Remodeling your home will disrupt your life. You will need to move things around in your home, or maybe move out altogether for a time. Depending on what the project is, you may have to set up a temporary kitchen somewhere, or stop using one of your bathrooms. You’ll need to make arrangements for Fido or Fluffy to be out of the way, and you’ll have to get used to living with more dust than you’d like. On top of all that, you’ll have workers trooping in and out, sometimes early in the morning, sometimes unannounced.

Of course, you knew all that when you decided to remodel, and because you will end up with the home of your dreams, it will be relatively easy for you to endure it.

Your neighbors, on the other hand, may not find it so easy to live with your project.

Look at it from their point of view: their nice, quiet, attractive neighborhood will become a construction zone, virtually overnight. That means a lot more traffic, trucks parked all along the street, more noise (again, sometimes early in the morning), and the addition of a lovely porta potti to your front yard landscaping. They may even be facing the loss of their view because of your new second story. All that, and they don’t even get a nice new master suite for their trouble!

Is it possible to do a major remodeling project AND stay friends with your neighbors? I say yes, you can, with a little help from your contractor.

I recommend you sit down with your job superintendent and discuss some job site issues before work begins. This is your opportunity to find out what he expects the schedule to be, including what days and hours workers will typically be at the job. Ask the super what his job site policies are for the workers. Are the workers allowed to smoke on the job? Will they have radios playing? Are they allowed to have their dogs with them at work (yes, some guys do bring their dogs to work with them!)?

If you are uncomfortable with any of the policies, or the lack of policies, say so right in the beginning. In addition, give some thought to how these policies will impact your neighbors. Maybe you don’t care about a loud radio playing during the day because you’ll be at work, but that neighbor home all day with a newborn might not feel the same way.

If you know of any neighborhood issues that might impact the super or the workers, make sure you share that too. Perhaps a neighbor needs to keep a parking spot open in front of their home for a private duty nurse, or the kids on the block are accustomed to playing basketball in the street after school. Telling the super about that early on will allow him to communicate to his workers to avoid parking in that spot and to be extra careful driving in the neighborhood after school.

Once you have a clear picture of the daily routine, I recommend you visit your neighbors and fill them in on your plans. Even better would be to have the contractor print up a letter, and distribute it to the folks most likely to be impacted. The letter should include contact information for the super as well as some info about the hours and job site policies. In my experience, providing this information to your neighbors will help to minimize the impact on them. In general, people are more likely to put up with some inconvenience if they know what to expect ahead of time and who to contact if they have a problem.

One last tip: don’t forget to invite the neighbors over to see the final result and thank them for their patience!

Tags: job policies, living near remodeling, Neighborhood remodels