What drives the cost of a villa renovation?

What determines the cost of a villa renovation?

The cost of a villa renovation depends on house size, the state of the services, materials and bespoke joinery, site conditions and the scope of work, not on one item.

Villa renovation cost is therefore not a number you find by multiplying square metres. Of two villas of the same size, if one is unfinished and empty and the other has been lived in for years, the item lists do not look alike. This article gives no figures; it explains which item pushes the price up and at which stage that item becomes clear.

On unfinished villa projects Umut GÜRLER Interior Architecture closes waterproofing, the garden manhole and the main services on site with a written record, and only then locks the budget and the site calendar. The order is deliberate: a budget given before the services are clear has to be rewritten when breaking out and double labour appear later.

The headings below split the items into two groups. The first comes from the house itself: size, floor layout and services. The second comes from decisions: materials, bespoke joinery, lighting and how the site runs. The first group is read at the survey; the second grows with the owner’s choices. When comparing quotes keep this split in mind, because two quotes can come close to the same total and still cover different items.

The items do not appear in the same order or with the same weight in every villa. In a house with a basement, a large garden, several floors or high ceilings a different item comes first; in a plain single-storey villa another one does. Reading the house first and listing the items afterwards is firmer than writing the list first and fitting the house to it.

How do the size and condition of the house change the cost?

House size and condition are the first layer of cost: more square metres mean more surface and more lines, and an old or unfinished shell changes the services item.

Size is the most visible factor. The 350 m² Mavi Ladin villa (Beysukent) and the 700 m² Santra Villa job (Çayyolu) do not differ by square metres alone; the larger house has more wet rooms, longer plumbing and electrical runs, and more doors, cabinets and ceiling details. Number of floors, stairwell and ceiling height push the same way. In a high-ceilinged lounge like the one at Alpine Garden, the same cladding and lighting work is harder and takes longer than in a single-storey room.

Condition is the second factor. In an unfinished villa pipes and cables are often brought to the doorstep but not connected inside; in an old villa the waterproofing may have tired, the garden drain may have failed or the street level may have risen. This difference makes the first item of a full villa renovation quote, the services, read differently in the two houses. We explained the checks step by step in our guide to services checks in villa renovation.

Skipping the services does not shrink the cost, it postpones it. Cladding laid before the wall and the floor build-up are clear comes back as leaks and smell in the first winter rain or after the move; breaking out again, carting rubble and paying for double labour then arrive as a new item.

Items such as dark timber, marble and concealed light lines raise the cost regardless of the size of the house, because each one needs its own work sequence and its own craftsman on site. In the 450 m² Santra Villa (İsmet Bey) job in Çayyolu, natural textures, dark timber and marble were used together; niches were positioned on the wall surfaces and concealed light lines and a lighting scenario were set up. On a surface like this the drawing comes first, then the electrical run and the niche position are fixed behind the wall, and the stone and timber cladding follows. If the order breaks, the cladding is taken off and redone, and this comes back as an item that was never written in the quote. Seeing these items as separate lines defined by drawing reduces the chance of extra work later.

How do materials and bespoke joinery steer the cost?

Materials and bespoke joinery are the part of the cost in the owner’s hands: the same plan turns into a different item list with the stone, timber and lighting chosen.

Our own projects show it. At Santra Villa Serdar Bey timber wall panels and natural stone run from the entrance hall through every space; that continuity gives visual unity but also enlarges the surface to be clad. At Alpine Garden the high-ceilinged lounge carries marble fireplace masses and crystal pendant lighting. At Diyarbakır Villa custom-made furniture, timber-clad niches and acoustic panels were used; at Santra Villa İsmet Bey dark timber, marble and concealed light lines stand out. Each means a separate craft and a separate skill.

Material is not a single item either: which surface the same marble covers, how many surfaces it covers and with what workmanship all steer the cost separately. You can see how such choices sit on a plan in our villa decoration examples article.

The rows show sequence, not a total. Area and services are settled at the survey; flooring, joinery and lighting are chosen at the drawing stage. If a decision is left for later, the same item is paid twice, once as work and once as site time.

How do site conditions and time show up in the cost?

Site conditions affect cost in two ways: fewer workable days stretch the calendar, and a longer calendar keeps the crew on site for more days.

A lived-in villa is worked room by room, with pauses for dust and noise; an empty one is worked all day. If the estate management closes Saturday and Sunday the week shrinks to five days, and official working hours cut the day once more. Some office residences allow work after 18:00, the end of office hours; villa estates rarely do. A child’s room or home office that cannot be emptied is left to the end and the site waits for it; the waiting day is written into the calendar too. How many months each stage of a villa job takes is set out in how long a villa interior architecture project takes.

Under Zoning Law article 21/3, work that does not change the structure or the exterior of the building is not subject to a building permit. Not needing a permit does not mean no management consent, fee or application is needed; these items are asked about up front. Minor and substantial alterations are also separated: work touching the structure, the stairs or the façade is substantial, while paint, flooring and loose furniture mostly stay on the minor side.

The estate’s own rules are part of the cost as well. Noise hours, lift use and rubble removal differ from one management to the next, and without a written rule a neighbour’s complaint can stop the work. That is why the survey should ask about the estate’s working rules, not only about the house.

We compared how these rules change across Çayyolu, İncek and Gölbaşı in this article.

How should villa renovation quotes be compared?

The fair way to compare two villa renovation quotes is to set the items each covers side by side, not the totals; unless the scope matches, a total says nothing.

A home renovation contract should write the scope item by item. These questions bring quotes onto the same line:

• Are the services check and waterproofing inside the quote?
• Are breaking out, rubble carting and removal included?
• Are bespoke items (kitchen, wardrobe, niches, panels) defined by drawing, or lumped into one line?
• Are materials written by brand and model, or only as "to be selected"?
• Is the number of lighting and electrical lines fixed?
• Are the assumed working days and the estate rules written down?
• How is a change of decision priced?

The difference often hides not in the numbers but in the footnotes: sentences such as "materials will be selected later", "demolition excluded" or "bespoke joinery priced separately" move an item outside the quote. An owner who finds those sentences can compare two quotes on the same page.

It also helps to put the same questions to each bidder in writing. The answers show which quote takes on which item and which will open as extra work later. A written answer also closes, from the start, the argument over who had taken on what once the site is running.

An item left for later does not shrink; it can come back under another name, often as extra work. Which item takes how much room in your villa becomes clear on the survey day; the item list is written from that day on.

The same cost logic applies to an apartment; we explained the extra items specific to apartments in our What Determines Apartment Renovation Cost? article.

Umut GÜRLER is an interior architect and a graduate of Çankaya University Interior Architecture; he has worked since 2009 (more than 17 years) on villa, office and clinic interiors in Ankara, and his office is in Cepa Ofis Kule. The examples in this article come from villa projects he has completed.