With a new year comes New Year’s resolutions, be them goals on health, renewed focus at work or targets for personal achievement. For many of us, at best, these amount to a temporary change in our behaviour, or worse, just idle chat during a hungover breakfast on New Year’s Day. But, for all of us it’s a time to take stock and make some exciting plans.
If you’re considering embarking on a renovation or building project, now is the time to start the process, and it all starts with careful planning and research. First off, if you’re reading this then hopefully you’re already aware of the benefits of getting recommendations, which is why RatedPeople.com is so useful.
For many, the decision to embark on such a plan is influenced by one of two things: they either want to improve/expand, instead of bearing the heavy cost of selling and buying, or they want to get improvement works completed prior to putting their house on the market.
The trouble here is that it can create a bottle neck in demand for tradesmen and builders. Potential sellers are often told by estate agents that the market picks up in spring – the days are getting longer and property generally looks better surrounded flowers in bloom – a further issue here is that as everyone’s encouraged to do the same, there is often a glut of similar properties coming onto the market, which can soften demand.
Now for large projects that involve a property being open to the elements. It might seem fairly obvious that the summer months are the best time to have work done, but during the school holidays builders are often stretched across a number of jobs that they have running at one time and delays are often unavoidable.
For larger schemes, giving yourself extra lead-in time allows you to visit potential builders’ previous projects and assess the quality of their work. The main aim in starting early is to give yourself enough time to make an informed decision of who you want to use and why – it’s worth remembering that a good tradesman is always busy – all the guys that I’m working with at the moment are up to their ears in work, so if you want your first choice get them booked in.
Finally, by giving yourself this breathing space you get the chance to buy your materials at your convenience and you might be lucky enough to take advantage of New Year’s discounts. But most importantly it gives you the required time to budget sensibly and save.
I’ve seen countless jobs that have had to compromise on fittings or finish due to money running out – it can be avoided.
