It’s a common problem among homeowners—you love where you live, but you know that you’ve outgrown your home. The home that was once functional, no longer suits your family and lifestyle and you’re continually finding yourself short of space.
For many homeowners facing this issue, a home extension is the perfect solution.
If you’re planning a home extension, the communication you have with your design and planning team during the initial stages of the project will have a significant impact on whether the finished home meets your design, budget and timeline expectations.
To ensure your communications with your home extension team are as effective as possible, try asking the following questions which can help you formulate the ideal design and establish clear expectations about how the planning and construction process will work.
1. How will the new extension tie in with the original home?
Achieving cohesion between the different areas of the home is a common challenge when adding an extension to an existing residence. For this reason, it’s important to carefully plan your design scheme, considering factors such as:
The colour scheme
Will you adopt a consistent colour scheme, or use a different colour palette in each area of the home?
Your choice of building materials
Will you need to source the same type of materials (such as floorboards, skirting boards, cornices, lights and window frames) that are used in the original home, or will modern variations suffice?
The type of fittings, fixtures and finishes
Will your selections be in keeping with the style of the existing home, or will you adopt different styling in the new extension?
While some homeowners want to create a seamless transition by replicating the style and finish of the original home, others prefer to draw a clear distinction between the old and the new by embracing contemporary styling in their new extension.
Your design team should be able to help steer the design of your home extension, including providing recommendations about which styling approach will be most effective at tying each area of the home together based on your individual preferences and the style of the home.
2. What features will add the most value to my home?
While every professional home extension should add value to your property, some features will add more value than others.
Features which commonly add significant value to a property include:
A new kitchen
Coined as the ‘heart of the home’, a new kitchen will make a big impact, particularly if the existing kitchen is outdated or poorly connected with the rest of the home.
An extra living space
Most families value having more than one living area.
A study or home office
As more families’ place value on achieving better work-life-balance, the option to work from a home office or operate a business from your home has become increasingly attractive to buyers.
An extra bathroom
Most of today’s buyers expect a free-standing home to have at least two bathrooms.
Additional bedrooms
While an additional bedroom may not add value to every type of home, an extra bedroom added to a two- or three-bedroom home in a desirable family-friendly location could add significant value.
An alfresco deck or terrace
An alfresco entertaining zone that draws a strong connection between the indoor and outdoor areas of the home is a highly desirable feature.
While these additions have the potential to add significant value to your home, the features that will add the most value will largely depend on the current market, the individual property and the existing layout of the home.
Additions like a swimming pool, bespoke or custom features, luxury fittings or bold decorative finishes may offer various lifestyle benefits, however, may not always add significant value to your home.
If you’re unsure if a feature will be a worthwhile investment or if it’s smarter to compromise on some costs, your design and planning team should be able to help.
While it can be easy to get carried away with grandiose ideas, you can use your design team as a sounding board to develop a realistic understanding of the various costs of construction and the value they’re likely to add while working within the constraints of your budget.
3. How involved will I need to be?
Home extension projects can be complex and require a combination of design, planning, construction and project management skills.
If you don’t have the necessary skills, experience or time to oversee the management of your home extension project, it’s important to clarify the various roles and responsibilities with your design and planning team early during the planning process, as not all home extension companies are the same.
While some offer an end-to-end design-and-build service where they will manage the entire project for you, others specialise in either design or construction services, requiring you to assume some responsibility for planning and/or project management.
Opting for an end-to-end design-and-build professional home extension company will ensure you have control over the design of your home extension, with relatively little involvement required throughout the construction process.
This model also makes it easier for the designer and the building project manager to collaborate at every stage throughout the project and provide more accurate quotes for the cost of construction at an early stage.
4. What assurance of quality can you provide?
Your home extension service is also required to provide some form of warranty as a guarantee of the quality of their workmanship.
The most common forms of warranty provided for a home extension include:
Maintenance period
The builder will agree to address any maintenance issues the homeowner notices after works are completed during the specified maintenance period.
Structural warranty
This covers any structural defects with the home extension during the specified warranty period.
Give Us a Call
At Bayside Extensions, we guarantee the quality of our workmanship by providing a 10-year structural warranty as standard with all our home extensions. Find out more about us, view our portfolio of previous extension projects or contact us to discuss your ideas for a home extension.
Book A Free Consultation Today
One of our experienced designers will contact you to discuss your renovation or extension.
