What if we told you the most precious commodity wasn’t gold, diamonds, or oil.
What if we told you instead that everyday, you are given the most valuable resource on the planet, and everyday it was taken from you.
That means no deposits, no overdrafts or savings. What you don’t use, will be your loss.
If you haven’t guessed it by now, we’re talking about time.
It is the only one variable that we are all given the equal amount of on a daily basis.
How does this relate to interior design?
Interior design is a service based industry, which means we are here to SERVE.
Interior designers do not sell you designs, or furniture choices and definitely not “an experience”.
As a service provider, designers are actually selling you TIME.
Here are some of the ways an interior designer can save you time,
A SECOND SAVED IS A SECOND EARNED:
The value of art and design is subjective, but what we can all agree on is that time is money, and to pay someone else to do a job for you is more of an investment to your future time rather than an expense.
When you hire an interior designer that really understands your outcomes and can tailor to your individuality, its like hiring an architect.
Your not just paying for the carpentry design, color choices and material selection. Your paying for a streamlined renovation operation that ensures your designs can be constructed from start to finish. They are like the director of a movie that’s meant for you.
Not to mention that by handing over the project to a professional who can lead your project from start to finish saves you tremendous time and stress.
A lot of clients try to “save costs” by decentralizing and hiring separate companies for designers, contractors, cleaners and project managers.
This means that in order for you to check up on the progress, you’ll have to call multiple people to find out what’s going on, as well as getting mixed responses from each team.
On top of that, you can have instances where contractors may not able to construct the project your designers made, and each team will most likely not be held responsible for the work or mistakes of the others.
This in turn can cost you months in renovation delay as well as tens of thousands of additional costs to fix renovation mistakes.
By centralizing the operation and hiring one designer to manage the entire job, you can rest at ease knowing the person in charge in only a phone call away.
PICKING THE RIGHT DESIGNER:
This is super important, by delegating your entire project to one company that offers A-Z services, you’re basically putting all your eggs in one basket.
This can be risky especially when you’re building a premium property which usually involves a big budget.
Be sure to pick a design and build company that you feel can understand your outcomes and speaks your language.
You also want to be sure to vet them for quality and see that they have a legitimate history of successful projects of your taste.
You also want to make sure that they are easily reachable and you can contact them at any time.
The last thing you need are flaky and late responses.
Take our company Latitude Design for example:
By only delegating a handful of projects to our designers, we’re able to maintain quality control and build close relationships with our clients.
This lets us fully understand their outcomes and what are the things most important to them, which is why we are able to create projects that reflect their inner worth and success.
By honing in on individual projects, our designers are able to break down the running costs down to the last millimeter and create a streamlined operation, like an orchestra of drills and hammers: everything runs like clockwork.
You want to be able to find a company that can offer you the same kind of attention and involvement.
On a side note, always be sure to ask for a few design proposals from your designer of choice before you commit to any monetary compliance.
Most companies should be offering this service free of charge.
FOCUS ON WHAT YOU DO BEST & DELEGATE THE REST:
There’s a lot of misconception going on regarding the narrative of art and design.
And I mean design in the general sense: architecture, graphics, painting, photography, illustration and even digital media.
The value of art and design is a subjective one. You can’t place a fixed price on something that appeals to some and not to others.
Everyone is entitled to price and spend on what they decide is best for them and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Hence why there are a lot of people who actually believe that designers are overpriced and that its ridiculous to charge millions of dollars on a painting or logo that took a few hours to create.
And while it might be difficult to agree on subjective value, there are a few undeniable factors that designers offer you:
- While it only takes a matter of days for them to complete your design, it took them their whole life to be able to do it in a few days.
- Peace of mind: knowing your project and money are in good hands, you can focus on spending your time on things that matter the most to you
- Multiplying your time: a renovation gone wrong can take months to complete, with a professional streamlined operation, it can be done within a matter of weeks.
- Save you money by preventing mistakes: interior experts have an extensive knowledge in their craft which was accumulated through years of making mistakes.
By hiring one firm, you not only get premium consultancy, but their insight will prevent you from making mistakes that can cost you thousands of ringgit to fix.
Another thing worth mentioning is price justification.
Sometimes clients are surprised to see that the designs they had in mind can be more expensive than they anticipated.
What you need to realize is that quality materials are not cheap, paying for top notch materials and craftsmanship can mean the difference between a 10 year property and 100 year property.
On top of that, these expensive quotations are normally going back into your property.
Meaning to say that 80-85% of a renovation budget goes to the cost of purchasing materials, constructing the project, paying workers and other business expenses.
Which means that the designers only make a net fee of 10 -15% of the entire project budget.
A small price to pay for peace of mind, project success guaranteed, and tons of time and energy saved.
Interior designers can also get you the best deals for your buck and can vet manufacturers and suppliers for quality due to their extensive insight in market prices as well as ties built over the years.
So it’s probably cheaper and safer to acquire everything through your interior designer.
And that fee doesn’t come without justification, their trained eye can also spot the potential of your property which can otherwise be overlooked by the average person.
EVERYTHING IS CUSTOMIZED:
By hiring a premium interior designer, everything in your property will be customized to your personality.
Picking inspiration from Instagram and Pinterest can serve as great reference material, but having every cabinet custom made to your liking will ensure you have a space that feels personal to you.
And while this may be your forever home that you don’t plan on selling or moving from, life can be unpredictable.
So if there ever came a time where you needed to sell your property, having quality renovation in place will definitely increase the value of your property in the long term.
Not only that, but having customized interior will allow your property to stand out from the rest of the houses in the neighborhood.
They may be the same size as you, but they will never have the same character as your brand new renovation, making it easier to sell.
CONCLUSION:
Hiring a professional interior designer can make or break your renovation project.
Like any skilled professional, they can:
- create your unique vision.
- handle your project from start to finish.
- offer efficient budget allocation.
- save you from making costly mistakes.
- creating a streamlined operation that can save you time and ease of mind.
- increase the value and quality of your property in the long run.
They also have an extremely versatile skill set:
- From design and knowledge in architecture.
- obtaining permits.
- knowing building codes.
- quality inspections.
- after sales services.
- dealing with orders and deliveries.
- negotiating with tradesmen and,
- even advertising.
So are you still convinced that interior designers are still an expense? Or an investment in your time?
AT LATITUDE DESIGN WE’VE ALWAYS GOT YOUR BACK.
IF YOU NEED ADDITIONAL INFO ON TRANSPARENT INTERIOR DESIGN AND RENOVATION FEES,
LEAVE A COMMENT BELOW FOR INQUIRIES,
OR
CLICK HERE TO APPLY FOR A FREE RENOVATION BUDGET PLAN FROM CERTIFIED INTERIOR DESIGNERS IN MALAYSIA
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