The Homeowner's Renovation Guide

A free MyRenoHQ guide — the smart way to renovate your bathroom

An honest look at how a bathroom renovation actually works, where the money goes, and the three ways you can choose to run yours. Australia-wide. May 2026. V1.

Why this guide matters

A bathroom renovation is one of the biggest single purchases most households ever make — and yet most people only do it once or twice in their lives. The trades, the suppliers and the renovation companies do this every day; you're learning it from scratch.

This guide is here to level the playing field. By the time you finish reading, you'll know how the industry is put together, what a bathroom renovation actually involves, where the money goes, and the three different ways you can get yours done. We'll be straight with you throughout — there's more than one sensible choice, and the right one depends on your budget, your time, and how hands-on you want to be.

The short version. A full-service renovation company is the easy option, but you pay a premium for that ease — often 40 to 45 percent on top of what the work itself costs. Managing the project yourself can save tens of thousands. MyRenoHQ exists to give you the savings of running it yourself with the support and quality of a professional company.

What you'll learn in this guide

The Australian renovation industry — who's who and why it can feel confusing
How a bathroom renovation actually runs, start to finish
What good looks like in any quote, contract and payment schedule
The full-service route — when it's right and what it costs
The three ways to renovate
How MyRenoHQ fits in
Your renovation journey with MyRenoHQ, step by step
Why homeowners choose us
How to start

1. The Australian renovation industry

Renovation in Australia is a big, busy and fragmented industry. Around 250,000 bathroom renovations happen across the country every year. Despite that scale, there's no single, transparent way to buy one. Instead the work is shared between a web of different businesses, and as the homeowner you sit in the middle of all of them.

Who's who:

Renovation companies and builders. Full-service operators. They coordinate design, trades, materials and scheduling and hand you a finished bathroom. For that convenience they charge a substantial margin.
Individual trades. A bathroom needs several specialists — a plumber, an electrician, a waterproofer, a tiler, and often a carpenter, plasterer and glazier. Each is a separate business with its own schedule and pricing.
Suppliers. Tiles, vanities, toilets, tapware, screens and fixtures come from suppliers and showrooms. Retail prices in showrooms are typically much higher than the trade rates the industry pays.
Designers. Some homeowners pay separately for a designer to plan the layout and select finishes. Done traditionally, this can add several thousand dollars before a single tile is laid.

Why it can feel confusing. Because the industry is split across so many businesses, pricing is rarely straightforward. Quotes from different companies are hard to compare because they include different things. The market wasn't designed around the homeowner — it grew up around the businesses that work in it every day. That's the gap this guide is here to close.

2. How a bathroom renovation actually runs

Whether a company does it for you or you manage it yourself, every bathroom renovation follows the same basic sequence. Understanding it removes the mystery.

Enquiry and site visit. You make contact; the company visits, takes rough measurements, and discusses what you want.
Quote and design. They prepare a quote and, usually, a basic design or layout.
Contract and deposit. You sign a contract and pay a deposit. The payment schedule from here is largely set by the company.
Demolition (strip-out). The old bathroom comes out back to bare walls and floor. One of the simpler, more physical stages.
Rough-in. The plumber and electrician install the pipes and wiring hidden inside the walls and floor, positioned for your new layout. This stage has to be right before anything is covered up.
Waterproofing. A licensed waterproofer seals the wet areas. This is regulated work; it has to be done properly because everything that goes over the top depends on it.
Tiling. Floors and walls are tiled and grouted. Usually the longest stage, and the biggest single visual impact.
Fit-off. The plumber and electrician return to install the vanity, toilet, taps, shower, lights and fittings now that the surfaces are finished.
Finishing touches. Shower screen, mirror, accessories, final clean and inspection.
Handover. The bathroom is signed off and handed back to you with warranties and compliance certificates.

A typical bathroom takes around three to five weeks of on-site work, though waiting for trades and materials can stretch the calendar longer. The work itself is the same regardless of who manages it. What changes — dramatically — is the cost and who's holding the reins.

3. What good looks like in any quote and contract

A great renovation experience comes down to two things: detail and transparency — agreed up front, in writing, before anyone picks up a tool. Whichever path you choose, look for these markers of a job that's been set up well:

A detailed itemised quote, broken down by trade and by category, rather than a single headline figure. The detail is where the real picture lives.
A defined scope of works that covers what's included and what isn't, so any variation has to be explicitly agreed.
A payment schedule that tracks site progress — staged against milestones, not weighted up-front.
Clear pricing on materials and fixtures, with quantities and brands listed so you know what you're paying for and can compare.
A realistic schedule — a week-by-week plan rather than a vague "three to five weeks."
A clear, visual picture of the finished room — renders, mood boards, product samples — so you know what you'll get before you commit.
Care taken on the work that's hidden. Waterproofing and rough-in are buried behind tile. They're also the most important things to get right the first time. A good renovation never compromises here.

The lesson. The more clearly the scope, design, products and price are pinned down before work starts, the smoother every later step becomes. This is just as true for a $20k renovation as a $50k one.

4. The full-service route — when it's right

A full-service renovation company takes the whole job off your hands. For some people that's exactly the right choice, and it's worth being fair about it.

The pros	The trade-offs
Genuinely hands-off — you make a few decisions and they handle the rest.	You pay a premium — often 40 to 45 percent on top of the actual cost of the work.
One single point of accountability if something needs sorting.	Less visibility into what materials and trades really cost.
Established trade and supplier relationships already in place.	Less control over fixture choices, timing, and which trades work in your home.
Usually a builder's warranty on the completed work.	You move at their schedule, not yours.

The headline takeaway: a full-service renovation buys you convenience, and convenience is worth something. But on a typical bathroom, the trades, tiles and fixtures might cost $20,000 to $30,000, while the finished full-service price often lands at $35,000 to $55,000. The difference is overhead and margin — and it's the single biggest opportunity for a homeowner to save.

5. The three ways to renovate

There are really three ways to get your bathroom renovated. They differ in how much you pay, how much you do, and how much of the saving you keep.

Option 1 — Hire a full-service company. The company manages everything and does all the work. You make a handful of decisions and stay almost entirely hands-off. Lowest effort, highest cost.

Option 2 — Manage it yourself, no tools required. You stay the project owner and make the decisions, but you don't pick up a single tool — every trade is still done by a licensed professional. You hire the trades, buy the materials, and keep the schedule moving. Done with the right support, this typically saves 20 to 25 percent compared with full-service. This is the path most MyRenoHQ customers choose.

Option 3 — Manage it yourself and do the simple labour. Same as Option 2, but you also take on the unskilled tasks that don't need a licence — demolition, painting, basic preparation and clean-up. Skilled, regulated work (plumbing, electrical, waterproofing) is always left to licensed trades. Taking on the simple parts can push your saving to 30 percent or more.

How they compare on a representative $45,000 job:

	Full-service	Manage yourself (no DIY)	Manage yourself + simple labour
Who manages it	The company	You, with MyRenoHQ's guidance	You, with MyRenoHQ's guidance
Who does the work	Company's trades	Licensed trades you hire	Licensed trades + you on simple tasks
Your time and effort	Low	Medium	Higher
Cost on a $45,000 job	~$45,000	~$34,000–$36,000	~$31,500 or less
Typical saving	—	20–25%	30%+
Cost transparency	Often low	High	High
Best suited to	Those who want zero involvement	Homeowners who want big savings and are happy to make decisions	Hands-on homeowners happy to do demolition, painting and prep

Figures are illustrative, based on a representative $45,000 full-service bathroom. Actual costs and savings vary by project, location, size and finishes. Current as at 2026.

The opportunity. Until recently, managing your own renovation meant doing it alone — finding trades, comparing quotes, ordering materials, scheduling everyone in the right order, knowing what good looks like. That's the gap MyRenoHQ was built to fill.

6. How MyRenoHQ works

MyRenoHQ is an Australian online platform that helps you manage your own bathroom renovation — and keep the savings — without doing it alone. We give you the design quality, the product buying power and the trade access of a professional renovation company, while you stay firmly in the driver's seat as the project owner.

Think of us as the brain and the support team behind your renovation. You make the decisions and the project is yours; we do the heavy lifting on design, pricing, products and trade coordination so you never have to guess your way through it.

What we do:

Turn a quick scan of your room into a real design and an honest cost estimate
Select the exact products and give you a detailed, week-by-week plan to run the job
Connect you to vetted, licensed trades and supply your materials at our discounted trade rates
Hold and release payments safely against agreed milestones, so money only changes hands as work is completed

What we don't do. We don't employ the trades, run the building site, or take over the construction work. You are the project owner — that's the whole point, and it's how the savings stay with you. We're the platform, the guidance and the safety net that makes managing your own renovation realistic for an ordinary homeowner.

The combination. The savings and control of doing it yourself, with the design, products, trades and protection of a professional company.

7. Your renovation journey, step by step

We've broken the whole process into three clear stages. Each has a clear price, a clear deliverable and a clear next step — so you always know where you are, what you're paying for, and what happens next.

Stage 1 — Scan & concept ($399). You register and use your iPhone Pro (12 Pro or later) to scan your bathroom with Metaroom — a free LiDAR scanning app we recommend. Modern iPhones have a real laser scanner built in (the same technology behind Face ID) and Metaroom turns it into a measurement tool that builds an accurate 3D model of your room in about 90 seconds. You answer a short questionnaire about your style and project; within a few days we send back a concept design and a realistic cost estimate. For the price of a tank of fuel and a nice dinner, you go from a vague idea to a real plan and a real number.

Stage 2 — Detailed design ($699). If you love the concept, this stage turns it into a complete, build-ready package: detailed drawings, the exact products selected, a full itemised price, a week-by-week schedule, and a plain-English manual on how to run the project safely as the owner. This is the document your trades will quote and work from.

Stage 3 — Trades, products & milestone payments. With your plan in hand, we bring the rest together:

Vetted trades. We connect you with licensed, vetted plumbers, tilers, waterproofers and electricians who already understand the MyRenoHQ design package.
Products at trade prices. We supply your materials at our discounted rates and pass the saving on to you.
Protected milestone payments. Your money is held against agreed milestones and only released when each stage is completed and signed off — so you're never paying for work that hasn't been done.

Throughout all three stages, you have support behind you. You're managing your renovation, but you're never doing it alone.

What it feels like. Scan the room. Choose your style. See the design. Get the products. Hire the trades. Pay safely as milestones are met. Finish your bathroom — and keep thousands of dollars that would otherwise have disappeared into someone else's margin.

8. Why homeowners choose MyRenoHQ

Pulling it all together, here's what you actually get by renovating with us rather than handing the whole job to a full-service company:

You keep the savings. Typically 20 to 25 percent versus full-service, and 30 percent or more if you take on the simple labour yourself. On a typical bathroom that's many thousands of dollars staying with you.
Professional design, not guesswork. You see a real design and a realistic cost before you commit a cent to construction.
Real buying power. We hold trade accounts with major Australian suppliers — names like Reece, Beaumont Tiles, Fienza, ABI Interiors and ADP — at trade discounts, and we share that saving with you.
Vetted, licensed trades. You're connected with trades who already know the plan.
Your phone is the measuring tool. The iPhone Pro you already own — paired with the free Metaroom app — becomes a professional 3D scanner. No site visits just to get started.
Safer payments. Money is released against completed milestones, protecting you from paying ahead of the work.
Control with a safety net. You stay the project owner and keep the savings, with expert support behind every decision.
Built by someone who's done it. MyRenoHQ comes from years of hands-on bathroom renovation experience — so the advice is grounded in what really happens on site, not theory.

9. Ready to start?

If you've read this far, you already understand more about renovating than most people ever will. You know how the industry works, where the money goes, and that you have a real choice about how to spend yours.

The next step is simple. Register and begin Stage 1 — Scan & concept for $399. In a few days you'll have a real design for your bathroom and an honest estimate of what it will cost — with no obligation to go any further. It's the easiest, lowest-risk way to find out exactly what's possible for your space and your budget.

Start your bathroom, your way. Scan your room, see your design, and discover how much you could save — all before you commit to the build. Welcome to a smarter way to renovate.

Important notes

Savings figures and costs in this guide are illustrative and will vary depending on the size, condition, location and finishes of your project. Results are not guaranteed. MyRenoHQ is a platform that supports homeowners managing their own renovation — you remain the project owner, and skilled and regulated work (plumbing, electrical, waterproofing) must always be carried out by appropriately licensed professionals. Always do your own research, use safe work practices, and seek your own advice where needed. Prices and supplier relationships current as at 2026.

The Homeowner's Renovation Guide · MyRenoHQ A free guide from the team at MyRenoHQ. Australia-wide. Bathrooms & ensuites. V1.