House Mynhardt

The Mynhardt Home – Testimonial

Building, Emotional experiences and Legal Pitfalls.

Some good practical legal advice – a home-owner and consumer’s perspective.   

It is true, renovating a house is not for sissies. In retrospect and going through a very unpleasant dispute process with a building contractor, I would have included Roelf Nel, a suitably qualified and experienced legal advisor, at the very beginning of my renovation project. Ignorantly, innocently and to “stupidly” exclude a legal advisor proactively in the planning and contracting process, will more than often result in several months of delays of a home renovation project with unnecessary escalating of costs.

Home is a physical, social, emotional space and spiritual sanctuary where one escapes to and share with family and friends. Buying a house more than often coincides with the urge and need to customize and convert the space into your own haven. This entails infrastructure changes, alterations and décor upgrades with the aim to create a personalized “home”. A space that reflects your own creativity and a physical reflection of who you are, your values and your outlook on the word and your interaction your personal environment. After years of planning and dreaming I decided (with great excitement and anticipation) to, not only renovate my house, but to also convert it into an upmarket guest house. A place and space to share with friends from all over the world.

By announcing my endeavor to friends, I had an overwhelming amount of goodwill advisors warning me about the pitfalls of building, the poor reputation of the residential construction/ building industry and escalating project costs. But, as the ever optimistic believer in the good of people and the world, I decided to ignore the good intended advice. With careful planning, detailed project budgeting and monitor mechanisms in place, my architect and I started the process to convert my house into the dream guesthouse. Several creative planning sessions resulted into detailed architect technical designs. We completed the project scoping, we have done the quantifying process and put a costing to the project. We painstakingly went through a process of selecting the “best and able to deliver in time” contractor to do the renovations. And so started a wonderful journey of home/ guest house renovations. Soon the journey landed us onto a road full of potholes with very unpleasant experiences. However, this story is not unique and I don’t have to expand. Unfortunately, more than often a homeowner’s renovations dream becomes a nightmare.

What was wrong with the process? Simply to exclude legal advice at the very beginning of the renovations project. Both the architect and I did not comprehend, nor did we anticipate or plan for a “worst case scenario”. We did not anticipate the various interpretations of a contract or even the legal muddle that goes with a contract and associated legalities. Fortunately there are advisors available with the relevant qualifications, expertise, and experience. Roelf provided us with sound advice, guided a legal process with clinical facts, assisted with the emotional reasoning processes and steered the course with the necessary empathy to make the right decisions. My recommendation: Proactively include legal advice and services into your project planning and during the construction execution.

Andre Mynhardt