How do you fund renovations?

[BoysRule]

We would like to move house to somewhere bigger but the area we live in is very expensive. The only way we can get somewhere bigger is to buy something that needs extending and renovating. We have extended our current house to the maximum so that isn't a possibility.

My question is how do you fund large renovations? If we buy a house can you remortgage within the first year? Obviously you would need to have a large amount of equity in it. It would take years and years of saving to get enough. Just wondering how people do it.

We’ve remortgaged and used equity. If you’re buying somewhere I’d put a smaller deposit down and hold back equity to fund it

Equity release when we moved.

We paid builders to do the external shell, plumbing and electrics and did all the internal decor ourselves including doors / skirting / floors/ painting. It saved about 15k. Next time we've got the skills to do more which would make it cheaper. It was extremely stressful doing that, living in it and working full time though. Just something to consider. However we've got a house which is designed specifically for us. E.g. We don't have bedroom wall lighting but the wires are there if we change our mind. You'll make it work somehow.

We’re remortaging to do our renovation works when our 2 year fix is up. If you sell and buy something that needs work and only put down a 10% deposit would you have enough cash to do the work? Or could you afford a loan?

We used equity and then when it became clear we needed more to have the finish we wanted, we took out a bank loan.

We bought the house and saved up for over 7 years while it crumbled into disrepair around us. That's another option, but perhaps not the wisest.