Realistic timeline and trade order for renovating a Dubai apartment?
Planning a full apartment renovation (kitchen, two bathrooms, flooring, paint). I keep getting vague timelines from contractors. What's a realistic schedule, and what order should the work actually happen in so nothing gets redone?
3 answers
Vague timelines usually mean the contractor hasn't sequenced it. The realistic shape:
Timeline - Approvals / fit-out NOC: 1–2 weeks before any work (see do I need approval to renovate). - Single bathroom: ~2–4 weeks. Full apartment (your scope): ~6–12 weeks, depending on kitchen/joinery lead times.
Trade order (the important part): 1. Demolition / strip-out 2. First-fix plumbing & electrical (pipes/cables in walls) 3. Plastering & gypsum (ceilings, partitions) 4. Tiling & waterproofing (wet areas first) 5. Joinery / kitchen installation 6. Painting 7. Second-fix — sockets, switches, taps, sanitaryware, light fittings 8. Deep clean & snagging
The classic expensive mistake is painting or tiling before first-fix, then chopping into it. Lock the sequence and the material lead times (kitchens/joinery are the long pole) and the timeline stops being vague.
The joinery lead time caught us out — the kitchen took 5 weeks to arrive and held everything up. Order it first, not last.
One thing that changes the timeline/trade-order a lot: whether you're living in the home during the work. If you are, the sequence gets re-planned around keeping a usable kitchen and bathroom, and you add serious dust control (sealing the work zone AND the AC return grilles so dust isn't blown through the whole house), which makes it slower but liveable. There's a thread specifically on renovating while still living in it — phasing, dust and staying sane. The core order (messy/wet work first, clean finishes last) still holds — you just do it zone by zone.
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