Is it time for a new home remodel? For many homeowners, remodeling their home is a stressful event. Couples often experience marital strife during major home renovations due to financial stress, disagreements about things such as paint color, and the general chaos that tends to ensue when your whole life is turned upside down for weeks–or even months. While the end results are well worth it, you don’t have to suffer through months of stress and frustration while you renovate your home. Here are a few tips to help you emerge unscathed:

Plan Vacations Strategically If you’ve hired a contractor to oversee your home renovation, you can strategically plan a vacation around the time your kitchen or bathroom will be out of commission to avoid some of the headaches that come with a major home remodel. Plus, a relaxing vacation can be just what you need to take a timeout when the stress of your remodel starts to wear on you. However, if you’re acting as your own contractor, or aren’t confident that things will go as planned without your oversight, you’ll want to stick around.

Make Plans for Your Pets The upheaval that comes with a home renovation is stressful for many pets. If your pet is the anxious type, hire a dog boarder or pet sitter while your home is being torn apart. This will limit anxiety for you and your pet.

Expect the Unexpected Unforeseen complications can quickly increase the total cost of your home renovation, so it’s wise to plan for the unexpected. In general, add at least 15 percent to your total estimated costs. This cushion will help cover things like insect damage, water damage, or the unexpected cost of those chic backsplash tiles you just have to have. If you don’t end up using the extra funds, you can spend it on rewarding yourselves for surviving the remodel. In either case, you’ll avoid the panic that comes from being over-budget.

Plan Your Meals in Advance A good contractor will keep you in the loop: you’ll know when certain areas of your home will be out of commission. For instance, you should know if your kitchen is going to be gutted next week (and if not, you might reconsider your contractor). You can set up a makeshift kitchen and cook meals in advance that you can easily heat up in your crock pot or in the microwave. Of course, you can always choose to order take-out every night or hit up your favorite restaurants.

Home renovations often require compromise. You and your spouse or partner probably won’t agree on every single decision, like the backsplash tiles or the color of the living room walls, so going into a remodel knowing that you’ll need to be willing to compromise can make all the difference between a successful outcome and months of stress and conflict.

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