When you’re looking ahead to your home renovation, it’s exciting! It’s going to be wonderful, everything you’ve dreamed of, you’ll be so excited to rectify the problems in your home that you’ve been putting up with for years.
Decisions, Decisions
You have the funds, it’s finally happening. Then the decisions start rolling in like an avalanche. What is the scope of the project? What is your total project budget? Do you have a contingency fund set aside in case you run into unforeseen situations? Will you be moving out or staying in the same place during the construction? Do you have a design style in mind? Who will you hire? Which room will you start with? Do you have a target completion date? Have you picked out all of the finishes that will match with your design style?
Not a single question or decision seems easy or low impact. They’re all key, and represent a big financial investment that you hope to only have to make once. With the pressure of these decisions mounting, is it possible to make confident choices and actually enjoy the process of your project?
Big Picture
While there are never any guarantees, there is a way to keep yourself, and your choices, centered throughout the process of making many unified decisions: “working backwards.” The premise is simple but impactful. The better your end result is defined in your mind, the easier it is to guide each small choice to that final goal. It is like if you were to take a trip, it is best to figure out your trip destination first, then you can work through the rest of details.
Find Your Why
In her book, Revivify Your Home: Take Control of Your Home Improvement with Peace of Mind and Level Up Your Life author Grace Mase calls it Finding Your Why. She shares how she was introduced to the concept of Finding Your Why through Simon Sinek’s TEDx talk. Once you know your purpose, your motivation, and your why for embarking on your project, you’ll find your end goal that is meaningful to you. It will propel you to make confident decisions throughout your project.
In her chapter “Connect Your WHY/Fi” she writes,
“Anytime you ask a WHY question, you need to follow it up with more WHY questions until you arrive at a specific (and often simplified) WHY. This process helps you quickly go from general to granular— and you can usually get there by asking five WHY questions. (See? WHY/FI!)”
You want your end result to be beautiful, yes, but dig deeper. Asking a series of 5 why questions helps you do just that. You know you can’t wait to get X Y or Z changed . . . but why? Here’s the example Grace shares to give you an idea of how it might go.
Statement: I want to renovate my kitchen and make it bigger.
WHY 1? Because the kitchen is too small, and I want more counter space.
WHY 2? Because I feel cramped, and there’s not enough space to prepare a meal. I’d like to have a more open plan kitchen.
WHY 3? Because I want to fit more people in the kitchen comfortably.
WHY 4? Because I enjoy preparing meals and spending time with family and friends, especially while cooking for them.
WHY/FI = Create an open plan kitchen to prepare meals with at least 10 people I care about so that I can spend quality time with them, create new memories, and improve the quality of our lives together.
Read the full Revivify Your Home book if you’re interested in more professional and first hand guidance through your life-changing home improvement journey. In the meantime, you can use a tool like our free Revivify Your Home workbook to work your way down to the important answers.
Confident Choices
The more work, details, and understanding you have of what’s important to you in your end result, the easier it will be to guide yourself through each decision as it arrives. The benefits of keeping your end goal in focus are reducing stress, potential conflicts, and frustrations Furthermore, it keeps your decisions on track, while it reminds you of what all your hard work will result in.
Better Collaboration
Having a detailed final goal also improves your communication and collaboration with your Pro. The better you can define what is absolutely key to realizing your dream remodel, and which aspects you’d like input or new ideas on, the better they know how to help with their expertise. Throughout every phase of decision making, you or your Pro can always use your end result goals to recenter the conversation and realign your thought processes and manage expectations.
Knowing yourself and your big picture goals also helps BEYREP’s smart matchmaking technology match you with the Pro who best shares your priorities.
Work Backwards
This process can work on phases of your project as well as the project as a whole. At any stage, at any question that you’re getting bogged down on, recenter to the end result for that question. If you’re getting to the finishing touches of a room, go back to the elements of the design that tugged on you the most.
If you spend your time delving into your deepest wants and needs for your end result, you can spend your project confidently making the decisions that will take you there, one choice at a time.
