Whole house renovation budget: kitchen, bathroom and living spaces

A whole house job puts several rooms on one budget, and the same trades work in more than one of them. The sheet keeps the Room on every line, so you can read the kitchen, the bathroom and the shared lines separately.

General information only, not financial, construction or legal advice. Contingency, holdback and payment-split percentages are your own inputs, and payment and deposit rules vary by contract and by state or province; check yours. Names and numbers in the example are invented.

What changes for this kind of project

In a whole house job the same firm can work in several rooms. In this example Northside Plumbing has a kitchen line and a bathroom line, and Integrated Renovations has the kitchen demolition and the bathroom tile. Each is its own Budget row with its own Room, so the room totals and the contractor totals can both be read.

The shower line has no accepted quote yet, so it reads Not committed and adds nothing to Committed. The tile upgrade and the kitchen lighting change are approved and already count. The gas line change is only proposed, so it stays out of Committed until you mark it Approved.

A worked example: Whole house renovation, 3 rooms plus shared lines

Invented numbers, to show the shape. Settings on Start Here: contingency 15% (an example value you set), total project budget $38,200.

The contingency pool is $5,730 ($38,200 x 15%). That leaves $32,470 to share out as line budgets. The lines below add up to $32,400, so $70 is unallocated.

Change orders on the Change Orders tab. Only Approved rows move into Committed:

What the summary shows

• Committed: $29,450. Paid: $9,900. Unpaid commitment: $19,550.
• Contingency used: $1,400, what each line's committed total goes above its line budget, added up. Contingency left now: $4,330.
• Pending exposure (Proposed change orders): $650. Contingency left if every proposed change order were approved: $3,680.

Where each piece goes in the workbook

1. Start Here: Type the total project budget, which includes the contingency pool, the contingency percentage, the four contractors and the room names Kitchen, Bathroom, Living room and Whole house. Percentages are example values you overtype.
2. Budget: One row per scope line, each with its Room. Northside Plumbing appears on a kitchen line and a bathroom line. The cabinets, paint and permits have no contractor because they are owner-paid. The shower line has no accepted quote yet.
3. Change Orders: Log the tile upgrade and the kitchen lighting change as Approved against their Line IDs, and the gas line as Proposed against the kitchen plumbing. An approved change adds to the committed total of the room its line sits in.
4. Rooms & Summary: Read budget, committed, paid and remaining for each room, then the same by category. A room reads Over limit when its committed total is more than the Room flag % above its budget, and that percentage is an example value you overtype on Start Here.

Two formulas worth a cell of their own

• Committed for one room: =SUMIFS(Budget!$K$6:$K$65,Budget!$B$6:$B$65,"Kitchen") returns $16,100 on this example.
• Contingency used, the sum of the Overrun now column: =SUM(Budget!$S$6:$S$65) returns $1,400.

Four tracking tips

1. Northside Plumbing works in two rooms, so keep two lines. Rooms & Summary splits them into Kitchen and Bathroom, while the Contractors tab adds them into one contract with one typed % complete for the firm.
2. The room list on Start Here holds ten names and this example uses four. Pick each line's room from that list, because a room name that is not on it falls into the row labelled Not set, or not on the list above.
3. The cabinet and countertop line is the largest in the file and has no contractor, so no firm owns it on the Contractors tab; it is totalled in the row for lines with no contractor. Its unpaid commitment also shows on the Budget tab and in the Kitchen row of Rooms & Summary.
4. The kitchen plumbing line is already over its line budget on the accepted quote. Before you approve the gas line change, read Overrun if pending approved and Contingency left if all pending approved to see the extra draw.

Questions

Where do paint and permits go if they are not for one room?

Give them a room label of their own, such as Whole house in this example, and add it to the room list on Start Here. They then total in their own row in Rooms & Summary instead of inflating the kitchen or the bathroom.

Can I see all plumbing across rooms in one place?

Rooms & Summary totals budget, committed and paid by category as well as by room, so the kitchen plumbing line and the bathroom plumbing line add up in one Plumbing row. Compare that row with the room rows to see whether a trade or a room is behind an overrun.

Related renovation guides

• Renovation budget by room spreadsheet: SUMIFS per room, with an overrun flag
• Contractor bid comparison spreadsheet for homeowners
• Renovation change order tracker: a spreadsheet for homeowners

More renovation budget guides

• Renovation budget spreadsheets by room and project type
• Budget for adding a new bathroom: rough-in, fixtures and permits
• Attic conversion budget: handling structural surprises
• Basement finishing budget spreadsheet: quotes, change orders and contingency
• Deck budget spreadsheet: material upgrades and impact on contingency
• Exterior renovation budget: comparing roofing, siding and window bids
• Fixer upper budget: everything at once, commit as quotes arrive
• Garage conversion budget: multiple trades and owner-bought materials
• Home addition budget: design, permits, general contractor and utilities
• Laundry and mudroom remodel budget: owner-bought appliances and small change orders
• Owner as general contractor: budget, payments and milestones per trade
• Primary suite renovation: bedroom, bathroom and closet with separate trades