How to budget for home interior decor

Budget allocation

The first step is to allocate a budget to your home decor. Whether you’re building new or renovating, make a start by putting your ideas down on paper. List what you want to accomplish and what needs to be purchased in order to make it happen. Then, prioritise it; decide what the important items are and allocate budget to these things first. Whatever is leftover can go towards the smaller details and accessories.

Remember, it doesn’t all have to be completed at once. Yes, that would be nice, but you can ease the pressure of your budget by staging the project.

Also, breaking down the overall budget into smaller chunks for each room gives you a much better chance of staying within it. And it never hurts to have a back up so plan a contingency fund as well.

Using your existing furniture helps keeps costs down.

Surprisingly, enlisting the help of an interior designer can help keep costs in check. Their fees vary so ask at the outset. But once you’ve made an agreement and a budget has been set, it’s their job to give you what you want within your means. They often have access to better deals than you will get yourself in retail stores and their knowledge or where to find what is extensive.

Estimating the bigger ticket items

You can get some ballpark figures on things like cladding, flooring and painting at Builderscrack.co.nz using their cost estimators .They do vary widely from low-cost to extravagant, but at least it will give you an idea of where you’re comfortable before you go shopping around.

When it comes to renovations, according to this article from Westpac the average price across a whole house is around $2,200 per square metre. Updating kitchens and bathrooms and adding extra bedrooms offer a good return on investment when it comes to resale. But you don’t need to be driven by that if you intend to renovate for your own long-term comfort.

Keeping track of your budget

Once it’s time to get started, download our budget planning spreadsheet to help make the process easy and keep track of your spending. It’s easy to use and has a number of items already listed to get you thinking about what you might need.