Get To Know The Designer
With Covid-19, there have been long waiting times, shortages, and prices have increased for many different products and services. Even with all this, one of the biggest trends during the pandemic has been a home remodel. Luckily, we have Crystal Blackshaw of Crystal Blackshaw Interior in Chicago, Illinois, to give her tips on becoming the most successful with your home remodel in the time of covid.
Crystal Blackshaw has been doing interior design work in Chicago since 2006. She works with many vendors and contractors to ensure her client’s homes look their best and has even been featured in leading interior design publications like Elle Decor, Chicago Interiors, CS Interiors, and HGTV Magazine.
The three most significant issues with doing a remodel right now are increased prices for materials, a long lead time to get custom-made materials, and finding quality contractors to do the work.
How Remodels Have Changed Since March 2020
Since Crystal has established relationships with material experts that sell tile, bathroom fixtures, and other home remodel materials, merchandisers will email her to tell her that prices will increase by 4-10% with a lead time of usually a month. To help out with these price increases, Crystal splits her vendor discount with her clients.
Anything can help when there is a shortage of foam, lumber, warehouse storage, and freight shipping.
Crystal says she has been doing many more redesigns because the original layout will usually miss a critical piece after being presented to the client. To overcome this, Crystal says sourcing items from vintage stores and online marketplaces like Craigslist and Facebook marketplace can be an excellent way to keep costs low and keep the project moving forward.
For getting furniture, a sofa could be acquired in 2-3 weeks before covid, now that the shipping window increased to 22 weeks at a minimum. When you’re going through a remodel and want it to be highly unique, expected to wait longer for your materials to come in. Crystal does an excellent job setting expectations with her clients to let them know that prices are expected to go up while they work together and that patience is the key right now to get the project done.
The two most popular remodels during covid among Crystal’s clients are bathrooms and making a bonus room into something more functional like a playroom or office. People have been staying home more during the pandemic, and people should be expected to pay about 20% or more for these remodels. It also used to take a week to get a job done, but now clients should be expected to wait two months to get their job if they can land the right contractor.
How To Deal With Contractors
Right now, contractors are spread out pretty thin, and their subcontractors are not as reliable as before the pandemic. The lumber shortage is causing headaches since lumber prices increased as much as 400%. The prices are starting to come down, but it’s not like before the pandemic in acquiring material.
Most contractors want to get all the materials on hand before they start a project. Crystal Blackshaw states that it can be dangerous to start a project before all the materials are on hand first. If a contractor gets started on a project and is doing something like laying tile, running out of the material on hand may result in the vendor not having any in stock and could take a long time to get back in inventory. Then the customer has to live with a half-done bathroom until the product comes in or causes Crystal to do a redesign that will take more time and money to complete.
Since contractors are so spread thin, expect customer service to be unreliable. They are taking longer to communicate or not even responding to calls or emails. Crystal thinks part of this problem is that contractors don’t want to be constant messenger of bad news. It could also be because they are so overworked as well. When dealing with a contractor keep this in mind and ask them what is the best way to communicate with them.
How To Deal With Material Shortages
Coming back to the homeowner, they will be the ones that have to deal with all the supply chain issues with increased prices and longer wait times. Crystal has a client excited to get a significant bathroom to remodel started and has been waiting for four months now because everything hasn’t come in yet.
And when it comes to estimates from a contractor, they say the forecast is only suitable for 36 hours because materials are so volatile. A contractor doesn’t want to eat that cost and will pass it off to the homeowner. So if you’re going to do a remodel, you have to be patient with the process right now and realize something will change or there will be a setback.
As an interior designer, Crystal is responsible for budget tracking, sourcing items for the remodel, paying the vendors and using her discount for her clients, tracking shipping, and being a liaison between the client and the contractor. She wants to maintain quality.
Since Crystal finds unique pieces that will land her clients in the home magazines, one of her biggest headaches is items being damaged in shipping. If Crystal needs to get a mirror, she says it’s a 50% chance that the item will arrive damaged. Since there are many shipping delays, many more people are touching that box with the mirror in it. Shipping companies are probably just worried about getting the package to the next destination and are not handling packages with the most care.
These damaged pieces then creates another issue for remodels because if an item that took three months to arrived comes damaged, does the homeowner want to wait another three months or longer to get a replacement or find an alternative item that is going to cause a redesign and cause more time and money to do.
For the lumber shortage, Crystal said she would travel to nearby states like Indiana and Wisconsin to get the lumber required for the job, which takes time away from other parts of her business. If you’re looking to build a fence right now, expect to wait a long time because fencing companies are backlogged. Crystal is hopeful that some innovation will happen to find new materials like composite materials instead of wood.
When it comes to doing the remodels, Crystal notices that the trade work usually costs the same. It’s the materials that are increasing the project by 6-15% overall. To help cut down on the material costs, Crystal sources vintage items in her area because it’s better for the environment since she is either reusing, reducing packaging and shipping costs, or recycling an object that can be transformed into something that the client would enjoy.
Crystal says a great place to find reused or refurbished furniture items is to check out Etsy, Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, Chairish, 1stdibs, and eBay. They usually have an artisanal craftsman that bring to life to old pieces of furniture that would look perfect for a remodeled home.
How To Prevent Headaches During The Remodel Process
When I asked if the client are waiting for prices to come down, Crystal said it depended on the size of the project. If someone was willing to pay $10k for a bathroom remodel, that price might be $14k now, and clients are most likely to go through the project. But with more extensive projects that can increase by$20k or $100k, more clients seem willing to wait until prices come down.
When it comes to getting materials, Crystal’s most important tip is not to procrastinate. A person going through a remodel might have to spend $50k on materials in June to ensure that the job will be ready in September where all the materials are there to finish the job. And it’s essential to run the items by the contractor to make sure that they will fit into the location. For a remodel to go through, many stars have to align to avoid a nightmare situation.
How To Find The Right Contractor
Crystal shares her best tips to make sure the process goes as smoothly as possible in hiring contractors. The first thing to do is look at reviews and see if they have a portfolio of work. This way, you can see if they are legit and can offer quality work. It’s also essential to make sure the contractor is licensed and insured.
In Chicago, a lot of people get unlicensed and uninsured contractors to do the work. This can be a lot cheaper than finding a proper contractor who will get the proper permits, but the downfall can be if the unlicensed contractor does a lousy job. Suing them or fixing an issue can be nearly impossible since the courts won’t look at the case because the homeowner decided to save money instead of doing things correctly. This is also good for the contractor because if the homeowner doesn’t pay up, they can put a lien on the home, making it impossible to sell their home until the contractor removes that lien.
When the contractors are done with the job, Crystal recommends that you use everything to ensure it is working correctly, like a faucet, light switches, and cabinet doors, and to put in the agreement that the homeowner has a week to review everything before the final payment is delivered.
A homeowner will have to look at this remodel every day, and to ensure it’s perfect, give the contractors an incentive to finish the job correctly. So don’t give the entire payment upfront. Deliver a portion of the money every time the contractor hits a particular benchmark. Crystal said as a designer, she is not available to verify everything, and it’s up to the homeowner to give the final blessing. Crystal also recommends at the beginning to tell the contractor that you will write a review for them on any platform of their choosing (Facebook, Thumbtack, Google, Houzz, etc.).
Final Takeaways
Remodels are popular because people are staying home more because of the pandemic. Hopefully, if you decide to go forward with your own remodel, these tips will make the process easier and give you more clarity on what to expect.
If you’re in the Chicago area and want to do a remodel, make sure to check out Crystal Blackshaw Interiors, or you can follow her on social media on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest.
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