ID Hunting

Wifey and me had always intended to do minimal renovation to the house. We only had in mind to redo the kitchen and the 2 toilets. But after much pondering, feedback gathering and careful consideration, we decided that we should also redo the flooring as well as ceilings as doing this at a later stage would not only cause massive headaches, but would probably be more expensive if done on its own.

We began ID hunting approximately in July 08, by first visiting some ID firms in IMM. I've posted a review of the experiences below. As a starter guide to renovation, i strongly suggest that users first go through renotalk forums (www.renotalk.com) and read through all the relavant sticky threads that will give you a good understanding as well as an overview and feel of the overall Renovation process.

In the end, we took about a month and a half to finally settle on an ID that we were comfortable with.

A key consideration that we kept in mind during this process was that I would be away for a good 3 weeks while renovation was to take place and hence it was out of the question for us to hire a contractor. Furthermore, neither one of us had reliable contractor contacts nor prior experience with house-making. Being risk-averse, we decided that an ID was the best way to go and that hiring a contractor or sub-contractors to do up part by part would probably cost us more in the long run given the problems that arise from the lack of experience.

In actual fact, the renovation that we had in our head was not so much design heavy, it was just more construction heavy. We were not intending for our house to be designer level or anything but we did have some ideas of certain additions we felt like having. But due to the considerations I had mentioned previously, we felt that the additional expense we would have to fork out with an ID would in the end save us alot more. This is on top of all the heartache that could be avoided as well as the time that would be saved too.

Comparing all the quotations we had, we figured that the work we needed to do would roughly amount to somewhere between 25K - 35K. There were of cos IDs with quotations which said that the work i had intended to do would add to more than 40K, which we immediately ignored. I think a good rule of thumb would be to get a handful 3-6 quotations which fall within the rough budget and then from that handful dwindle down based on your comfort with the interior
designer himself.

Wifey and I in the end decided to go with Louis from Renozone because we were comfortable with him and we were confident on the quality of work and the delivery having known of the reputation of Renozone from the renotalk forums. I had initially intended to go with Colin, Colin was gracious and immediately called back to say he has too many projects on his hands and it would be unfair to us if he took us on. Instead, he asked if he could pass us on to Louis and he promised that Louis would deliver and do a good job. A combination of the turst we had in Colin and the belief we had in the firm from its reputation drove us to decide to go with Renozone. We then finally put pen to paper and hence stage II of our renovation journey commenced.


Review of ID's we visited (only the ID's we spent a significant amount of time with are listed here):

1. Inner View (Isasc)
Isasc was a good ID in terms of response. He was timely in his replies and got us our quotations on dates he promised. Our feeling is that he is more of a man handler and less of a designer. Refused to provide email quotations and always insisted on meeting in person. Overall, an ok ID.

2. City Design (Edwin)
Edwin is a DESIGNER and less of a contractor kind of ID. So if you want a house that is very stylish with lots of designer input, Edwin is your guy. This company has a weird style of working, they require you to commit a certain amount of money before carrying on to the design stage. I liked the guy and his ideas but he was just too expensive for the simple work we were intending to do.

3. Ideal House (Peter)
Peter is highy recommended. replied to my email and gave me a call. He is a nice guy who is not pushy at all. He lets you do what you want to do and lays it out straight for you. Seems like a sincere fella and i would have gone with him if his quotation was better. Still to expensive but highly recommended.

4. Renozone (Louis)
Vey jovial ID. Our feel is that Louis is less of a designer and more of a do-er. He is very easy to get along with and provides his inputs to try to keep cost low. He will work under your budget and offer alternatives to meet requirements. We went with his due to our confidence in the firm and the relative ease we are with him. Considering that our requirements are more work intensive and less design heavy we feel that Louis met our requirements. Most importantly, Loui sis experienced and i think he wil have no problems in terms of scheduling. Based on initial impressions, Louis works fast.