The Renovation Order of Work Nobody Tells You

Renovation budgets rarely blow up because materials cost more than expected. They blow up because something finished had to be undone.

The sequence

1. Survey and structure. Damp, roof, drainage, movement. Everything else is decoration on top of these.

2. Strip out. Remove what is going. You will find things; budget time for finding things.

3. Structural work. Walls out, steels in, openings formed, floors levelled.

4. Roof, windows and external envelope. Get the building watertight before anything internal begins.

5. First fix. Wiring, pipework, drainage, ventilation ducts, and any framing for stud walls. Everything that will disappear inside a wall.

6. Insulation and plasterboard.

7. Plaster. Then wait — new plaster needs weeks to dry before it takes paint properly.

8. Flooring substrate and screeds.

9. Second fix. Sockets, switches, radiators, sanitaryware, doors, architrave, skirting.

10. Kitchen and joinery.

11. Decoration.

12. Floor finishes last, or protected extremely well if laid earlier.

Where people break the order

• Buying the kitchen before the walls are final. Millimetres move. Order after the plaster is on.
• Decorating before the plaster is dry. Emulsion on damp plaster peels. Mist coat only, then wait.
• Laying the finished floor early so the site "feels done". It gets destroyed.
• Deciding lighting positions after first fix. Every downlight, switch and socket must be decided before the plasterboard goes on. Walk the room with a pencil and mark the walls.

Budget reality

Hold 20% contingency, not 10%, on anything older than 1960. Get three quotes, and treat the cheapest with suspicion rather than relief. Ask every trade what they need from the previous trade and when — the answer tells you your real programme.

What to do yourself

Stripping out, decorating, simple joinery, tiling if you are patient. Not: gas, structural work, consumer units, or anything that needs a building control sign-off you cannot obtain. Doing it yourself and having it fail a survey in eight years costs far more than the day rate you saved.