The realities of house renovation and kitchen projects - and how to get through these!

A stunning kitchen such as this may be where you are trying to get to, but you’ll come across plenty of challenges along the way.

Introduction

Embarking on a kitchen or any sort of house building or renovation project is rarely an easy prospect at the best of times. Unless you have plenty of time, money and experience, it can be a demanding and stressful undertaking.  

So we thought we’d share some of the challenges that we’ve experienced ourselves and also seen our clients face and share a few tips on how to overcome these. It’s not an exhaustive list and we’ve not touched on some very important points (e.g. have a proper contingency fund!). 

We’ve written these notes having gone through two major house refurbishments ourselves (if we are being honest, we have fallen foul of some of these points ourselves), project-managed large elements of a new-build house and major extension/renovation and delivered kitchen projects to in excess of 250 clients over 12 years. 

Finally, it’s not an attempt to preach or provide definitive answers - these are our observations and our suggestions, based on our experience, and we think they are valid. But others may well have different views and different solutions - so please feel free to take or leave the advice as you see fit!

Projects can and will go wrong

The first point is a general one - projects rarely go to plan at the best of times and even in these post-COVID-19 times, there are still reasons for them to go awry. Whether it’s a delay caused by a shortage of good tradespeople, or spiralling material costs, there are even more risks than before. 

If you can aim off for these (and please note, these shortages can be for the most mundane items, including plaster/plasterboard, cement, lighting components, appliances - even certain screws were in short supply at one point during the pandemic) then so much the better - order early, order enough and have somewhere safe to store the items securely. In a world of Amazon Prime 24hr deliveries, this can be hard to adjust to, but it’s just how things are at the moment.

Ordering enough is sometimes hard to do - you may be tempted to cut costs by ordering less e.g. fewer floor tiles (remember, you should almost always allow 10% extra for wastage). But if you don’t order enough then you risk delay (lead times can be long and stock levels can fluctuate), items may come from a different batch, which may not match the original order and you may lose the tradesman to another job, with potential knock-on consequences. The cost and stress of resolving this is almost always greater than the cost of ordering enough to start with.

But, perhaps more than anything, you need reserves of patience, which will almost certainly be tested. Take the long view; accept that things will sometimes go wrong and be delayed; mistakes will be made; and console yourself with the knowledge that you will, eventually, get there. That’s not to excuse poor service or errors and it’s far easier to write than practice it, but “stuff happens”. 

Define and stick to the scope

In an ideal world, a project's scope is defined clearly at the outset and never changes. However, that isn’t always realistic - in practice, the scope can change considerably as items are removed or added to a project. This can be a challenge, whichever happens. 

If you reduce the scope of a project, it could leave the builder and other trades with a gap in their programme, potentially exposing them to a loss of income. On the other hand, adding items, whilst understandable and possibly very welcome, can cause the builder and other trades a scheduling challenge. They will have planned to complete the work in a set period of time and possibly made commitments to other clients to move on to their work at a certain point. By adding to their workload this may delay their work with other clients. That’s not your concern, but it’s worth bearing in mind if your scheduled start date comes and goes and your builder is still working on a preceding project.

Try to be as clear as possible about the scope of the project and about the potential for this to either shrink or increase. Communicate clearly, early, openly and honestly and hope that the tradesmen concerned do the same. If you think at the outset that some items may need to be removed from the scope, then tell your builder or designer - it will help them to plan and budget and lessen the surprise if and when it happens. If you do increase the scope, please be patient - they may not be able to fit you into their schedule as quickly as you’d probably like. It won’t be for a lack of trying, but instead because they may be trying to honour commitments previously made to other clients.

Make timely decisions

The next point relates to the first in this series and concerns decision-making. At the start of a project, it’s often quite good fun making decisions. But as a project goes on, you will be faced with all manner of choices about the smallest of details, which will feel as though they are coming at you thick and fast and all of them can appear both urgent and important!

At this stage there are two problems. First, you risk over-thinking the issue - call it the “paralysis of analysis”, if you like. You will be faced with so many choices of materials, colours, styles, finishes, textures, price, quality and so on that there is a real risk that you will simply fail to decide, which can risk delaying the project. 

And second, you may well hit a point of “decision fatigue”, at which point you are so overwhelmed by the choices and decisions required, that you simply (almost) don’t care or don’t have time to make informed decisions.

So, to avoid this, make as many decisions as possible as early on in the project as you can. To help with this, consider seeking professional advice for some or all of it, depending on your budget and personal experience and knowledge. For instance, we help our clients by guiding them through the whole kitchen design and sourcing process, distilling almost infinite variations of design, worktops, appliances, handles etc down to manageable quantities of known and recommended products.

Interior designers, such as Vanessa Horne of Oswin Interiors, can help in a similar way with wider interior design and style choices. Whether or not you seek such help, you will need to accept that there are myriad possibilities and that many of these will be equally gorgeous, practical and/or affordable.

Consider your options, by all means seek a second or third opinion, trust your instincts and the experience of those with whom you’ve chosen to work - and make a decision! Then move on and try not to dwell on it.

Same project, different perspectives

As a client, your project is (in your view, at least) the only one that matters and every tradesman should be focused on working to deliver your dream. You are paying good money and therefore you have the right to expect great, responsive service. Meeting your project timelines is a shared goal and, if it means people working longer days, 6 or 7 days a week to get your project “over the line”, so be it. Besides, you were given a timeline near the start, so this should be adhered to, regardless.

On the other hand, as a tradesman, you are working long, often physically demanding days, often for six days a week, overcoming problems, juggling the need to be “on the tools” with also running a business (providing quotes, sending invoices, paying bills and so on) and juggling a work diary that is constantly changing due to delays, sickness and mistakes by others that then become your problem. This isn’t a one-off project for you - it’s your livelihood, day in, day out, month after month. Everyone wants a piece of your time, you try to satisfy everyone and, invariably, no matter how good you are, you drop a ball or two. And you probably haven’t managed a holiday (or even a few weeks off work) for as long as you can remember.

So, how do you reconcile these two views? Great communication helps, as do realistic expectations and - as mentioned before - a good measure of patience. Save the “I really need you here today” conversation for when it’s necessary, not for something unimportant or that really can wait. There’s a world of difference between something that is merely aesthetic, which can really wait, and something that is critical to allow the project to continue or for you to begin to use parts of the house.

Understand that, for your tradesmen, yours is just another project and that expecting them to work weekends and long into the evenings is often unrealistic and even unfair, especially if the delays aren’t of their making.

And set realistic timelines when booking tradesmen. For example, we don’t have a bottomless supply of great kitchen fitters, able to drop onto your project at the drop of a hat. If we’ve booked a fitter for a certain date and a client then needs to delay that, he will probably be committed to another project. And that’s besides the possible loss of earnings caused by the delay.

Consider using a professional project manager

Next, depending upon your experience and time available, as well as the scope of the project, consider using a project manager. The cost of employing one may seem prohibitive, but, in our experience, the best-run projects have a good project manager running things and they almost invariably pay for themselves over the course of a project.

A good PM will reduce the risk of things being built wrongly, items being ordered incorrectly or too late and will coordinate the timings and activities of the myriad trades on site so that things happen as efficiently as possible. We'll be writing a separate blog on this subject, so will leave it at that for now.

The value of relationships

If there’s one aspect of house projects that people probably under-appreciate it’s the value of relationships. Most obvious are the direct relationships that you have with your builder, project manager, kitchen or interior designer and so on. These are crucial and it’s important that you choose people whom you trust and with whom you feel you can work for a prolonged period under what may be, at times, stressful conditions.

But the unseen relationships that they (your builder, project, kitchen designer etc) have with their tradesmen and suppliers is equally important. When all the things mentioned above go wrong, they may be able to fall back on tried and tested associations to resolve them as quickly as possible.

As a kitchen business, we value our key suppliers hugely and invest time and energy in sustaining these relationships. These connections are a hidden “added value” element of our service and allow us to call in favours when things go wrong: the same goes for the relationships enjoyed by builders and others.

It’s an area where you may feel you can cut costs e.g. using a cheaper window supplier rather than the one recommended and used in the past by your builder. But we have seen this go wrong many times, when delays occur and neither you, nor the builder, has a previous relationship with them to fall back on.

So, by all means choose to use your own suppliers and tradesmen, especially if you have used them previously. But remember to ask yourself, if things go wrong, how hard will they work to accommodate you and help to resolve issues? And don’t dismiss using recommended businesses and people without understanding the hidden benefits that they may bring.

Communication

Finally, we wanted to end with a piece on communication. We’ve touched a number of points so far and they can all, invariably, be helped by clear, open, honest and timely communication. It’s not always easy - people have different perspectives, prefer different styles of communication, use different words to mean the same thing and the same words to mean different things. People make mistakes, forget to pass things on, drop balls and the contents of a telephone call aren’t always followed up by something in writing. Clients and tradesmen (as well as kitchen designers and project managers!) are human.

There is no silver bullet when it comes to communication. Whereas many clients are used to sitting at a computer, experienced at using Excel and using project management software, many tradesmen have neither the skills or time to devote to documenting things in this fashion. A smartphone, old-fashioned diary and a notepad may be the best you can hope for. And (with sincere apologies to any tradesmen who find themselves reading this!) not every tradesman has the diligent approach to communicating with their clients that their clients might wish for...

So pick up the phone, follow up with an email or WhatsApp message and don’t be afraid to check and double check the plan, dates and timings.

We hope you’ve found this useful. If you’d like to know more, or would like some help designing your kitchen, utility, boot room or any other space with cabinetry, please do get in touch via our Contact Us page. And, regardless, good luck with your project!