move out of the master bedroom

have everything picked out before he demos

anything that is still in the area has the possiblity of being damaged, move it all out so you stop worrying about it.

anticipate that the bathroom will take longer than what he said. is it there now and just being renovated? or is it new and/or significant moving of things?

Thanks, everything is ordered and ready to go, but it will be a down to the studs remodel...so gearing up for plenty of dust.

I don't mind being without the bath, it's the closet!:)

Skatermom - I am currently 2 weeks into the exact same project, and I have to say it has not been bad at all. I took everything out of my closet and put my hanging stuff in one of my girls' closets - she has 2 in her room. Everything else went into bins which are stacked in my hallway and bedroom. We are actually staying in the room - my contractor seals off the rest of my bedroom each morning to minimize the dust - there is definitely still some, but it isn't horrible. In the past 2 weeks they have gutted my bathroom and closet down to the studs, roughed in plumbing and electric, and sheet-rocked. Tile guy came today to set the mud pan for the shower, and he will start tiling tomorrow. We should be completely done in the next week or 2 - the one thing that will push it out another 2 weeks is the vanity which is being custom built by a cabinet maker. Once we finish our bathroom, we move onto the girls' hall bath! I am pretty new to the forum, so I have never posted pictures, but I will check the instructions and try to post some before pics and progress pics for you.

I don't know if you have the room or not, but if so, I'd set up a temporary closet in a guest room. You can use a portable rack that will hold about 4.5 feet. You can set up a rod between two ladders. When my daughter had a foreign exchange student come live with us, we installed two rods in a hall closet that had previously housed the vacuum cleaner, spare toilet paper, winter blankets, etc. Perhaps you could pack away the coats in your coat closet and hang things there for awhile. Just some ideas...

we are in about the same state as Ridgemom, although we are building on, and had to go out of town so we moved out of the closet long ago. :( . DH built large racks out of metal piping and scrap lumber, but we have underwear all over the house.

We were going to move out of our bedroom, but after several very sleepless nights, I had to move back. DH's nasal drip is kicking up, so we may have to move back out AGAIN, we will try son's room this time, maybe the bed is more comfortable!

It'a the underwear and socks I can't find, somehow they got all split up. Our spare bedroom is downstairs, but it is bare bones, only a bed and bookshelves and a rocking chair.

Here is my master bath and closet prior to demo. We do have another closet in the room for DH. My clothes were in the sliding closet, but are now in bins and other closets throughout the house. We will build a wall to create a slightly larger master bath and a walk-in closet.

Here are some progress photos. Tile man starts tiling tomorrow...

Patience and a sense of humor! We are almost finished with the same thing - gutted the master bedroom, took over a spare room next to the old master bathroom, and used it to make a new powder room and new master bathroom, and closet and turned the old powder room into a pantry. We have done everything ourselves, with the exception of taping & texturing the sheetrock. We did the tear out the first Monday of spring break (although we had actually already tiled the shower before that.) My husband does all the big stuff - my job is to clean and grout all the tile. I also stained our oak vanity, changing it to a dark espresso color (per celticmoon's instructions.)
We have a motor home, so we've been sleeping in that. Our hanging clothes are out there, our dressers are in our office. I'm more than ready to be done with the dust.
Another 1 to 1 1/2 weeks.

Looks like I've got the slowest contractor on the PLANET! We moved out of our Master bedroom, bath and closet in January. DH did the demo in the bath, and the contractor started February 2nd.

The Caesarstone was delayed because one of the sinks broke in transit and they wouldn't template without the sink in hand. (even though we had two of the exact same sinks). They are slated to finish tomorrow..one piece of frosted glass for a cabinet they built took a week to come in.

Anyway, back to your question...The best thing we did was to move into our spare room with our own comfortable bed. All of our current clothes are stored in our third floor office in bins and laundry baskets. Seasonal stuff is in the basement. Now that seasons are changing and I'm looking for things I can't find, I'm getting cranky. Luckily we don't have to "dress" for work or anything, we are fairly casual. Our clothes definitely don't belong in our new Elfa closet..it's so nice!

If we hadn't made ourselves as comfortable as we did I think the contractor would have a totally different opinion of me. :)

So I say, plan for it to last longer than they say for sure.

Beth P.

Just finished our master bath/closet construction (it took 2 months). Move out of your room because the dust will kill you. We used a spare closet for clothes (also a good time to donate unused items) and set up in spare bathroom. Make it easy on yourself to find things. I was surprised how much tile cost- I spent more on tile than it cost to install! Make sure your contractor and you are on the same page as what they are doing- don't assume anything.

Large master bathroom remodels are frequently more difficult than any other project in the home, including the kitchen. Expect delays and surprises along the way, especially if you are starting from studs and/or moving electrical or plumbing.

Our master bath renovation is nearing completion, and it has taken 68 days of hard work, with another week or two to go . . . we hope!

Here is a link that might be useful: Master bathroom renovation underway...

thanks everybody, this will be the thrid major project with this contractor so, thankfully, I am already prepared to to be prepared about upcoming hitches in the plan. I am so glad we have all the parts to get started, no fun waiting for an out of stock faucet.

Today we cleaned out the closet and found lots of stuff to donate,yeah! Have found places to store and stash stuff, etc.

Thanks for the hint to move out to a new room, the dust will be a lot, and we have to move the furniture anyway to paint.

I just keep thinking about what a dream it will be to move back in...aaaaah.....

We hope to start ours in a couple months. I am definitely taking my bed and moving it into the guest room. I'll move all the furniture to the far side of the room and most clothes into the guest room with as well. And make sure the room is sealed with plastic to keep as much dust from circulating. I'll also seal the ducts as lesson learned from the previous remodel dust likes to settle in the ducts.

We did our master bath remodel in phases and the entire process took a tad over a year to do. It does require patience and a sense of humor, both of which will help to keep a good working relationship between you and your contractor.

The advise I found to be most valuable I read in this forum and that was to learn the basics about the work to be done and to stay involved with the process. Since I work from home, I was available and would check in to look at the progress least once sometime through the day. Then each evening our GC would update me and let me know what steps were planned for the next day. He was always happy to explain about the process and materials he was using and I made myself available for when decisions needed to be made. You need to know it's ok to question something you don't understand and to speak up if something isn't working for you.

With larger projects, odds are a time will come up when you don't agree on something and it's ok to hold your ground for what you want but be a good listener and find out why your GC is disputing the plan. If his argument makes sense, be flexible but if it's something that concerns just the aesthetics and really affects your vision stick to your guns. For example, our GC wanted to use those niche boxes for the shower niche. We wanted something with an entirely different look but building it in would be more work for him. We went back and forth about it and while I understood why he wanted to take the easy route, it didn't fit our vision. Per the advise from Bill & Mongo, I stood my ground and we love our over sized niche.

Good luck and don't forget to post pics when it's done!