[Raiqi]

I know there are some previous posts about renovation contractors, but they all seem to be a year old or so, so I will ask again.

We are planning to buy a flat (and are totally fed up with the crap that estate agents seem to want to shovel onto us). We found one we like but it needs total renovation.

Can anyone recommend anyone or share their own experiences? I have no idea where to even start and want to (of course) avoid paying through the nose for it. My husband speaks Cantonese but I do not, so foreign or Chinese speakers are fine.

Cheers!

[Skyhook]

We fully renovated our apartment last year, we spent 3 months planning it, using our own idea's and contracting specific labour for each step. We located all of our tradesmen via the material suppliers, wall finishers, wallpaper guy who then introduced us to a guy who handled major bathroom / flooring and door framing skills.

It's a good idea to visit various material suppliers, get some samples of potential items to see how they look on site, also using decor books specific to the rooms you are renovating, especially colour combination books, to get a formal understanding of what will work, and what wont.

You can also get a lot of inspiration from Flicker interior design photo groups also, allowing you to print photos of ideas that you like, and then showing material suppliers what things you'd like to source.
Flickr: The Interior Design Pool

Once you have a style/ theme that you want to follow through out the home, it gets easier to match everything as a combination. Keep an archive of photos of the interior styles you have seen, and then order materials and get the sei fu to follow your instructions once they understand what it is you want to do.

Another rule of thumb is, its best to be there during the whole renovation while the tradesmen are on site and supervise their progress, you'll find if any mistakes are made, you can catch them on the fly, instead of arriving home later when its too late to recitify.

Our renovation was a total gutting job, but only took 7 weeks as we were very organised, and didnt conflict steps, thus avoiding doubling up work.

The hardest few days are when everything gets demolished and theres rubble on the floor,'dust everywhere, debris hanging, resembling a war zone, but things move along pretty rapidly, fear not, it can be a lot of fun..........

We are out Gold Coast way, but depending on what part of HK you are i can list some streets where a number of renovation material suppliers are located and you can start planning some ideas.

Good luck

[Raiqi]

Wow! What a comprehensive and useful response! Thanks - glad to know that someone out there has done this successfully and are happy with the results! We are planning on moving to Hong Kong Island side, but are trying to keep costs down as much as possible. I have been sourcing materials but am a little concerned still about the contractors - neither of us have much experience dealing with contractors and are worried about the first steps. We do have a friend who is an interior designer who has promised to look over things as they progress and give us advice on the whole process. that should help I hope!

[KnowItAll]

We used someone called Mable Lo for our new office.

VERY efficient, speaks good english (and does not charge gwailo rates) and finished the job on time and on budget.

mablelo17@netvigator.com

[rani]

Mabel told me she does mostly residential properties.

[Skyhook]

Originally Posted by Raiqi

Wow! What a comprehensive and useful response! Thanks - glad to know that someone out there has done this successfully and are happy with the results! We are planning on moving to Hong Kong Island side, but are trying to keep costs down as much as possible. I have been sourcing materials but am a little concerned still about the contractors - neither of us have much experience dealing with contractors and are worried about the first steps. We do have a friend who is an interior designer who has promised to look over things as they progress and give us advice on the whole process. that should help I hope!

The suppliers typically have their own list of installers, specific to their products, its not generally difficult to locate sefu's. All you need to do is measure the area's and then calculate what you need.

I'd start with the bathrooms and Kitchen first, we had a dedicated hot water pipe brought in from the bathroom into the kitchen, that run off the new electronic temp programable hot water heater we had installed in the bathroom. The secondary electric water heater in the kitchen was the first thing to go when it was gutted.

Get those rooms done first, when completed, shut the doors on them and then move onto the bedrooms and then work on your living area's last. Clean up as you go, as to avoid contaminating painted surfaces etc.

Flooring should be the very last things laid, as to reduce scratches avoiding heavy tradesmen traffic etc, once the place is at 90% finished stage, cleaned up, and all the mess taken away, then paint walls, lay floors, hang doors, add skirting boards, picture rails and door frames.

That was the order that we worked to.

I will send you a link via PM with some photos off my photo gallery to give you an idea.

We didnt use an interior designer either, it was entirely our own idea's from the onset. It might of also helped a little that we were in France a couple of months before we began renovations, which gave us some external inspiration, its very obvious we didnt follow any local HK fads in our design, that were popular here at the time..Especially the green glazed and stainless steel framed kitchen cupboard doors that were popular early last year. We went with timber instead.

Btw:

Lockhart Road from Causeway Bay to Wanchai has a myriad of shops that will have most of what you are looking for. It might also be a good idea to compare prices with Shanghai Street Mong Kok/Jordan and see if you can get a more competitive price on Kowloon side. Generally the case, especially on flooring, splash back tiles and bathroom sanity ware.
We ended up with a top spec Ikea kitchen, as we found it really hard to get HK kitchen makers to look outside the circle, and do something other than their basic line. It seems that whatever is the popular fad at the time is what everybody sells shop to shop, which we didnt like at the time. Ikea were pretty good, once they delivered everything, they took 3 weeks to deliver the rest of what wasnt during the first part of the install,which was my only gripe, but luckilly they delivered and installed the rest a week before our strict deadline. Things overall worked out well, with very little stress, it was all good experience..

[denisiel]

Very good info Skyhook. Would you mind sending your pictures link to via pm? I am trying to find ideas that work well for HK sized rooms and would love to see what you decided on. Enjoy reading your posts - thanks!

[Skyhook]

Thankyou deni,

you have mail btw

cheers

[blueagles]

hi skyhook, thanks for your detailed info...very useful. is it possible to send me the link of you renovation? thx for the flickr link...

[Pekkerhead]

I am currently using a local guy to do up a place in Sheung Wan. He's called Mr Wong and his number is 92869220. You will need to use your husband for communication. He is a tradesman, not a designer, so he can do all the physical work as long as you tell him what you want. And he will give you a local price.

I've used B&Q before (they have a design and fitting service) and to be honest they aren't worth the money. Expensive and a bit sneaky.