Renovation projects helping keep many area businesses afloat

Marty and Samantha Slapnik are amid a home renovation project turning a screened porch into a home office, and, like many other homeowners, providing vital work to struggling builders.

Remodeling jobs, like the Slapnik's office, are making up a greater portion of the business for home builders than they have in years, as the tough real estate market has severely slowed the pace of new home construction.

For the Slapniks, the remodel made sense - it will let guests stay undisturbed and the homeowners can avoid spending thousands of dollars in rent each year on office space for Marty Slapnik.

"It made sense because we're not in a place where we want to move but we just wanted to make the place more useful," said Samantha Slapnik.

Area builders, many of whom had to turn down remodeling work during the building boom a few years ago, are taking on the smaller projects to keep their companies afloat.

Remodeling has become so popular along the Grand Strand that the Horry Georgetown Home Builders Association recently created a remodeling council to educate builders and help homeowners find licensed contractors.

The hardest part of the remodeling process was finding the right builder to do the job, Slapnik said.

"You have to interview them. You have to trust your gut. Definitely check references. You have to go through the process when you're spending a chunk of change and letting people into your home," she said.

One of the goals of the remodelers council is to be a resource to the public, said Fred Coyne, the council's co-chairman.

"What we want to do is elevate the professionalism of our industry and become sort of a go-to for consumers looking to do [a project]," he said.

The council, which will provide education and information, was created in response to the growing importance of remodeling to the local home building industry, Coyne said.

"We really didn't have a huge demand for remodeling 10 years ago," he said. "Because of our aging housing stock in our area it's starting to come more into its own."

One of the challenges for builders today is that many unlicensed, non-professional workers are coming into the industry, said Jim Alessi, the owner of Alessi Custom Builder and Remodelers.

"Everyone who has a hammer in the basement is a handyman," he said.

Alessi said he understands many people are out of work and trying to get by, but as a licensed home inspector, he's also seen how the low cost projects done by less experienced workers can go wrong. He encourages homeowners to make sure the proper building permits are required and to make sure the person they hire for the job has the appropriate license and insurance.

The competition from unlicensed builders who do jobs without building permits and for bargain prices hurts the reputation of the trade, he said.

Alessi, like many builders, primarily built new homes for the past 10 or 12 years but has recently turned back to his roots in remodeling, where he started his career 37 years ago.

"Most of the people that were builders are all trying to reinvent themselves right now," Alessi said. "Now that the industry is in the toilet we're all going back to remodeling."

Harry Dill, president of the Horry Georgetown Home Builders Association and a partner at Sterling Homes, said that with home values still dropping and financing tough to get, more homeowners have to stay put so they may remodel a kitchen or bathroom to get the upgrades they want. In some cases homeowners are choosing to remodel their houses to upgrade to the features they want rather than buying a new house, he said.

His company started doing remodeling projects when the real estate market started to slow down a couple of years ago, Dill said.

"Once upon a time we had so many new construction projects we had to turn down remodeling jobs," he said. "In the past few years we've done more and more of them."

Remodeling is going to be the primary source of income for a growing number of builders and the best way for them to make ends meet as the market recovers, Dill said.

For some builders, such as Ray Floyd, president of Rebuilders, remodeling has always been a speciality, but he's also seeing changes.

There has been a shift to smaller projects, like bathroom upgrades, and away from larger projects as a result of the economic conditions, he said.

"A lot more in remodeling is a lot more repairs that are necessary in order to upkeep a home," Floyd said.

Bathroom upgrades are popular and many, especially some of the area's aging homeowners, are getting rid of bathtubs.

Sharon Proulx remodeled her master bathroom last year and got rid of the garden tub, which she called a dust collector. The new large shower, with two shower heads is far more usable than the old bathroom, she said.

She's slowly chipping away at the upgrades the house needs and is having her guest bathroom remodeled now.

"I mean I like living here and I'd just like to make my house more sellable and a better place to live for us," she said.

Often homeowners will spread out projects and complete them as they have the money to do them, and most of his clients pay cash, Floyd said.

Homeowners are still hesitant to spend money in this economic environment and challenges getting loans has hurt the remodeling market for those who need to borrow money to pay for a project, he said.

Still, remodeling is less expensive than buying a new property, so it has become the new reality for a lot of builders.

"We like what we do. In order to stay in the business these are the adjustments that we have to make," Coyne said.