Doing It Yourself
Before you definitively decide on when to start your project, you should understand hold supply and demand works. Supply and demand is one of the main factors in how much we pay for just about everything. What does this have to do with your renovation project? Those bathroom tiles you’ll be buying, or those new cabinets for the kitchen—and the labor to have the work done, if you’re not putting in the hours yourself—will cost you money. Just as school supplies are cheaper after the school year has starter, the price of building materials like paint, lumber and cement also changes depending on the time of year and the demand for that particular material.
How do you use supply and demand to get your materials cheaper? Plan ahead! Planning your project in advance means you can get your materials when they are at their cheapest and simply store them until you are ready to begin working on your home.
Using A Contractor
Not doing the renovation yourself? Paying for a contractor? Knowing when to renovate is not just about material cost but about contractor availability, too. Your contractor is more likely to make mistakes when he or she is juggling several other, similar jobs. Contractors have busy seasons where they are turning away work and times of the year when they can’t find enough. For example, renovating in the fall is different than renovating in the summer.
Depending on where you live, it is bad to enter some projects in the off-season. For example, installing a pool during a Colorado winter when there is snow on the ground is probably a bad idea. However, with some early planning and a little flexibility, you might be able to get your project in motion well before the main rush, allowing you to finish a little earlier and allowing your contractor to work more efficiently, as he or she won’t have any other projects to contend with. Since you’ll be providing work for your contractor when little is available, you are likely to get excellent service.