This the third post in our series of posts about our ongoing major home renovation. I've already written about mindset and about the demolition process. We also received a guest post written by my contractor which we'll publish in a couple of weeks. So what has been going on lately? Well, major grading has taken place, foundations have been laid, framing has been done, the roof has been put on, windows have been put in, and insulation has been replaced. But the last month or so of the project has been absolutely consumed by one thing more than anything else–making decisions.
Those of you who have built a house or done a major renovation know exactly what I'm talking about here. Everyone warns you about how many decisions you will have to make. I still severely underestimated it. Just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about, let me create a list just of what comes to mind in a couple of minutes as far as some of the decisions we've been asked to make in the last month:
- Where do you want outlets put in? Four outlets or two? With USB ports? Okay, let's go on to the next room.
- Where do you want light switches put in? What kind? Automatable? On motion sensors? Where do you want the sensor?
- What shower heads do you want? What kind? How high on the wall do you want them? One handle or two to work them? How far apart do you want them? Where do you want the lights in the shower?
- Should this door open in or out? Should the hinges be on the left or right?
- What size screen do you want in the theater? What shape? What type of projector? What brand? Can you tell the difference between this picture and this picture? And this picture? Do you want a 10 inch or a 12-inch subwoofer? Do you want atmos speakers? How many? Where do you want them? What kind of lights do you want in this room? 6 inch or 8 inches? How many? Okay, what about this room? And this room? Do you want speakers in this room too?
- Where do you want your hose bibs? How many? What about in the garage? Do you want hot water available at it?
- How many windows do you want in this room? What kind? How tall? How wide? Do you want them to open? How? Do you want automatable window coverings?
- Do you want this wall 4 inches thick or 6 inches thick? What about this wall? And this one?
- Where do you want to have hard-wired internet? Where do you want wireless hubs?
- Do you want cabinets here? How many? How tall? How wide? How deep? What about here, do you want cabinets here too? Would you like drawers under them? Three 12 inch deep drawers or two 18 inch deep drawers?
- What do you want on the floor here, wood, tile or carpet? What kind of tile? What color? What shape?
- How thick should the grout be?
- Do you want floodlights, can lights, or standard lights on the front of the house? Do you want them automated? Would you like to be able to turn them on with your phone?
- You have a 5/8 inch pipe here, the city thinks you should put a bigger one in. Do you want 3/4 or 1 inch?
- Do you want an icemaker? Where? What brand? Do you want it left or right of the garbage?
- Should this sink be 1/2 and 1/2, 70/30, or 60/40? What brand? What material? What kind of faucet do you want? What brand? What handle should be on the faucet?
- Do you want stone on the house? What color? What size? What material? Where on the house? What else do you want on the house? What garage doors do you want? What color window frames do you want?
New foundations
It just goes on and on and on and on and on. It was like a part-time job there for a while. Katie is doing 90% of it and I still spent 6 or 8 hours a week just making decisions and meeting with suppliers, the contractor, and subcontractors. It's absolute insanity, especially when you start driving around town to look at other houses so you can see what all these things look like when they're not on the showroom wall. For someone like me who dislikes shopping, it's like a trip across the River Styx.
We were lucky, however, because one of us cared a lot more than the other. I talked to one of my partners about a very minor remodel compared to this one that they recently did. The contractor came over and the two spouses got into an argument about the color of the grout in a fireplace. The contractor eventually said, “You guys work it out, I'll come back tomorrow.” And that was just one decision. Katie is much more interested in this process than I am. I would guess I don't care about 90% of the decisions. So I've told her about the ones I care about and let her make all the other ones on her own. While that does create a lot of work and responsibility for her, it is far better than the alternative of us trying to make every decision together. So far, she's only taken advantage of me once (she wanted a garage door with windows on it, she knew I didn't, and she just ordered what she wanted), but mostly it's worked out fine. Even the garage door I didn't care that much about.
The view from the recording studio
Since Katie is the one doing all this work, I thought I better get her in on this post, so let's go interview style!
WCI: Were you surprised by how many decisions there are involved in this process? What is the worst part of that?
Katie: I knew there were a lot of decisions that had to be made but was surprised by the sheer number of them. There are so many details that you take for granted and never really think about until you have to make a decision about them. I was also surprised by how concentrated time-wise the decisions were.
WCI: Do you like the fact that your husband is letting/making you make most of the decisions?
Katie: I don't mind it as it is easier to coordinate meetings with the general contractor and the various subcontractors when not trying to add another schedule into the mix. Jim also shops like a hunter which is to the shoot the first thing he sees and doesn't want to look at the various options so I can take as long as I need to peruse stone slabs, tile, etc. However, it takes a substantial amount of time and the pressure is on to make it all look good!
WCI: What have been the hardest decisions to make?
Katie: It's hard trying to coordinate all the various elements in each room such as countertops, flooring, cabinets, furniture, lighting, etc when you're picking them out at different locations and aren't able to get samples for them all. Sometimes it is hard to envision what a small sample of wood or tile will look like when it fills a room floor or wall. Many hours have been spent scouring the internet for pictures and ideas. Hopefully, it all works out when they are put together!
The boat garage below the new WCI office space, recording studio in front, Katie's office in back
WCI: What is the biggest disagreement you have had so far on the decisions?
Katie: Whether the garage doors would have windows or not.
WCI: Have you gotten the kids involved at all with these decisions?
Katie: They've had input on a few things but haven't been super involved.
WCI: Is it worth it to go through this process to have a custom-designed home rather than one someone else designed or a spec house?
Katie: I think we will really enjoy it when it's all done and is built to suit our wants and tastes. I just wasn't quite prepared for all the work and time required. I'm not a big shopper nor one to pay close attention to details in house designs so it is overwhelming at times.
WCI: What role has price played in any of these decisions?
Katie: Our contractor was very helpful in laying out reasonable budgets for each element based on the types of finishes he thought we would want so it gave us a good idea about what to expect costs to be. It's interesting that most of the showrooms don't show prices on the items. They have you pick out what you like and then you get the pricing afterward. Sometimes you go back to the drawing board to shave costs especially if you don't feel strongly about one option over another. In the end, we're building what we want as we don't want to do any more remodeling while we live in this house.
WCI: How would this process be different if your household income were still that of a typical physician?
Katie: We certainly wouldn't be doing this scale of a project and would have done any changes in phases — not all at once. The reality is this project is mostly about wants but the house is paid for and we've set aside the cash to pay for the remodel.
There you have it, decision fatigue and its consequences. It's a good thing we didn't have to make all of these in one day and that no one put them all together in one place or we would have never begun this project! Tune in next time for more adventures from renovation land!
Have you experienced decision fatigue from new home construction or remodeling? How did you handle making decisions with your partner? Share your story below!
Pretty hard to relate to this. We have to do a home remodel and make decisions like… where do you want the ramp. what kind of ramp. How wide do we need to make the doors for your wheelchair. Where do you want the elevator so you can get to the second floor in your wheelchairor do you want to transfer to a stair glide. Do you have enough function left in your arms to make the transfer to a stair glide? Is this contractor VA approved or not (Injured while serving in the U.S. Army Medical Corps).
I wish that I had your problems with your remodel.
Thank God every single day that you’re able to practice until you can make a decent living.
By the way…I strongly recommend young physicians take out WAY more disability insurance than they think they will need.
Insurance companies have a way of making you settle for less. While you are losing your house due to inability to make mortgage payments, the disability insurance company attorneys are drawing things out so you are forced to settle for a fraction of what you deserve. I’ve seen this happen to many professionals.
Sorry to hear about your challenges.
One nice thing about our “firepole shaft” is it is perfectly sized for an elevator in the future. A ramp in the garage would be easily added as well. Hopefully we never need either.
Most of these decisions could have been made in the design phase where detailed drawings and material lists can be created. If a vendor doesn’t show costs upfront I don’t use them.
The way our contractor does it all is that he takes the risk for the vast majority of the project (gave us a flat price up front) but some areas have “allowances” where he has estimated costs. For example, there is a kitchen appliance allowance. We are going to be under it I think.
But the cost of putting a light switch in is the same whether it goes here or there, and someone has to decide which place it goes.
Not normal
A paid off mortgage, more income from non-clinical work, renovations all at once with a boat garage, separate office and a recording studio with a Mountain View. I’d say you have arrived at the place your hard work, two jobs, investments and planning were designed for. Not to mention that you got there by helping others and have a generous “giving plan” for charities.
Congratulations to you and your family. I hope the renovations turn out for you. Once it’s all done and paid for it will have been worth it like most things in life that are hard.
I’m working our plan. When we sell our McMansion and downsize and pay off the retirement home in the mountains, we have renovations planned: new metal roof for the cabin and garage, redo the kitchen and master bathroom, new windows and upgrade the deck surface and railing. It’s a lot of work and decisions but I think the end result will be worth it.
Of course, as the first comment mentioned, health and ability are two of the most important things in life. One hopes to avoid injuries and disability. All the more reason to live each year like it’s your last. Once any project I’ve done was finished, I usually wished I’d done it sooner.
Whew! Sounds like a project I did where every step we thought ‘we’re almost done’. Had I known we were only about 5% or so further each time I thought that I would never have started!
Main reason we never built a house is in-laws’ experience- delays, promises not kept, builders disappearing as one company then reappearing as another one no longer responsible for any screw ups. Our main push here in AL past 14 years has been helping the economy recover. Buying new cars and putting in a pool didn’t do it, so metal roof, wooden floors and driveway followed. Lucky for hubby I did the floors while he was deployed.
I can absolutely relate to this, and feel for you. We just completed a major remodel as well. We bought the house specifically to gut and rebuild, so it was essentially a new build. It was a two-year process between planning/permits and construction. The sheer number of decisions required was indeed staggering, especially since each individual decision could involve wading through hundreds of options.
Two things helped us a lot in this process. The first is that my wife and I have very similar taste, so mercifully we tended to gravitate toward similar styles/colors. The other was that we used an interior designer to choose the majority of our finishes before construction even started. We found examples of what we liked and posted them in various “idea books” that the designers then used to put together each room. They basically narrowed the decisions down for us by presenting what they thought we would like. They were wildly inaccurate for some things like lighting (so we did our own searches for those) but overall they captured the look we were going for rather well. But having this done for us saved us probably hundreds of hours. Priceless!
Most importantly we also kept perspective—we knew that in the end much of this wouldn’t matter. We would be fine with whatever we ended up with because in the end a faucet is a faucet. Tile is tile. Very soon you forget what the other options even were.
We finally moved in two months ago. Would we do it again? Yes because we love the end product and look forward to watching our young kids grow up here. This is also our forever house so (hopefully) we will never have to do any of this again!
Good luck to you Jim. Yes it’s a ton of work but it will end eventually, and it will be worth it!
We thought about a designer. Can’t blame anyone for using one. While an additional expense, it certainly would have eased the decision making process.
I used a designer when I bought my house. It ended up cheaper than not having a designer because she received and passed along 10—20‰ discounts on almost everything.
Easy way to provide value if you can get discounts. Of course, that may mean the recommendations have a little bias/conflict of interest.
The division of decision making will pay HUGE dividends 10-15 years down the road.
I wish we would have decided this ……..
is much easier than
You didn’t listen to me, I told you that was a better choice.
The path not taken will come up. The decision maker simply says , I wish I would have choose the other option. Too bad.
I wouldn’t do it again. No such thing a perfection. Once is enough.
I always value and enjoy your posts, but not this one:
Building or renovating a house is a lot of work. I’ve done it. Embrace it and be thankful that you’re in the position to do this. A bit of “First World problems” syndrome here.
Sorry, but the post is a bit heavy on the complaining and the entitlement. I’m surprised by the content.
Sorry for all the whining. That’s how my contractor described the post too before we went skiing this morning.
OK, that is hilarious!
Very interesting! I greatly appreciate your willingness to share your experience with the remodel.
Your experience is perfectly typical. It’s also why I always have contractors provide a default decision / answer for every single question they ask. In the guise of having everything customized to your exact preferences, you’re somehow expected to know the consequences of every piddly decision. That takes an immense amount of upfront work – as you’ve already discovered. Imagine the contractor asking about insulation preferences, substrate materials and other physical building minutiae. Ugh.
The reality is the vast majority of these things fall into “it really doesn’t matter” for most people other than cost. You probably won’t agree with that at the moment, but will come around after doing this 3-4x. It would be awesome to have a magical piece of software that you click preference boxes and it instantly shows the absolute cost difference and timeframe, but I’ve yet to see that happen in reality.
How many of these detail items have you felt compelled to change after initially buying the home with no input at all?
Bet I dislike shopping even more than you. Thankfully, my wife actually enjoys making 98% of these decisions. We’re almost always on the same page (probably because I don’t care much), so my veto power is rarely exercised.
The “default answer” is a great idea. To be fair, my contractor has made a lot of those decisions for us. “This is what you’re going to want” etc. It also helps that he recently completed his own house two doors down with a lot of similarities. Made estimating costs much easier than usual.
I for one really liked this post since it showed me what building/remodeling feels like on the ground if you aren’t familiar with the process. Of course it’s First World Problems… that’s what this whole blog is about! No shame in that.
WCI, did y’all give any thought to going one step further and being (or have Katie be) your own general contractor on this remodel? Might sound crazy off the bat, but I’m reading _The Owner-Builder Book_ and it claims with good support that this will save 35% on average when building a new house and will allow for even more customization and potentially better quality work by subs since the GC (you) has real skin in the game. Of course, the downside is it requires 2-4 hours a day of planning and other work for at least 6 months.
Maybe I’m just getting burned out on being an EM nocturnist, but being my own GC seems like a decent excuse to cut down by one shift a week or so to save an equivalent amount of money on a new house (~$100k over the year that the whole project would take).
No way. We’re in the midst of trying to hire help to do what we’re already doing. It simply wouldn’t have been done if we had been the GC.
We’re not through the process, but I am VERY skeptical of the premise of the book. The relationship the GC has with the subs really matters.
I have much experience in starting projects and leaving them unfinished. Being your own GC sounds like a fantastic way to find out how much you don’t know about construction and leave it partially completed.
My MIL decided to fire the GC and do that part herself. She liked the way it turned out, but I think she drove the subcontractors absolutely bonkers.
I know you don’t want suggestions, but I can’t help myself: 8′ tall garage doors!
One of them is either 8 or 9. It’s tall enough to get the boat in though.
Get the WIDE garage doors!
One is already a double car and the other is wide enough for the boat. So I think I did.
Different doubles. Go WIDE. It’s not only getting in and out of the garage. An extra foot or two makes l, doors packages and loading so much easier was the point. I hate when 6” too far one way ends up with a tight sideways shuffle etc. Creates tight spots.
“Typically, two car garages are 18 feet wide by 20 feet deep. This is just enough to fit two cars in your garage. There are several other common sizes including 20 x 20, 22 x 22 and 20 x 22. Some of these sizes make it far more comfortable to open the doors of your car.”
Go for 22.
Too late to make any changes there. The doors go the whole width of the garage and I’m not going any wider on the garage. They’ll be wide enough for my needs.