What Could Impact Your Home Renovation Plans

Thinking of renovating or extending your house?

Home renovations range from minor cosmetic touches, like repainting a house, through to bigger changes, like redoing paving and constructing pergolas and verandas. Then there are more major changes, such as extending the house by adding additional bedrooms, bathrooms and garages. More complex and major changes could include structural changes and even adding an additional upper floor.
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There’re restrictions which could limit what you can and can’t do and what you can change in an existing house. These include:

• Physical restrictions which include:
  • The location of sewer pipes which could be in the way of a planned extension. The location (including vertical alignment) could impact where new bathrooms, laundries and kitchens can be added and even the position of toilets, bathtubs and sinks.
  • The layout of the current house.
  • The structural integrity of the existing building. You might not want to spend lots of money renovating a house that's structurally in a poor condition. Or, certainly take into consideration the cost of repairing and making good structural problems.
  • The design of the existing roof. Modifying an existing roof on a house is often costly and can result in leaks and colour and material differences. Extending an existing house is cheaper and easier if it can be done without altering, or tying into the existing roof.
  • The materials incorporated in the existing building. Can you match them? Are they still available? How do you join the new to the old?
  • The topography of the property. Sloping sites require level areas to be created for the extension, which require ground excavations or filling with earth.
  • The house foundations under the existing walls. These foundations may prohibit, or make it problematic, to add on another floor or storey, or could make it difficult to relocate internal walls.
  • The location of the current building on the property. Is there space for the planned extension?
  • The current architectural design of the house. The alterations, changes and additions should generally match the existing architectural style of the house, or the existing style (interiors and exteriors) need to be modified so there’s a coherent design flow. For instance, adding a modern cutting edge extension to a Victorian existing design in most cases will result in a mismatched poorly coordinated design. So matching a modern extension with an existing vintage house could require extensive modification of the existing fixtures, fittings and finishes (at additional costs) to maintain continuity. Having said this though, clever architects have managed the transitions with sympathy and good effect.
• Local or council bylaws and estate rules will dictate how close you can build to the boundary. Sometimes it could even be restrictive on architectural styles, placement of windows, building heights, types of materials and possibly even colours.
• Heritage listing – Heritage listed houses limit what can be done on the exterior of the house, and in some cases, depending on the type of listing, could even restrict what can be done internally. Heritage listed properties can be very expensive to change.
• Neighbours’ objections.
• Access for construction.
• The requirement to continue living in the house.
• Your budget.

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​​For more valuable tips and advice read: 'An Introduction to Building and Renovating Houses - Volume 1 Hiring Contractors, Managing Construction and Finishing Your Home' and'Volume 2 Finding Your Ideal Property and Designing Your Dream Home'

​This is an extract from: 'An Introduction to Building and Renovating Houses Volume 1' by Paul Netscher. Available in paper or eBook from Amazon.com, Amazon UK, Amazon CA, Amazon AU and all online bookstores. To read more
​© 2019 This article is not to be reproduced for commercial purposes without written permission from the author.

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