LESSONS
Before you renovate...
Take some time to think about it
Y
ou don’t want your house f lip to f lop do
you? So if you are the kind of person who
would rather buy a property to renovate it
and turn it into your dream home and are insistent
on doing it on your own, hold on a minute and
think about it.
Unless you have experience in construction:
brickwork, laying foundations, breaking down walls,
feeding electrical cables through roofs and walls you
should seriously reconsider. (Unless of course you
simply plan on repainting, knocking a few nails in
the walls then by all means go ahead.)
But for those who are gung-ho on doing some
serious breaking down and building up, it is highly
recommended that you pay the experts to come in
and do what is required. Especially if the house is a
really old one, to take it upon yourself will not only
cost you thousands - if not hundreds of thousands
of rands more than you had budgeted- but it will
take a lot longer than anticipated, will create great
amounts of tension and frustration, may even
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Residential Handbook 2014
become inconveniencing and could even be unsafe
for your family and will possibly kill any dreams you
had about your perfect home.
Homes needs certif icates of compliance for
electricity, geysers, electric fencing, bug clearance
certificates are also necessary to ensure that all is in
working order and within the regulations of the local
council, messing with any of that could end you up in
serious trouble with your local municipality.
In addition, it would be wise to double check if for
example, you plan on adding a pool to your property,
or want to run electrical cables through a wall or
part of the roof, \