How To Renovate

EP62 The Power Of A Pause: Why a Mid-Renovation Breather Can Be a Smart Move

• Tash South

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If you’ve renovated before, you’ll know that it can be very exciting—but let’s face it, it can also be overwhelming. In this episode of I’m talking about something not often discussed but absolutely essential: the power of a well-timed pause. 

A strategic breather can give you clarity, reduce costly mistakes, and help you reconnect with your vision. Join me inside where I’ll share signs you might need a pause (I’ve been there many times myself!) and how to use that time wisely. 

Renovating moves through distinct phases—the slow, methodical planning followed by the frenetic on-site execution where suddenly everyone wants answers yesterday. So a well-placed pause can be okay, sometimes you need to step back for a moment to move forward with more confidence.

Whether you're currently mid-renovation or planning your future project, this episode provides the permission to incorporate intentional pauses that will ultimately save your sanity, your budget, and ensure your finished home truly reflects your vision. Remember, a successful renovation isn't just about speed—it's about creating a home you'll love for years to come.

In This Episode:

  • Why living in your home pre-renovation can lead to smarter planning
  • How a short break mid-project can help you reset and refocus
  • Common signs that you’re experiencing decision fatigue
  • Ways to use a renovation pause productively
  • How to avoid burnout and costly mistakes near the finish line

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Hi I'm your host, Tash South I'm an Interior Designer and Renovation Consultant.
Each episode of How To Renovate is short, but brimming with practical advice to help you manage your renovation project with confidence and success.

Grab some more renovation advice & free resources and become part of the South Place Studio Renovation Community at
https://www.southplacestudio.com/freebies

Everything I teach about renovation falls within my Five Pillar Process for A Successful Renovation, to learn more about the process, head to
https://www.southplacestudio.com/pillars


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Tash South:

Hello, hello everybody, welcome back to the how to Renovate podcast. It's Tash here and I hope you're having a good week. We are having a great week, very productive week this week. I've got loads done, feeling very proud of myself. But this week, on the podcast, I want to talk to you about the power of a pause. So we're talking about why a mid-renovation pause, so a short breather.

Tash South:

Mid-renovation can be a smart move. Now, if you've been listening for a while, you'll know that I'm all about the planning so that when you hit your on-site stage, things can just run smoothly and you can go through. You've got all your decisions ready and you can move smoothly, quickly through the process with your team. But sometimes I think we have to acknowledge that renovating can be a lot. It's a lot of pressure. It's a lot of pressure, it's a lot of stress. You know it's a lot of pressure on your finances, on your time, and so I think, even if things are running as smoothly as possible sometimes it's if you feel you need it and you're recognizing that you're struggling a bit perhaps it's time just for a little breather now. You know by now that I'm not one for slow renovating. I totally believe in putting in all the time at the start, investing all the time planning research at the start so that your actual renovation can run really smoothly. But today we're just talking about when you're on site, when you're mid-renovation, and it's all a bit much what to do. So let's get into the episode. And it's all a bit much what to do, so let's get into the episode. So, as you know by now, everything I teach about renovations falls into my five pillar process to a successful renovation and the information in this episode falls under pillar four practical management. Let's get into the episode everyone. Practical management let's get into the episode, everyone. Okay, everybody.

Tash South:

We are starting with number one. I know this episode is about pausing mid-renovation, but I just want to reiterate how important it is at the start of the project, at planning stage, about taking a pause there as well. And I want to talk to you about this, explaining how pausing at the start when you're living in your home, if you are in a position where you're living in the home that's going to be renovated so, for example, you're not buying a home, renovating and then moving in if you are in a position to pause at the start and just know the building you're living in, to experience the building you're living in before you start your renovation. That is going to give you so much more information about how to carry out your renovation well and how to plan your renovation well. So let's have a quick look at this number one before we get into the other points.

Tash South:

So number one, pausing at the start what you can learn by living in your space first. So, of course, if you have the luxury to do so, then living in a space first, before you renovate, is going to give you so much knowledge and information about that home. So you're going to have all that insight before you start your planning. Really important things will reveal themselves to you, like how the sun, how the light moves around the home and how you can plan for the future. Where do you want the light to be and in which rooms at which times of the day. You'll find out which areas you gravitate to within the home, and that might be connected to the point we just said about the light. Perhaps you love to be where the sun is at that point of the day. Perhaps you spend your time at certain areas and you're gravitating towards the kitchen, as most of us do, but perhaps that kitchen is not exactly where you want it to be, perhaps you want it to be where the sun is, where there's more light, and so on. So all this information is going to help you plan your new layout really well so that your space can really work for you. You'll also find out things or know things like perhaps there's not enough storage, perhaps the storage needs to be somewhere else, perhaps the flow needs to be different or better, and so living in a space is going to give you all that information so you can plan your new renovation even better. So, before we get into it, if you have this time, if you have that luxury to pause before you start your planning, then take that opportunity just to notice these things, note it down, make your lists of what you want now and what you want in the future, and then those are going to help determine your layout and the outcome of your whole project at the end. So now let's get into number two and the power of that pause mid renovation. Okay, number two is strategic pauses to regain clarity.

Tash South:

So if you haven't renovated before, renovation moves through these phases. Some, some phases are slow. That's the planning, the architect waiting for your planning, approval. Those phases are usually quite slow. So you might have made your decisions and decided on your house style right at the start in the planning phase, pillar one, which is what I recommend. But that also means that by the time you get to the onsite phases so pillar four or even pillar three, determining who your team will be then that means that you might have kind of lost that momentum, lost that track of your decisions in pillar one, and then suddenly you're kind of thrust into pillar four.

Tash South:

You're on site, you're having to remember your decisions, refer back to your planning, and that can become quite overwhelming. So you start off off slow. Then you come on site and then suddenly everything's all go, go, go. It can be overwhelming. And that's exactly why I'm doing this episode, because I think at that point where everyone is asking you, or your trades people, your architect, your builder, everybody wants decisions, everybody wants your choices, your materials, there might be a few changes. Where do you want this plug socket, where do you want this light? What sort of light fixture will be here? You have to refer back to your plans. You've got to make sure you're happy with your decisions you made. You've got to have all your items on site.

Tash South:

So really, that mid-renovation can be really, really hectic and I think if you are in that place where you've got everybody asking you questions, you need some time to just either switch off or refer back to your plans and just re-familiarise yourself with your decisions and why you made those decisions or perhaps have been slight changes and you need to make some new decisions and you're just feeling overwhelmed. I think that is the time to just take this short pause we're talking about because the decision making at that phase can be relentless and really you don't want to rush decisions. You want to make sure that what you're deciding is right now. I'm not saying take a week's break here. That's not what I'm talking about when I'm saying a pause, because you want to keep up the momentum of your renovation and you want to find that balance. You want to to keep up the momentum, but you don't also want to rush any new decisions that you have to make and you want to make sure that you've got the time to refer back to your decisions that you'd made before. Just check in with them, double check, make sure that they still the right decisions for you, for your project, as your project moves through the various phases.

Tash South:

So I think this is the time where you just need to take a moment so even just taking 24 hours or two days where you just say to your team I'm going to be off site for two days, I will come back to you with everything you need to know at the end of those two days, then just take some time, split that, take some of that time to just sit with your plans, make all the decisions you need to make, get them ready to hand over to your team, and then the other half of that time maybe take a break, have a day off from sites, have some time to clear your mind and just regain that clarity, regain that calm, because you want to take that time so that you can see your vision again, see your design again, not just that chaos and so you can take that quiet time just to just to remember again what you wanted that space to feel like, what you want your home to be, what you want the feeling in your home to be, what do you want it to look like, how you want it to feel, and then just realigning yourself with that will give you some more clarity and will give you some calm as well. Because, moving on to number three, having a break is going to really support that creativity and just reduce mistakes, just reduce you making the wrong decisions on any new decisions that you may need to make, because when you're constantly in decision-making mode, that really makes our brains really tired and then obviously we're more likely to make mistakes and get decision fatigue and make the wrong decisions. So I think it is important just to, when you're starting to feel overwhelmed, just to take a moment, just take a day, take a couple of days, okay, and then moving on to number four, so these are signs that you're probably rushing your decisions and it's time for a break. So ask yourself some of these questions to see if you might need that little break. So, are you feeling irritated? Or maybe you're feeling a little bit weepy when the trades are asking you lots of questions and you don't quite know the answer and you're feeling a bit emotional about it, that's a good sign that you probably need a break.

Tash South:

Or if perhaps your when your phone, when your messages ping, when your phone pings and you're like, oh, that's the builder again asking me another question, asking me to come to site, if you're starting to feel a bit demotivated about going to site or being involved in the project, that's also another sign that you should probably take a little, take a moment, take a break. And also, if you find yourself saying yes to things just to get them off your plate, even though you feel like maybe that's not quite the right decision, but you're just wanting to to make decisions quickly and not thinking things through properly or not referring back to your original decisions and just being felt like you're under pressure to make decisions quickly and not thinking things through properly or not referring back to your original decisions and just being felt like you're under pressure to make decisions on site or to give the information on site, that's another sign as well. So when you start feeling these things, really, I think that that is the time. That is the time to just say to your team look, I need, I need a day, I need two days, and then take that time so that you can go back to your project excited, ready with your decisions, with a clear mind and just some more energy, so that you can take it from that point on through to finish, because that is when I find people make the worst mistakes is the last bit just before they're finished. They're tired, they're exhausted, they're really bored of making decisions, really overwhelmed. The budget and the finance stress becomes a bit much towards the end when the budget starts running running a bit low. So that really is the time, I find, when when people are feeling like they just want it over and done and they'll just go do that yes, do that and then regret it when they've moved into their property. So just be really aware of that, that really busy phase, mid-renovation, towards the end of that phase, that is generally when this applies. So just be really aware of the timings, be aware of when you might be feeling that way and then also be aware of these questions and just when it might be time just to take some time out.

Tash South:

So that brings us to the end of this episode, everybody. I really hope it was helpful. I would love to support you in a way through your renovation where you know where to take a little break so that you're not finding it utterly overwhelming and becomes so stressful for you. So just knowing that it is going to get difficult in this phase we've spoken about and knowing that just taking a little bit of time out it's not going to affect your timeline or your project drastically. If you know that you're feeling this way and you know that you're starting to feel overwhelmed, then you can also know that if you just take a moment and get yourself back on track, that then that will actually be a good thing, because then the rest of your project you will have the energy you'll have the decisions to move forward clearly, rather than feeling stressed out and then trying to keep going in that stressed out way to get to the end of your project but then making mistakes or making the wrong decisions in that little bit of time right before you get to the finish line. So that brings us to the end, and if you know a fellow renovator who needs to know when they need to take a break, please do share this episode with them. It might give them some help as well. Thank you so much for listening and I really hope to see you in the next episode. It's bye for now.

Tash South:

For more information on my five pillar process for successful renovation, you can go directly to southplacestudiocom forward slash pillars, where you'll find an introduction to the process which covers each of the pillars and what they cover. We also have a number of other free renovation resources. Go now to southplacestudiocom forward slash freebies. I have created some amazing freebies for you there. There is one on the process, like we just said. There is one on planning permission, there is one on kitchen design, there is another one on lighting planning. Go and check those out. There's so much free information there to help you with your renovation.