Home Renovation in Vancouver

Phasing work around occupancy

Two models. Move out and do everything at once, which is fastest, cheapest per unit of work, and requires somewhere to live. Or stay and phase it, which costs more overall — trades return repeatedly, protection has to be set up and taken down each time — and lets you spread the cost.

If you stay, the rule that makes it bearable is to keep one bathroom and one functioning kitchen space intact at all times, and to seal work areas properly rather than optimistically. Dust travels far further than anyone expects, and a zip wall and a taped-off return grille are the difference between a renovation and living in one.

Staging a budget across seasons

Sequence by weather and by consequence. Exterior work — roof, siding, windows, decks — belongs in the dry months and should generally come first, because there is little sense finishing interiors under a roof you intend to replace.

Then services: anything involving rewiring, plumbing or heating, which is invasive and wants doing before finishes. Then interiors, which can be done in any weather and can be paused between phases without leaving the house exposed. Budgeting across two or three years usually follows that order naturally.

Structural changes and engineering

Removing or altering a load-bearing wall needs a structural engineer, drawings and a permit. This is not a step to skip: the contractor builds what the engineer specifies, and the drawings are what the inspection is against.

In older Vancouver homes, opening things up frequently reveals that previous work was done without any of that — a wall removed with a piece of dimensional lumber across the opening and hope. If we find it we will tell you, because it becomes your disclosure obligation when you sell and it is cheaper to correct during a renovation than as a condition of sale.

Heritage and character home rules

Vancouver and New Westminster both protect substantial amounts of older housing, and the controls apply to exterior alterations, street-facing elevations and sometimes original windows. What you may do at the back is often quite different from what you may do at the front.

There can also be incentives attached — heritage designation sometimes comes with density or tax considerations that change the economics. Establish where your property sits before designing, because a design that assumes replacement windows on a protected elevation is a design you will pay to redraw.

What this costs

Bathrooms $32,000–$78,000 · kitchens $55,000–$140,000

Multi-trade renovation, quoted from drawings with a fixed payment schedule. The range reflects specification more than square footage — the same bathroom can sit at either end depending on tile, glass and fixtures.

Materials are always separate from labour and passed on at cost. Quotes are free and written, and the full rate card is published rather than given out on request.