When most owners researching a major house remodel, they begin their search by Googling home remodeling contractors near me.
It is an obvious place to start since a professional remodeling contractor can answer your technical questions and you can vet them for the job at the same time.
Researching quarries for home remodeling contractors near me is just the first step in collecting information needed for both hiring a professional remodeling contractor and preparing for a house remodel.
The intent of this article is to share some of the important benefits of hiring home remodeling contractors near me and discuss the inherent risk of the remodeling industry.
Although we will start by explaining the size of the house remodel industry to give you an idea of how vast this trade market is so you might appreciate some of the challenges associated with hiring a reputable remodeling contractor.
Collectively the home remodeling services & products industry is estimated to produce nearly $500 billion annually by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.
This amount represents nationally all home improvement services and products. The home remodeling segment accounts for more than a quarter of this total.
The DIY retail market for materials and products represents another $840 billion annually according to Allied Market Research.
We will only focus on the Houston home remodel industry in this article.
The Houston house remodeling sector continues to grow at approximately 6% annually.
This is principally due to the growth in home equities and job growth in most major cities.
The owner’s emotional commitment to their house and a promising economy drives them to find the confidence to invest in their home.
The Houston home remodeling is estimated to continue its brisk growth as one of the leading national cities in this industry.
Houston is suffering from a shortage of skilled labor, rising material costs,s and a shortage of single family homes.
These market conditions make locating and hiring professional and competent house remodel contractors even more challenging than at any previous period of time.
Most homeowners do or should understand that home remodels contractors provide many benefits to them.
Some of the more important benefits are supervision, professional experience guidance, remodeling efficiency and ultimately saving money by avoiding costly mistakes.
We will discuss these benefits in detail and more importantly discuss why hiring home remodeling contractors near me makes financial sense.
Learn About the Benefits of Partnering with Home Remodeling Contractors Near Me
Benefits of Hiring Home Remodeling Contractors Near Me
- Qualified Professional Supervision
- Professional Adviser & Advocate
- Schedule and Performance Efficiency
- Construction Budget & Cost Management
- Mitigate Financial and Construction Risk
- Why Hire a Home Remodeling Contractor
Qualified Professional Supervision
Planning and managing a major home remodeling project is complicated and requires professional experience.
When a homeowner hires a house remodel contractor, they are expecting qualified and experienced services such as the proper material procurement, appropriate sequential scheduling, and the insight to anticipate situational problems.
Professional supervision also requires project quality control. The remodeling contractor is expected to establish performance standards and the tolerances for deviation with all craftsmanship.
Managing subcontractors and self-performing trades can be both time consuming and necessitate conflict resolution.
These matters take special skills to resolve issues without making them worse.
Your general contractor spends a good deal of time on all these items and more as part of the supervision services that they provide owners.
Professional Adviser & Advocate
One of the most overlooked benefits of commissioning a house remodel contractor is the professional adviser services that come with hiring an experienced professional.
These services address such matters as building codes, design ideas, material performances, value engineering, and cost option estimating for making alternative choices.
Having a professional construction expert on-site during construction mitigates a lot of potential risks as well as provides you with an advocate when dealing with the HOA or building officials, as would be the case doing the DIY method.
There are also many potential cost risks associated with a home remodel. The main difference between new home construction and home remodel is the unconcealed unknown factors that occur during remodeling.
When your contractor opens up concealed conditions like walls and foundations, the code requires them to bring the condition up to the current code.
This can cause unexpected costs and difficulty in compliance with the newly publish building codes.
The cost surprises are usually the responsibility of the owner. So, finding a cost effective and code compliant solution is always in the owner’s interest.
Schedule and Performance Efficiency
There is a critical path to each major house remodel project. It may be materials or it can be an actual construction task.
Identifying these early in the construction schedule is essential for being efficient. The selection of subcontractors can be a significant event in the success of job site efficiency.
Selecting a subcontractor that either performs poorly or does not respond to the urgencies of a schedule can also result in cost overruns and disrupted project performance.
There is a central relationship between the construction schedule and subcontractor performance. A poorly developed construction schedule can have a profound effect on the subcontractor’s efficiency and profitability.
If a subcontractor consistently is frustrated by the prime contractors’ poor scheduling and the negative effects it has on their profitability, they are not likely to want to continue to work with that general contractor.
Construction Budget & Cost Management
One of the critical elements of residential construction management is the creation of a home remodel budget that is accurate and reflects the product selections and architectural amenities of the project.
This is the very reason that a homeowner should not hire the cheapest home remodeling contractors near me based on the bid alone.
Hiring an ill-equipped house remodel contractor can actually lead to an incomplete construction budget, higher construction costs,s and a high probability of questionable results.
All major house remodel projects should have a detailed budget that is structured by essential tasks line items.
Managing the remodeling budget is all about managing construction costs. Managing construction cost is not just about finding the cheapest materials or labor.
Construction cost management is a balance of performance efficiency, quality workmanship, and the associated cost.
This can also be referred to as a cost-value relationship. The cost value relationship is an essential cornerstone to the optimum performance and long-term value.
If an owner or their remodel contractor does not see the value in a particular product or skilled labor function, there is little likelihood that they will select the source or item.
Mitigate Financial and Construction Risk
A house remodel is risky both financially and from a construction error perspective for both the owner and the owner.
There are many things that can go wrong and escalate to consequential damages as a result of one construction error or omission causing multiple errors to be compounded.
Most remodel contractors have been trained on how to mitigate risk through contracts and financial structured payments.
Owners are typically not trained in such areas of expertise. These issues can potentially wipe out any possible savings from a DIY.
Other common construction risks are the mishaps that can happen with subcontractors like personal injuries or nonperformance turmoil.
Maintaining subcontractors’ insurance information is essential to avoiding the insurance exposure of an injury on your property.
Nonperforming subcontractors create many complications when the owner is seeking to fire them and hire a different subcontractor.
Although this appears to be a simple matter, depending on the contract and settlement resolution, these terminations can result in legal disputes that become very expensive.
This is the very reason that hiring a home remodeling contractor for a project is such a good idea.
Why Hire a Home Remodeling Contractor
Many homeowners understand the benefits of using a house remodel contractor but are reluctant to hire a professionally qualified contractor due to the additional cost of the general contractor’s fee.
Depending of the actual project the remodeling contractor’s fees will traditionally be in the range of 20% – 30%.
Although the consequences of using a cheaper general contractor or not using one at all can lead to project mistakes and subcontractor rework that will rival the original contractor fees the owner wanted to avoid.
In addition to budget blow-outs, there are a host of other negative consequences that increase in probability.
Unwelcome results such as the project schedule doubling, unintended damage to adjoining finishes and poorly executed work fails to provide its intended service.
These all result in anger, frustration, and a great deal more expense than was intended.
Thoughtful consideration and decision making are required when preparing for a home remodeling project in Houston.
Aligning the owner’s interest with the house remodeling contractors’ interest will result in a much more pleasant experience and better project performance results.
Conclusion
House remodel contractors fill an extremely critical role for owners that are rarely taken into consideration.
Having the expertise to sequentially progress a remodel project from design through completion without a serious event requires years of direct experience.
Having a professional remodel contractor in your corner for a major home remodeling project will likely save you money in the long run by avoiding the long list of unfortunate things that can occur during a remodel project.
