knowing there are no safety concerns.

Electrical Socket Expansion

There’s a high chance you’ll find you don’t have enough electrical sockets in your home to cope with the number of devices you and your family use (this upgrade is a little eerie if you think about it, considering how much more enmeshed we all are becoming with tech, no?). The living room, for example, always needs multiple sockets to power things like TVs and whatever other entertainment equipment.

Plus, it makes more sense to get plenty of extra electrical sockets fitted rather than using lots of extension boards that could potentially cause electrical safety issues.

Increased Home Value

Lastly, getting your home rewired means you will increase its value. That’s because potential buyers won’t need to factor in the cost of getting that work done if they buy your house from you.

Fix Any Potential Issues

Before you begin with your remodeling plans in earnest, one final thing to consider (and include in your upgrades) is to fix any minor or potential issues before they become catastrophic ones.

For example, if you have leaking faucets, replace them or fix the pipes that go to them before they cause your home to flood, resulting in additional repair work and costs - and any redoing of the work you’re about to do anyway.

Lastly, make sure to factor in a contingency of around 8-12% on your project, as the majority of renovations tend to go over budget.