‘Uh-Oh’ Remodeling Moments and How Pros Handled Them
See how pros stayed calm and came up with smart solutions to keep their clients happy and their projects on track
Sometimes a remodeling project goes off without a hitch. Other times, not so much. In fact, the latter is more the rule than the exception. So many details, processes and people need to align during a renovation that things are bound to be a little bumpy. There are tense moments, unhappy clients, measuring mistakes, delayed shipments and sudden discoveries behind walls and under floors that inevitably end with “uh-oh” escaping from someone’s lips. But quick thinking, confidence in one’s experience and just good old-fashioned gut instinct can help turn these trials and tribulations into positive outcomes and learning experiences. Here, we revisit some “uh-oh” moments featured in our New This Week column and show how pros handled the situations for the better.
It’s also important to stay calm and focus on solutions so clients will trust that everything will work out. That’s what designer Sarah Dane-Brown did when the posts for the kitchen island shown here arrived wrong. “They were only finished on two sides, so I had to reorder,” she says. “Customers always hate it when something like this happens, but what I like to say is, ‘Something is going to go not as planned.’ Every designer and contractor experiences this. It’s how you handle it. Kitchens are not as mathematical as people think. There are so many layers of materials, talks and decisions that no matter how diligent everyone is, stuff can happen. Just solve it and move on with love and good humor.”
Rolling with a problem is helpful no matter how disappointing the mistake is to you and your client. For example, when a massive slab of honed Calacatta Oro marble — one that designer Julie Brown of Brownhouse Design and her clients had spent nine months looking for — broke within the first 10 minutes of installation on the kitchen island shown here, Brown remained calm. “It was toward the end of the project, and every finish in the kitchen was selected around it,” she says. “Our hearts sank immediately, but after calling around there were plenty of other options that could work, just not how we planned. It’s really important to stay flexible at every turn.”
Designer Mary Beth Childs of MB architecture + design remained positive when the tile for the shower surround in the bathroom shown here was originally installed in the wrong direction. “While the homeowners took it in stride, they very much wanted to go with the initial design look, which is what the final layout ended up being,” she says. “It was a moment when everyone could have been upset and fingers pointed, but all involved came together and made it work for the clients.”
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2. Dealing With Unexpected Discoveries
All the planning in the world won’t always prepare you for what might await behind walls and below floors. Especially with older homes, those on the renovation team often hold a collected breath when they’re opening up a structure. Problems with broken plumbing or damaged structures can catapult a client’s budget into the stratosphere and put the renovation in jeopardy.
Again, having a conversation upfront with clients about these kinds of game-changing discoveries will help ground the project in reality and keep the team active rather than reactive should an unfortunate problem arise.
Designer Joe Chiavaroli of Core Remodel experienced this situation when renovating a bathroom in a 100-year-old house. “Once you start demolition and open up walls that have timber framing and layers of plaster and flooring, you just have to be prepared for the unknown,” he says. “We had to completely reconstruct two of the four walls, reconstruct the ceiling so that we could correctly vent the exhaust fan, and completely replace a window that had wood rot. All of these little obstacles can be easily repaired and corrected; it just takes more time than originally expected. The owner was made aware of these potential issues and delays prior to construction starting, so it was not a huge surprise. The job was a great success because the owner’s and contractor’s expectations were both realistic.”
All the planning in the world won’t always prepare you for what might await behind walls and below floors. Especially with older homes, those on the renovation team often hold a collected breath when they’re opening up a structure. Problems with broken plumbing or damaged structures can catapult a client’s budget into the stratosphere and put the renovation in jeopardy.
Again, having a conversation upfront with clients about these kinds of game-changing discoveries will help ground the project in reality and keep the team active rather than reactive should an unfortunate problem arise.
Designer Joe Chiavaroli of Core Remodel experienced this situation when renovating a bathroom in a 100-year-old house. “Once you start demolition and open up walls that have timber framing and layers of plaster and flooring, you just have to be prepared for the unknown,” he says. “We had to completely reconstruct two of the four walls, reconstruct the ceiling so that we could correctly vent the exhaust fan, and completely replace a window that had wood rot. All of these little obstacles can be easily repaired and corrected; it just takes more time than originally expected. The owner was made aware of these potential issues and delays prior to construction starting, so it was not a huge surprise. The job was a great success because the owner’s and contractor’s expectations were both realistic.”
Thinking quickly can make a huge difference too. When designer Melinda Woodruff of M Woodruff Design learned that plumbing in an unlikely spot meant she couldn’t remove the bulkheads in her client’s kitchen, even though an initial assessment had ensured her that she would be able to, she jumped into action. “I immediately put a hold on the cabinet order and revised the design to incorporate shorter wall cabinets and a taller, stacked crown molding to accommodate the plumbing,” she says. “Major crisis averted.” Indeed, the photo of the kitchen shown here ended up becoming the most-saved kitchen photo uploaded to Houzz in 2020.
But sometimes you just need to account for what insurance companies refer to as “acts of God.” For designer Kelsey Haywood of haywoodmade interiors, that realization came when she was renovating a Chicago kitchen one summer. “We had a lot of rain and some really nasty storms that knocked out power to the carpenter’s shop where the painted panels were drying,” she says. “The heat and humidity kept the paint from hardening and drying the way that it should have. What resulted was a delayed install, which had strategically been planned for when the clients were out of town, and the need to replace panels due to chipping. The moral of the story is that you can plan for everything, but there will always be something unexpected.”
3. Making Hard Decisions
Nobody wants to be the one to delay a project, create more work or increase costs. But sometimes you’ve got to make the hard decision so your client will be happy in the long run. Your client might view a mistake now as one that’s not worth fixing, but it’s important to emphasize that even a minor frustration with a material, color or product could compound over the years into something that’s a constant daily frustration. And nobody wants that. So it might be best to make the tough call and initiate the correction, even if it means a major setback or extra cost. As changes are made, it’s a good idea to keep a paper trail of all decisions. (Houzz Pro makes this easy through a dashboard you can share so that clients have a centralized record of all documents and the communication history for their project.)
Designer Lisa Janzen of KC Interior Design and her clients had selected a metallic glass tile backsplash for the kitchen shown here. “But when it got installed, you could see the trowel lines of the mastic behind it,” Janzen says. “We had to rip it all off and source a new glass tile that had a completely opaque painted back so you couldn’t see the mastic. We ended up with a white tile that blended in with the upper cabinets, but they still had the bit of gloss and shine we were looking for from a glass tile.”
Nobody wants to be the one to delay a project, create more work or increase costs. But sometimes you’ve got to make the hard decision so your client will be happy in the long run. Your client might view a mistake now as one that’s not worth fixing, but it’s important to emphasize that even a minor frustration with a material, color or product could compound over the years into something that’s a constant daily frustration. And nobody wants that. So it might be best to make the tough call and initiate the correction, even if it means a major setback or extra cost. As changes are made, it’s a good idea to keep a paper trail of all decisions. (Houzz Pro makes this easy through a dashboard you can share so that clients have a centralized record of all documents and the communication history for their project.)
Designer Lisa Janzen of KC Interior Design and her clients had selected a metallic glass tile backsplash for the kitchen shown here. “But when it got installed, you could see the trowel lines of the mastic behind it,” Janzen says. “We had to rip it all off and source a new glass tile that had a completely opaque painted back so you couldn’t see the mastic. We ended up with a white tile that blended in with the upper cabinets, but they still had the bit of gloss and shine we were looking for from a glass tile.”
Designer Carmit Oron faced a similar dilemma during the renovation of her client’s kitchen shown here. “After the countertops were already installed, we realized the store we bought the slabs from accidentally ordered the wrong material,” Oron says. “At that point, the slabs were already cut and glued to the cabinets. That was a frustrating moment, because we knew that first, replacing the slab will delay the project; and second, we were afraid that taking off the countertops might damage the island cabinets. At the end of the day, we decided to go back to the store and ask them to order the original slabs. After a long week and a half, we got the right slabs installed without damaging the cabinets and were thrilled to see the outcome. That made a huge difference in the final look.”
And designer Gina Holz had to make a difficult, quick call for the kitchen shown here. “When the kitchen cabinets were first designed, there were actually more upper cabinet doors than there are now,” Holz says. “It’s a large kitchen with an enormous amount of storage. When I saw how many doors were on the upper cabinet area, I felt dizzy.
“There were too many of them, and they were on the small side. I found it to be visually overwhelming. I also knew that the more cabinet doors we had, the more cabinet pulls we would need to buy. My biggest concern was really the size of the doors. You would have to open two small doors to get out one plate. Nothing about it felt good to me.
“We made a last-minute design change to all of the upper door cabinets in the kitchen. We cut the amount of doors in half and made them wider. This was a massive improvement both to the form and function of the space.”
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“There were too many of them, and they were on the small side. I found it to be visually overwhelming. I also knew that the more cabinet doors we had, the more cabinet pulls we would need to buy. My biggest concern was really the size of the doors. You would have to open two small doors to get out one plate. Nothing about it felt good to me.
“We made a last-minute design change to all of the upper door cabinets in the kitchen. We cut the amount of doors in half and made them wider. This was a massive improvement both to the form and function of the space.”
More for Pros on Houzz
Read more stories for pros
Learn about Houzz Pro software
Talk with your peers in the Pro-to-Pro discussions
Join the Houzz Trade Program
The biggest source of “uh-oh” moments seem to come from mishaps during ordering, measuring and installing products. Someone mistakenly orders the wrong product or material, or the supplier ships the wrong one. Someone miscalculates a measurement. (The Houzz Pro room measurement tool can help you avoid this.) Or something gets installed the wrong way.
Designer Alison White of Blu and White had this happen when working on the laundry room shown here. “After most of the wallpaper was installed, we realized we were one roll of wallpaper short,” White says. “We called the distributor to rush-ship us one more roll, and he told us he wasn’t sure he would be able to get another roll! Thankfully, he was able to find one and rush-shipped it to us (and at a cost that far exceeded the cost of the paper itself), but we learned the importance of ordering enough — and extra — the first time. It would have been a disaster if the paper was on back order or we couldn’t get an extra roll. Better to have it and not need it than to not have it and need it.”
The point is, always recheck orders, measure twice (or more) and thoroughly consult your design plans before installing anything. But also understand that mistakes can happen even with careful planning. And it’s always a good idea to have that conversation with clients before work begins. Assure them that you’ll do everything in your power to deliver a smooth renovation, but also let them know that you will have a strategy in place should any issues arise.