Mistakes When Buying Real Estate

When you are looking at a home to buy in the type of real estate market that is today, (a market where there isn't a lot of homes for sale and the price of those homes has risen with the market demand) don't start projecting your dream home on to it.

What do I mean by "projecting your dream home" on a resale home? It means that you look at a home and you start envisioning all the renovations that you would do to it to make it your own.

Now this is a common practice with home buyers, to envision what a home could look like with some changes, but what starts to happen in a tight market (with limited homes for sale) is people start changing everything about the house.

Recently I have been asked for prices from people that wanted to buy homes that wanted me to give them a budget price on renovation work on older homes in the area. The problem is that its not just renovation work that people want they also want to add square footage so the budget price includes an addition. Additions are far and away a lot more money then most of the renovations that are asked for by the potential buyers.
In the end the budget ends up being almost as much as some of the houses that are for sale. These budgets run well into the hundreds of thousands and it ends up throwing a monkey wrench into the deal.

When you are looking to buy a home and you ask a contractor to work up a budget for you be careful what you tell them. If you tell them an endless stream of changes that you want to the house because that is what your dream is then they (the contractor) will work out the cost based on what you have asked for and that can end up being a lot of money all at once.

What you should be doing is putting them into 3 categories;

1. Immediate repairs. These are things that need to be fixed before you can move in or fairly quickly after you move in, these would be leaky roofs, leaky foundations, broken furnaces, broken windows, etc.
2. Updates and making the home functional. People are pretty resilient, they will adapt to pretty much anything but it doesn't make life easier or more functional. These things are new room layouts, moving the laundry room, new kitchen, new plumbing, new electrical, new bathrooms, updating insulation, refinishing floors, painting. Houses should be updated and renovated every 15 to 20 years, that's not just for resale but also because everything wears out and will need to be replaced. So unless you bought a house that had just been renovated then you have to figure on renovating the major areas in the house within so many years of moving in. 
3. Long term Plans. These are plans that will cost a lot more money then you are willing to spend, these plans can change overtime with your life. Examples of this are adding more square footage to the home (an addition). Or building a garage or carport on the property, also demolishing part of the house to rebuild it is a longer term plan. These big ticket items should always be considered part of the longer term, it allows you to save money and properly design something so that you get the most bang for your buck when you fully commit. Additions can a lot of times be added to your home while you still live there, to a certain extent.

If you were to take the rather large budget that you were given by your contractor about the house you want to buy and break it down into those three categories then you can see if spreading out the spending overtime makes sense when buying the home. After decades of spending money on it will you get your money out of it at the end when you sell it? Does spreading the money around for years mean that you can actually afford to spend that money? Do you want to spend that much money over a longer period of time or do you want to spend your money all at once to get it over with?

Deciding on what you want to do renovation wise will help clarify if you can afford to buy the home and also if the house actually will work for you now and in the long term.

Rob
Village Builders Inc.

5 Questions To Ask Yourself Before Starting Any Major Renovation

Before you jump head first into a major renovation on your home or cottage you should be asking yourself these questions, if you don't you are asking for trouble.

Can You Commit To A Major Renovation

Major renovations take longer then you think. The longer the renovation takes the more a lot of people become disinterested in it. Life can get in the way. Having major renovations is a big commit of you (the homeowners time) even if you have a contractor.

Can You Find A Good Contractor To Do The Job

In these busy times finding a good quality contractor to do the renovation for you is harder, the really good ones are usually booked and pretty busy. But if you star the process early enough and you look around for the right one you should be able to find the right contractor. Contractors will make time and space for you, as long as you appear to be serious about the renovation and you will be committed to having it done in a timely and efficient manner.

Can You Make Decisions In A Timely Manner

A good contractor will give you options on your renovations as the project proceeds. You the homeowner will have to make timely decisions or the project will come to a stand still. Some decisions will cost money others will save you money. Your ability to make an efficient decisions will help keep the project on schedule.

Can You Afford It And Can You Handle Paying For It

Renovations are expensive, the cost of labour and material has risen every year especially in the last couple of years. When you and your contractor figure out a budget you should add 10 to 15 percent on top for a contingency fund, this will allow for anything that was forgotten in the budgeting, changes to what you want and for fixing problems that are always found when doing major renovations. If you go into your renovation thinking that your going to be able to bring your renovation in under budget then your going to be in trouble.
The other problem some people have is that even if they have a budget they can't handle paying, renovations that last a long time require you to write a lot of cheques. You will be paying for things on the time. This can wear on a lot of people to the point were they come to a point that they just stop paying and the renovation comes to a grinding halt.

Can You Handle People In Your Home

Major renovations are invasive. You will have people (mostly men) in your home, their will be different people all the time as different sub-contractors come and go. In any renovation a good contractor will end up using up to 20 different subs. That's 20 different companies with 20 different sets of workers. Every sub will need access to a different part of your house. One thing you should consider is that you should move out during the renovation, this will help you if having people you don't know around you all the time.

Do You Know Why You Are Doing The Renovation

Sometimes people get it into their heads that their home needs to be renovated. This sometimes comes from what they have seen on TV or what their friends have had done. People get caught up in the "keeping up with the Jones", there neighbour got a new laundry room so they should too. Most homes that are older then 20 years usually need to be renovated, but its the amount of renovations that are needed is the big question. Everyone has a limited amount of resources that they can spend on renovations, you should make sure that you are spending them on the right ones.

Before you start any kind of renovation, or before you even start interviewing contractors you need to come up with a list of things you want to do to your home or cottage. From that you need to come up with a rough budget. With those two things settled then you can start the process of finding a contractor and planning your renovations. If you can't answer yes to all the questions above then you really should rethink having your home renovated.

Rob Abbott
Village Builders Inc.

Why Changing All The Windows In Your Home Is A Good Thing

When you are thinking about changing your windows and or doors in your home one of the most common mistakes people make is try to save money by only changing some of the windows in the home or leaving just one door.

Now there's nothing wrong with trying to save money when you are renovating your home but what people usually fail to realize is that all the windows and doors in a house where usually installed at the same time. They were either installed when the house was originally built or they were replaced at one point, usually all at once. That means that they are all the same age, if you are having windows replaced because they are starting to fail or nearing the end of their life cycle then you really should replace all of them at once.

Depending on which direction the windows or doors face in a house will depend on how fast they weather, this usually is shown on a window or door as the paint or colour fades or discolours. If you think that the windows on one side of the house have gotten to the point of needing replacement and not some of the others let me tell you what is going to happen next;

• Once you have all the new windows installed you will notice how different they look compared to the old ones that you left. 
• You will notice how much clearer the new ones are then the old ones.
• You will notice how much better they operate compared to the old ones.
• The ones you left looked good compared to the ones you replaced by now they look tired and old compared to the new ones.
• A couple of years will go by and you will notice that some of the old windows will start to fail and then you will have to start to think about replacing them.
• If will cost you more money to replace those windows then it would have cost you to replace them at the same time as the rest of the windows. Smaller jobs usually have a bigger markup on them because of the set up and clean up.

Instead of living through one renovation you end up living through two renovations. 

Sometimes depending on how much time goes by between the two window replacements is that the windows you have installed first are not available anymore and you have to replace them with different windows. This can make for an odd look from the outside when you have different style of windows that look completely or slightly different.

Another thing to consider is that a lot of times there are government grants or rebates for changing your windows and doors, by upgrading them so that they are more energy efficient. These are usually one shot deals and do not apply when you do it several times over different years.

Its always easier to get things done all at once, live through the noise and hassle of a renovation once and change everything, it might cost you a little bit more in the beginning but in the long run it will save you time, effort, money and a lot of headaches.

Remember to always hire a contractor that has lots of experience installing windows, this will ensure that your windows and doors are in installed properly and will come with the proper warranty for any future problems that could arise.

Rob Abbott
Village Builders Inc.

You Get What You Pay For-When It Comes To Renovations

Recently we completed a renovation for clients, it was an interior renovation only and mostly cosmetic.

We had to bring in Electrician and Plumbers and our own carpenters to a lot of the work, but when it came to us bringing in a painter the homeowner refused to pay the prices that we found for them. We got multiple quotes and the homeowner still believed that the prices were to high.

Once our work was completed the homeowner brought in their own painter to finish the job, a painter that they found that fit their smaller budget.

Later when I returned to talk to the homeowner and pick up the final payment I asked about how their painting ended up with the painter that they hired.

It didn't go well, to the point the homeowner had asked the painters to leave before the job was completed and they were now finishing the job themselves and actually repainting a lot of the area's that the painters had already completed because of the poor workmenship.

At the time when I had presented the prices to the homeowner they had made comments that "those prices are ridicules, its just paint for crying out load!"

Now I stood there listening to my client trying to justify to herself and (trying to justify to me) about her choice, but the bottom line is that she was now painting the house herself and if you look at the work that was completed by the painting contractor (that doesn't have to be redone by the homeowner) and the cost of the homeowners time and their own materials that they had to buy to finish the job, my painters were actually cheaper in the long run. That doesn't even talk about the wasted time from everyone involved and the job is still not finished.

The old saying "You Get What You Pay For" is true. There's a reason that some trades are cheap and other trades are not, one party is paying for quality professional employee's that take time to do the job right with a high degree of quality, the cheaper trades pay employee's less (because they have less experience) and want to get in and out quickly so the costs don't run up.

No matter if it's your contractor bringing you a price from a sub-trade or you hiring a trade on your own the lowest price is usually not the right choice, especially a sub-trade that is significantly lower then its competitor. There's usually a reason that they are cheaper and those reasons are usually not good for you and your home.

Remember You Get What You Pay For!

Rob Abbott

Start Looking For Your Contractor Now For Spring And Summer Renovations

Renovations going strong in a light winter season.

The skiing and snowmobiling might not be as good as you want it to be this winter with the lack of snow and the warmer overall temperatures but it has been good for construction.

With the lighter winter many people are not waiting for the spring to start their renovations, in fact it has been surprisingly busy this winter compared to other winters that were colder and with a significant amount more snow.

With the early interest and demand for renovations this winter seems to show that there will be a very busy year. Talking to other contractors in the area they seem to be experiencing the same thing. A busy winter makes for a busy spring which makes for an overly good year in construction.

If you are thinking about renovating this spring or summer then you should start looking for your contractor now as a lot of contractors are already booked through the spring into the summer with work.

Not only are the contractors starting to book up but the sub-trades are booking up as fast as well, this makes it even more imperative that you find your contractor as a good contractor will have a loyal number of sub-trades that will make room for them in their schedule no matter how far in advance they have been booked.

If you are serious about renovating this spring or summer then send me an email at robabbott@villagebuilders.ca or call our office at 7054663202 and lets setup an appointment to start the process before its to late.

Rob Abbott
Village Builders