Once you’ve decided to conduct a whole-home renovation, start by making a list of the home improvements you want to make. Prioritize them because unless you’re among the one percent of the nation’s wealthiest citizens, you’ll handle the renovation one project at a time.
You might think that once you find a terrific general contractor (GC), you finished your search, but it doesn’t work that way. Although your GC will work with you on project planning and design, you’ll have a bevy of home improvement companies to hire, and which types you need depends on the projects you want to accomplish.
Your general contractor will typically recommend specific sub-contractors, but most GCs work with a few companies that perform each specialty. You’ll still need to interview a few contractors from each specialty to find the right one for you. Let’s consider the most common service personnel used in a whole-home renovation.
Electricians
Do you dream of building a home office with a multitude of electrical outlets, so you can plug in every peripheral your computer has? If your current home office setup lacks proper lighting, you’ll need to update that issue, too. Both projects require an electrician.
An electrician would also handle designing a home theater room or a conference room for your home business. For any project that adds to the wiring or alters the lighting, you need an electrician.
Plumbers
You’ll need to hire a plumber if your home’s renovation includes adding a bathroom, powder room, washroom, or utility sink in the garage or your home workshop. Similarly, a plumber handles installing a jacuzzi or hot tub. (Only a pool installer installs a pool and we’ll cover that later.)
Other interior projects requiring a plumber include adding a kitchenette or a bar with a sink. If you want to add an outdoor spigot or shower, hire this service personnel.
Master Carpenters
During a home renovation, people typically add to their home the built-ins or spiffy features that they wish they had come in the first place. If you want to add built-in bookcases, desks, a bar, or custom closets, you’ll find a master carpenter on the list of home improvement companies to hire.
A master carpenter crafts detailed work and can handle delicate carving. Use one to create custom newel posts for your home’s staircase or a custom mantle for the fireplace. This home service can also build custom furniture.
HVAC Installers
Although it receives little thought during the typical home update if you’re planning a whole home renovation, then consider updating your heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system. When installed, your original HVAC design met the load needs of your home. Anything you change that adds space or changes use can alter your home’s load.
That means that without having a new load calculation and perhaps updating your current system, it won’t do the job anymore. Consider these HVAC-related items when conducting a whole-home renovation:
- Have an extra HVAC vent placed right over your computer so it stays cool while constantly running.
- Install vents to cool your utility room, mudroom, and Florida or summer room.
- Switch from an under-the-home system to an in-the-ceiling system. These attic/roof systems benefit from the attic insulation to perform better.
Flooring Services
One of the most common home improvement companies to hire, a flooring service provider, specializes in removing, installing, and/or refinishing flooring. Some of these companies only work with specific types of flooring, such as a hardwood flooring service or a masonry flooring specialist. You’ll need to decide what type of floors you want to install before searching for your flooring services provider. Typical flooring choices include:
- Wall-to-wall carpet
- Hardwood planks
- Laminate
- Glass tiles
- Ceramic tiles
- Bamboo planks
- Cork planks or tiles
- Cement flooring
- Masonry or stone flooring
- Vinyl or linoleum sheets or tiles.
Most carpet layers only lay carpet. Masons specialize in stone flooring, while general flooring contractors typically lay vinyl, linoleum, or various tile types.
Window Treatment Services
Window treatment companies handle installing upgraded windows for you. You choose from single-, double, or triple-pane windows in an array of styles. The window installer professionally installs them, as well as insulating around them to ensure no air leaks exist.
Because its work affects your home’s energy efficiency, consider this one of the most important home improvement companies to hire. Ask if you must purchase the materials through them or if you can buy them on your own. Some installers only install manufacturers for which they’re also distributors.
You will obtain the widest number of window choices from a window installer that lets you purchase your windows independently. If you want to install a bay window where you currently have a single-hung window, you’ll also need a master carpenter because the new window will require a larger size opening. This could require altering the wall’s support beams.
Roofing Services
Start your search for a new roof with local roofing contractors, but know that if you want a unique roofing type, you may need to interview companies from out of town. In most localities, you can easily locate a roofer that installs asphalt shingles on residences. As long as you want that roofing type, finding home improvement companies to hire locally will seem easy.
Finding someone to install metal roofing, clay tiles, and cement tiles proves tougher. You may also need to interview outside of your locality for a roofing installer of cedar shakes. Each roofing type requires special training and most roofers specialize, not only in the type of roofing, but in the manufacturer’s materials used.
The roofers often undergo training with the manufacturer to receive certification in installing their products. You’ll usually obtain both a materials warranty and a workmanship warranty from these certified installers.
If you want solar panels installed on your roof, you have many options. On the other hand, if you want a solar roof, you must go through Tesla and use one of its certified installers.
Gutter Services
Repair your roofing gutters anytime they incur damage because they provide important protection for your home’s roof and its foundation. When you renovate your home’s exterior, you may find you need to update your roofing gutters.
Your choice of gutter installation service may offer you additional choices in materials because some companies only sell their products through certified installers. This ensures their products receive proper installation, which can help reduce warranty claims.
Many roofers undergo training in gutter installation because the two services go together. This can make it easier to find home improvement companies to hire since you can kill two birds with one stone.
Although most homes use white roofing gutters and downspouts, this important home exterior feature comes in many colors. Most roofing companies that also manufacture roofing gutters do so in colors to match their roof shingles, sheets, or shakes.
Siding Services
Do you want to transform your home’s exterior using Hardieplank siding or a stone veneer? One of the home improvement companies to hire for your home renovation needs to specialize in siding installation. Similar to specialties in flooring and roofing, siding installers specialize.
Most siding installers complete jobs using standard plank siding – the kind that looks like painted boards from a distance. Today’s siding options offer you many more choices than that. Choose a veneer siding that looks like brick or stone. Other options include siding that looks like wood, such as cedar log veneer siding.
Landscaping Services
Start your exterior home renovation with a landscaping plan to obtain better overall results. The landscape architect typically draws a plan that not only maps the plants of the yard but also designs the hardscapes and outdoor living spaces.
Landscaping services not only design the yard but also purchase the plants and plant them according to the plan design. Although their plan typically shows hardscapes and outdoor living spaces, such as decks, they don’t build these. For these items, you need to hire other services.
Paving Services
Perhaps within your home’s landscaping makeover you also want to update or add to its hardscapes. Among the home improvement companies to hire, you’ll need to interview residential paving companies to find the right one for your project.
Some masons offer paving services, but others specialize in cutting and installing pathways, driveways, walkways, carports, and patios. Finding the right paving service can save you time because those that offer design and installation of multiple project types can speed up your exterior renovation.
Ask if the paving service also handles the excavation. When you lay a walkway or driveway, you must excavate at least four to six inches into the ground, similar to digging the area to lay a home foundation. If they don’t excavate, that’s another service team you’ll need to hire.
Fencing Services
When making over your home’s exterior, consider fence installation. Leave the chain link fences for industrial complexes and consider wood or masonry fences for your home. Some vinyl fence options look like wood from a distance but won’t rot over time.
When shopping for home improvement companies to hire, ask what types of fences they install and whether they handle the surveying work. If you want a brick wall or a masonry retaining wall, you’ll need to hire a mason. Most fence companies don’t complete that type of work.
Deck Services
Ask your landscaper for recommendations for deck building companies. Decks and patios come naturally as built objects in a well-manicured landscape. Choose from these home improvement companies to hire carefully since their work will add to or detract from your home’s curb appeal.
Avoid companies that only offer a few standard designs. If you must choose from a pre-designed deck, then you spend money to make your home look cookie-cutter. That’s the opposite of what a whole-home renovation should accomplish.
Garage Door Services
Don’t forget your garage door in your remodeling or renovation project. Updating the garage door on your home can offer a whole new look for your home’s exterior with only a small expenditure. Start with a garage door inspection to find out the condition of your current door.
A newer garage door that’s in good condition doesn’t require replacement to look new. You can have it painted or encase it in a vinyl wrap. Using the latter lets you turn your garage door into a seasonal showpiece for $50 to $100. Doing so also reduces the number of home improvement companies to hire for your project.
Pool Services
The last type of home improvement companies to hire, the pool services, actually refers to two types of service personnel. To install, repair, or update a swimming pool, you’ll either need above-ground or inground pool installers. Typically, inground pool installers handle the partially above-ground types of pools.
If you want an aboveground pool, you won’t need to have your yard excavated. Partially in-ground and in-ground pools require yard excavation. Unlike pavers, it’s a given that an inground pool installer does their own excavation.
The other type of pool service you will need, pool maintenance, doesn’t include specialties. All types of swimming pools require at least monthly maintenance. If you purchased a home with an older pool, have a cleaning service conduct a maintenance visit first. It may only need cleaning and sanitizing.
Composing the Team that Renovates Your Home
When your general contractor lists the many individuals they need to hire to complete your home’s renovation, know that they’re not padding things for their friends. Each city or municipality passes its own building codes. Among those include requirements for licensed, certified personnel and a permit for each type of task completed.
Your fence requires its own permit, while the changes to your electrical require another. Typically, your general contractor handles obtaining these permits. If you do the work project by project, when you interview each business, ask if they handle the permits. If they don’t, you will need to obtain each from the city before beginning work.