On your next large scale home remodeling project or major home addition, follow these tips to save lots of time and money. On a large remodeling or renovation job, the key is making existing conditions of the work area as close to a new home as possible. So if the home is empty; no animals, no kids, no people and no furniture, in other words, as close to the condition the builder would face when building a brand new home, the vendors and subcontractors will price the job with lower prices. This is because the hassle factor has been reduced. The vendors and subcontractors don’t have to work around the furniture and worry about ruining it, they don’t have to worry about keeping dogs and cats in the house when the workmen go in and out of the doors. They don’t have to worry so much about safety of the little kids, they don’t have to make sure the utitlities are on at the end of each day – the water, the electricity , the heating and cooling. So when we can get this type of condition, we explain to the vendor that they will be able to work faster and have fewer interruptions. Plus the construction workers are always trying to be friendly to the homeowners and visa versa, the homeowners want to be friendly to the workers. So what happens is that “hello” in the morning can turn into a 30 minute chat about what the worker thought about the Washington Redskins or Obamas State of the Union or about the pipe burst at the Shady Grove Red Line Metro Station. And the cumulative impact is that the job ends up taking longer. Now you might say what about the cost of moving out and fining a place to stay? Well you can rent a pod for I think $80 per month. Also, through good planning the home builder may be able to set aside certain areas in your home that are not being worked on and block those areas off by building temporary protective walls to move some furniture and store it during the duration of the job. Also, we have temporary homes that we put our clients in that we rent back to the client for $1500 or so per month. These homes are in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, McLean and Arlington (call and reserve these way ahead of time). We have seen jobs that we estimated 10 months to complete but where the client moved out and we saved 4 months of time. So when you net out the 4 months of interest savings on a construction loan and the lower unit prices from the vendors, against the cost of moving out, we’ve actually seen savings of $3000 or more. Plus lots of these homes that are being renovated were built prior to 1978 and have lead paint. So if you have little kids you really don’t want them exposed to the dust particles and it’s just a lot more pleasant not living on a “construction site” for 5 months. I always joke and tell our clients that they’ll live longer if they don’t live on site! So when you think about that, this tip is really priceless! Thinking of selling our home? Call 301-370-6463 – - We Buy Homes. We are now reserving construction starts slots for summer and fall 2010. Don’t miss out on these low interest rates. Email me at rob@paramountconstruction.net to get on our schedule.