Home renovations are big projects that take plenty of consideration and planning. Most people don’t think of them as easy. But modern tools and technologies used by some contractors that help make the entire process nearly stress-free.
In addition to the new technologies available, there are steps you can take as a homeowner to help make your home improvement easy here in Washington State.
BuilderTrend
One of the biggest headaches of many home improvement projects is in keeping up with the schedule of work, and what is actually getting done. Working with contractors on small details and having people come in and out of your home can be downright stressful.
BuilderTrend is an online construction management system that allows the homeowner and contractors to connect on all the important details over one shared platform. It was designed to map out project schedules, management concerns, and the daily happenings onsite. As a homeowner, you will never be ‘out of the loop’ again when using BuilderTrend. You can access updated pictures, and see an overview of exactly where the project is on any given day.
You can also reach out to your team at any time, with any questions or concerns. BuilderTrend makes home improvements easy because you can find everything in one place. Even if you’ve been busy with your own life all week, you can easily check the status of progress in a couple of minutes.
One Click Contractor
Another major stressor during home improvement projects is keeping finances and paperwork straight. Knowing where you stand financially during a project and with a contracting company is crucial to continuing work. Stressing about invoices and costs can be overwhelming, to say the least.
That’s where One Click Contractor comes in. It’s an online platform designed to make one of the biggest stressors of home renovation easier, on both the contractors and the homeowners. One Click Contractor was designed to gather all of the important documents into one, easily accessible place. There, you can find digital estimates, invoices, and all other paperwork for easy reference.
Not only is it good to always know what’s going on, being able to pull up important paperwork like this at a moment’s notice is incredibly convenient. If you’re looking to start an easy home improvement project in Washington State, look for contractors who utilize both of these time-saving and convenient websites.
Other Ways To Make Home Renovations Easy
Using BuilderTrend and One Click Contractor can eliminate many of the stressors that come from home improvement projects. However, there are a lot more ways you can make renovations simpler for yourself and your family.
Store Project Materials Offsite
Consider is storing your furniture or valuables offsite. Covering furniture with tarp or plastic can minimize potential damage, but accidents are inevitable. The best way to guarantee that your belongings stay in perfect condition during a renovation is by moving them elsewhere. You should especially consider this if you’re taking on a larger project like a full kitchen remodel. If it’s a smaller project, you could consider moving things to another room or basement during construction time. Having an unobstructed workspace is a clear way to enjoy an easier home improvement experience.
Get Out Of The House
When construction is taking place, your house can look unrecognizably messy. It can stress most people out, so the best solution is often to just leave and let the professionals do their jobs. What looks like a mess to you, is something that contracting teams deal with on a daily basis. Instead of becoming overwhelmed by the sight of it all, getting out of the house will bring you some much-needed peace of mind during a big life change.
Stay Flexible
There are many ways to make home renovations easy, but there are still aspects of it that may overwhelm you. Home improvement projects often involve time-consuming planning and tough decisions, and you may second guess yourself often. The most important thing to do is take deep breaths and plan things out well. Make sure you have solid plans and decisions in place before beginning construction. Start by consulting with an expert contractor in your area.
Of all the many ways to make home improvements easy, the best advice is to stay flexible. No matter how well you plan, unexpected things are bound to happen, and your schedule may not line up as perfectly as you hoped. As long as you trust the contractors and utilize the online platforms they offer, you’ll be a big step closer to having the home of your dreams.
Owning a home means having a hundred potential projects. As years go on and families grow, finding the right time for these projects can become daunting. But it’s best to look at home upgrades as fun things that will benefit the whole family. And some can even improve the value of your home in the long run.
Here are a few examples of home upgrades in Washington state that the whole family will enjoy and appreciate.
Adding a Deck
When you add a deck to your home, you’re expanding your living space with endless entertaining possibilities. A grill and outdoor table can mean great summer barbecues. A raised fire pit can mean evenings roasting marshmallows and telling stories around the fire. You’ll have a go-to destination for outdoor dinner parties, birthdays, and hangouts for you and your family.
Adults will often enjoy a quiet place to sit and enjoy the outdoors, and the kids will often enjoy having a place to hang out with their friends. A deck is truly a home upgrade everyone loves.
In addition to the practical uses that decks offer, they can also maximize a home’s exterior appeal. Depending on which home upgrade specialists you work with, you can end up designing and creating a really beautiful space that will make your home look great. This can increase your home’s property value significantly.
With the help of a good decking company, installing a deck can be a fairly easy upgrade that the entire family will enjoy for many years to come.
Most homeowners think about how they would renovate or improve their home, sometimes even before they move in. There’s a lot of home improvement work you can do on your own, but these 6 renovations would greatly benefit from the help of a professional.
Home improvement TV shows and online DIY videos can make it seem easy to do major renovations, but what they don’t show could cost you. What those TV shows and videos don’t show you is how quickly things can go wrong, and how expensive those mistakes can be in the long run.
If you’re considering a home renovation project, these are six projects that you should hire a home improvement contractor for. They include roofing, siding, windows, decking, bathrooms, and kitchens. Everyone wants to design and build their dream home, but don’t let that dream turn into a nightmare. Let the professionals get to work on a job you can trust to be satisfied with.
Roofing
A well-built roof will last a very long time, but not forever. Damage or deterioration to your roof can lead to serious problems if left untreated. Roofing is a complicated job, and one of the most dangerous parts of home renovation — especially for amateurs. It’s also not as routine or cut and dry as you may assume. Tons of unexpected issues can pop up that a professional would be able to recognize immediately, but would slip past untrained eyes.
Roofing requires lots of expensive tools and attention to detail. Don’t risk your life by trying to do it yourself. If you hire a home improvement contractor, you can rest assured that the job was done correctly and that the pro did everything they could to optimize the longevity of your roof.
2.Siding
Replacing old siding can seriously improve a home’s overall curb appeal. It’s a great project that all homeowners should consider eventually. Doing it yourself, however, is not as simple as it looks. Siding takes lots of tools, equipment, and manpower to execute. On top of that, there are tons of technical aspects to the job that look easy, but are very complicated to implement correctly. You need to have background knowledge on mold, water damage, and pest damage if you come across it, and how to properly fix it.
It’s best to hire a professional home improvement contractor to get the work done for you, especially if you’re not an expert. You will not just save time and money — potential buyers can often recognize work that’s done professionally, and work that’s done DIY. Take great care in finding who to hire for home renovation before getting started.
Windows
New window installations don’t just look good, they will also make your home more energy-efficient, lowering overall costs. Many newer brands of windows are also built with UV ray protection that protects you and your things from the sun’s harmful light, making them a great long-term investment. Installing them yourself, however, is not as simple as it seems. Underlying issues surrounding your window frames are likely to occur, and you’ll need to be equipped for them.
It’s not just a matter of taking one out and putting another in. Ensuring that they’re properly and safely fitted and sealed is critical and takes professional craftsmanship to execute. Let a home improvement contractor take over to save you the headaches.
Decking
A deck is a wonderful way to better enjoy your property outdoors, spending summers with an outdoor barbecue or sipping drinks. While decking may seem like a fairly straightforward DIY job, there’s a lot that can go wrong. It’s not just ‘design and build in a weekend’ — you will potentially face ground issues, safety concerns, and everything will need to meet the right building codes. Even if you’re an expert DIYer, you’re not likely to finish the job within a reasonable time frame without the manpower.
No one wants to end up with a half-finished construction zone leading from their backdoor. Hire a home improvement contractor to ensure the job gets done efficiently and professionally.
5.Bathrooms
Remodeling a bathroom gives you the chance to replace old pipes, tiles, and fixtures that have run their course. They are perfect home improvement investments because they look great and can significantly increase a home’s sale value. There are tons of bathroom DIY videos online, but don’t be fooled — bathroom remodels take time and it’s easy to make mistakes cosmetically and structurally.
You need to ask yourself, do you really want to devote your weekends to work on the bathroom? Installing beautiful, new tiles is a tedious job that requires focus and craftsmanship. It can easily turn into a sloppy rush job if you need to hurry up and finish it to get your weekends back.
Pipes and fixtures are also tricky to install and easy to screw up. Hiring a professional home improvement contractor can save you time, as well as the potential of causing bigger issues than were already present.
Kitchens
Everyone can picture their dream kitchen. They’re the rooms we spend most of our time in, and are often considered the heart of the home. Remodeling an old kitchen can be one of the biggest home improvement projects a homeowner takes on, but also one of the most rewarding. Kitchen upgrades are some of the most valuable renovations you can make to a residential home.
We don’t need to tell you that kitchen renovations are complicated projects. Unless you’re a professional contractor yourself, taking on a kitchen DIY job is likely to be more trouble than it’s worth. It’s highly likely that you’ll mess something up and need to hire a professional home improvement contractor to fix things, so it’s best to just use one in the first place.
Planning your Home Renovation
Every homeowner should consider renovating at some point. Renovation projects increase curb appeal, sales value, and are an incredibly rewarding experience. DIY projects are fun ideas, but you will quickly realize that the details involved are not so simple. Not only can tackling your own home projects be dangerous, you can make costly mistakes that will set you back further than where you started.
Consider hiring professional contractors for your next home improvement project. Do your research when looking for who to hire for home renovation to find the perfect one.
Home improvement is a significant investment which—if handled properly—can improve both the value and the appeal of your home. However, if the job is done poorly, it can lead to years’ worth of headaches, exorbitant repair costs, and even lawsuits. You can spare yourself a world of frustration by ensuring that you work with reputable, reliable home improvement companies capable of completing the job to perfection.
1. Work Quality & Oversight
When you’re dealing with the best home renovation companies, the results speak for themselves. You can look at their past work and confirm that they’re capable of premium home improvements.
The first thing to consider is their level of experience and years in business. For example, Evergreen Home Exteriors & Remodeling hires master-level craftsmen who have a minimum of 10 years’ experience and a minimum of 5 years of home improvement leadership experience. That’s the kind of expertise you want when scouting home improvement companies.
Ask questions, read third-party reviews, and inquire about case studies and past jobs. The more you learn, the more confidently you can proceed.
2. Transparency & Communication
The best home improvement companies treat you as a partner and keep you in the loop throughout every phase of the project. You should have easy access to the project manager at all times, and they should be able to clearly articulate the status of the job at a moment’s notice.
If your home improvement team is slow to respond to calls and emails, if they’re not upfront about challenges or delays, or if they have long gaps in communication, these are serious red flags.
3. Material Selection
Some contractors will use cheap materials to cut costs, but these materials tend to degrade much sooner and never offer the level of stability that you need. The top home renovation companies are diligent about using premium-grade materials.
For example: if you’re having an extension built on your home, a cheap contractor might use 1/2-inch drywall sheets instead of the much stronger 5/8-inch sheets. While the difference might not be noticeable at first, it will become painfully apparent when the ceiling starts to sag or the wall takes some unexpected damage.
4. Trustworthy Estimates
While a home improvement company may not get your estimate exactly to the dollar, they should at least be in the ballpark. An experienced company will account for every factor that can influence the cost of a job, from the materials to the hours and the challenges that can potentially lead to delays.
Less reputable home improvement companies might give you a lowball estimate in the hopes of enticing you to sign on—knowing that the actual costs will be higher. A reputable company will give you an honest estimate every time.
5. Financing
If a company is hesitant to offer financing, it could mean a number of things. They might not be established or financially stable enough to manage financing, or they might be looking to collect the money upfront because they’re not officially licensed. At any rate, it’s potentially problematic for the buyer.
You want to work with a company that offers flexible and convenient financing. Not only does it ensure an easier transaction for you the buyer, but it’s an added vote of confidence that you’re working with an established, trusted business.
Go With the Home Improvement Experts
If you’re looking for a home improvement company that offers all of these qualities, we invite you to contact Evergreen Home Exteriors. We offer financing for 100% of our projects, we’re experienced and transparent, and we only use premium-grade materials.
Call or text us at (253) 313-7943 to schedule a free price estimate.
Whether it’s wrought out of boredom or the need to update your 1970s style kitchen, home remodeling is a part of almost every homeowner’s life. It may seem like a daunting task, but it’s one that millions of homeowners take on each year. Whether you’re just doing some siding repair or a whole home remodel, knowing where to start will save you time and money in the long run.
Your home remodeling process should be fun, creative, and exciting! It doesn’t have to be filled with complicated paperwork, difficult contractors, and months of endless construction. When you take the time to lay a solid foundation for your project, you’ll be able to relax and get the most out of your whole home remodel. So, where’s the best place to start?
Build a Detailed Plan
It’s easy to get lost in the complexities of home remodeling, but a little research goes a long way. Your first step should be to build a detailed plan of exactly what you want. Look up samples, blueprints, and find inspiration so you can effectively communicate your vision to your contractor.
If you’re doing a whole home remodel, you might want to look into the local permits and ordinances you may need to know before contractors start doing any work.
Create a Budget
This one may seem obvious, but home remodeling can get out of control…and fast too. Whether it’s uncovering new problems — like a roof that needs to be repaired — needing more materials, or even extending the project deadline, expenses can add up quickly. When you’re creating your budget, here are some helpful tips to keep you on track:
Lock in on how much you want to spend and don’t exceed it unless you absolutely have to
Set aside at least 10% of the budget for unexpected costs
Research and request estimates from professionals
Count the cost of all the necessary materials
Locking in the financial aspect of your home remodel or renovation will help the process go smoothly and help you determine what you can realistically get done.
Hire & Research Contractors
It’s easy to want to do it yourself, but at the end of the day, hiring the people who make a living doing home remodeling is the best way to go. That being said, you have to hire the right team. References, years of experience, certification of insurance, and payment plans are some of the things to keep an eye out for while doing a whole home remodel and figuring out where to start. While this step may seem like a lot of work, it’s well worth it. Plus, companies like Evergreen have already done all the research and leg-work. We have a broad network of licensed contractors who specialize in each aspect of home remodeling, from kitchens to decks, bathrooms, and more.
Ready to get going with Evergreen? Call or text (253) 320-5383 to learn about financing and schedule your free price estimate today!
