This is where your project begins – where your project is scoped, planned and designed.

This ensures the 5 key renovation questions are answered before your project begins, rather than when it’s too late and you’re knee-deep in the build process.

Through its unique series of 3 step-by-step reports, Betternest enables you to:

• Understand what you can do to your home in terms of planning and Permitted Development
• Create a unique design brief for your home
• Identify clear project costs
• Generate full project plan, including timelines
• Get a final masterplan of architectural drawings and documents ready for construction to commence

This process allows Betternest to deliver for you what a traditional architectural practice, cheap plans service or generic design-and-build company cannot.

The Qualify Report is the first of three steps in the Design phase.

Its aim is to help you (and us) understand the opportunities and restrictions specific to your home – answering the question “What am I actually allowed to do to my house?”

The Qualify Report ensures that you understand all of the development opportunities available to you so that you maximise the potential of your renovation project. It’s the perfect first step for any project and enables us to advise you on the best way to deliver your project by bypassing or negotiating the dreaded planning permission process.

Your Qualify Report takes just seven working days to complete. Your Account Manager will issue the report to you through your own online dashboard so that you can navigate through the 3D models instantly and download the report to your home printer. And when you have your Home Visit design session before moving on to your Analyse Report (see below), your Project Architect will bring along a professionally-bound copy for you.

Following the completion of the Qualify Report, Betternest highly recommends a Home Visit design session with one of our Project Architects.

The aim of the meeting is to discuss with you the findings of the Qualify Report and define a clear design brief which will form the blueprint from which your renovation project will grow. By focusing only on what is possible, no time is wasted exploring options which are not permissible – leaving you plenty of time to ask questions and give full input to style, features, cost and timeline.

If you want to make sure that you get real value from your money now, you have to make sure that you are not going to be changing your work again a few years down the line to accommodate bigger and better ideas. For example, this may mean understanding the best position for a downstairs WC which can accommodate more ambitious plans further down the line to convert, say, your garage.

Once we have formulated your design brief and captured all of your ideas, cuttings and web links we will issue you a document which summarises all of these objectives that you can then sign off.

Once you are happy that we have defined the problem perfectly we proceed with your Analyse Report, the second step in the Design phase.

The Analyse Report is a unique product in the market which really enables you to make that big decision on whether to proceed with your renovation project. It gives you the confidence that you have the design, costs and the timeline realistically pinned down, answering the following questions:

1. What will my renovation look like?
2. How much will it cost (construction, refurbishment and any other services?)
3. How much will my house be worth in the end?

The Analyse Report provides you with incredible value at a fixed price, whether you are just refurbishing one floor or planning a whole house renovation.

The central focus of your Analyse Report is an optimised design for your home. The design and the costs associated with it are neatly broken down into zones so that you can easily hone in on key areas and help you finalise your priorities. And we also include an independent assessment of the overall value the renovation will add to your home.

Having ensured your project now makes sense in terms of both ambition, design and budget, it’s in the final step, the Transform Report, that we really bring it to life.

This is where we begin to recognise the transition from design to reality. This aim is this Report is very much geared around setting you up with everything you need to proceed with the construction of your project – and also answers the question “How long will it take?”

This includes critical elements such as:

• Building Control quality architectural plans and drawings
• Plumbing and drainage schedules
• Lighting and power schedules
• Full bill of quantities of materials and components
• Project Plan with key deadlines and completion dates

The Transform Report offers excellent value. Unlike a traditional architectural practice, where your drawings are charged as a percentage of your overall project budget, your Transform Report is an affordable fixed price, so you know exactly what you’re paying and that, if your project budget increases, your architectural fees will not.

The effect of the Transform Report is to place you in a position where are fully ready to begin to move into the construction of your project – with full confidence that when building works kick off, we are in the strongest position possible to deliver to expectation and on time and on budget.