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Do you remember how a few days ago I was talking about the importance of understanding your building?
Today I share a checklist of some of the external elements of your building that you should check before embarking in a refurbishment.
Why?
Because problems arising from the condition of the building fabric (roof, walls, floors etc) may prevent the enjoyment of your home.
And, since repairing of any of these would use part of your budget , you should know of them in order to either increase the budget or reconsider the overall scope of the works.
You will also need to decide whether to address them beforehand ( delaying the start of the project) or include them in the contract.
Either way, ignoring such problems could be very costly.
Please be.mindful that should your home be a leasehold, the maintenance and repairs of those might not be technically your responsibility , however, you should keep an eye on existing maintenance regimes to ensure they don't become a problem
Allow me to share a couple of anecdotes to illustrate the impact that lack of maintenance may have.
In two projects I have worked on in the past year , the lack of maintenance or the building gutters (by the building management) has resulted in damages to the properties of our clients.
In one of them, the problem was addressed swiftly and the damage was limited to a stain on the wall.
In the other one, the accumulated damage was such that the three apartments sitting on top of each other were affected. The lower one most of all with the owner having to do major repair works to address the water damage.
These situations can not only escalate to an expensive matter (which could put to the test your building insurance and relationships within the block) but they will impact on your daily lives .
To the above, I want to add a final though. No matter how much you spend refurbishing your home, experience teaches us that it is the intangible that can have the biggest impact in your enjoyment (draughts, dramatic temperature changes, noise etc). Be mindful .
Today I share a checklist of some of the external elements of your building that you should check before embarking in a refurbishment.
Why?
Because problems arising from the condition of the building fabric (roof, walls, floors etc) may prevent the enjoyment of your home.
And, since repairing of any of these would use part of your budget , you should know of them in order to either increase the budget or reconsider the overall scope of the works.
You will also need to decide whether to address them beforehand ( delaying the start of the project) or include them in the contract.
Either way, ignoring such problems could be very costly.
Please be.mindful that should your home be a leasehold, the maintenance and repairs of those might not be technically your responsibility , however, you should keep an eye on existing maintenance regimes to ensure they don't become a problem
Allow me to share a couple of anecdotes to illustrate the impact that lack of maintenance may have.
In two projects I have worked on in the past year , the lack of maintenance or the building gutters (by the building management) has resulted in damages to the properties of our clients.
In one of them, the problem was addressed swiftly and the damage was limited to a stain on the wall.
In the other one, the accumulated damage was such that the three apartments sitting on top of each other were affected. The lower one most of all with the owner having to do major repair works to address the water damage.
These situations can not only escalate to an expensive matter (which could put to the test your building insurance and relationships within the block) but they will impact on your daily lives .
To the above, I want to add a final though. No matter how much you spend refurbishing your home, experience teaches us that it is the intangible that can have the biggest impact in your enjoyment (draughts, dramatic temperature changes, noise etc). Be mindful .
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