How to Determine Your Budget by DSD

What's your budget? What do you feel comfortable spending on this room? These are the questions that we always ask to our clients, many of which are unsure how to answer. Many times it's simply because you may not know how much things cost or you may not realize how many items you need based on your space. Well we're here to knock down that uncertainty and help you determine a budget that's comfortable for you!

Making your designer aware of your budget is very beneficial to you and the designer. If your designer does not get a firm budget from you, this will cause the designer to be unsure where to source from often leading to uncomfortable situations for you financially. The designer will then spend more time re-sourcing and you will end up being charged for more of their time. Once your designer knows a appropiaate budget, he/she will know which vendors to pull from based on quality and price point. This helps limit the amount of steps the designer has to do as well as the amount of time you will be charge for the design. It's a win/win!

To help determine a comfortable budget, we put together two variations of the same 216 square foot Living Room for high and low end products based on how we think it should be represented. Each Living Room checklist includes all items in which we consider to be a partial remodel. For example, we used new flooring materials, new paint with labor cost, and all new furniture, accessories, and soft goods. This is simple just a guide to help you understand what you may need and how to account for everything to make your space the best it can be. (see table below)

Keep in mind that all these items work together cohesively. Once items are taken out, you start to loose the overall look and feel of the space. It's best to understand that we, and most designers, are not trying to persuade you to spend more money, but simply trying to make you comfortable and happy with living in your space without any style or function regrets. We hope you take this as a guide in helping you and your designer get to a comfortable budget together. Enjoy!