Step-by-Step Guide: How to Renovate Your Apartment in Sydney

Most step-by-step renovation guides are written for a freestanding house, then have "check with strata" bolted on as an afterthought. That order does not work in an apartment. The approval, the by-law, the building access and the waterproofing sign-off are not side tasks, they are stages with their own deadlines, and doing them in the wrong sequence is what blows out apartment projects. This is the ordered journey, written by a Sydney apartment specialist, from the day you decide to renovate to the day you get the keys back.

How do you renovate an apartment in Sydney, step by step?

Seven steps, in this order. Steps two and three run in parallel because approval takes weeks and you do not want the design sitting idle while you wait. Here is the whole journey at a glance, with rough durations.

Durations are indicative Fine Touch Group ranges. The on-site phase is shorter for a single room and longer for a full apartment, and restricted work hours stretch it because there is no weekend catch-up. For a full breakdown of timing, see how long an apartment renovation takes.

Step 1: Define scope and budget

Lock what you are touching before you talk to anyone, because the single biggest cost driver in an apartment is moving wet areas. Relocating a bathroom or shifting plumbing means new waterproofing, new drainage falls and often strata sign-off on common-property pipework. Keeping the kitchen and bathroom where they are, and spending the money on finishes instead, is how you control the number.

Set the budget against real Sydney ranges, then add a contingency. Our canonical full-apartment ranges are a studio or 1-bed at $60,000 to $100,000, a 2-bed at $80,000 to $130,000, and a 3-bed at $100,000 to $160,000. Single rooms cost less, a kitchen from $18,000 and a bathroom from $15,000. On top of the build, budget a 15 to 20 percent contingency. Pre-1990 Sydney blocks hide asbestos, tired switchboards and old plumbing, and the contingency is what stops a surprise becoming a stoppage.

For the full tick-box version of everything to lock down at this stage, use the apartment renovation checklist. This guide stays on the journey.

Step 2: Strata approval and the by-law

Start this early and run it alongside the design, because it is the longest step and the one most likely to hold up your start date. Under the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015, the work falls into one of three classes, and the class decides what approval you need.

By-law drafting runs around $900 to $1,000 plus GST, plus a registration fee to NSW Land Registry Services. Major-works approval realistically takes 6 to 12 weeks because it usually waits for a general meeting or a special vote. A bathroom is the common trap: it almost always counts as major work because it affects waterproofing.

The by-law is not just paperwork. Once it is registered, the responsibility for the waterproofing you install transfers to you, permanently. An original bathroom is the owners corporation's problem, a renovated one is yours. That is why the membrane and its certificate matter so much later in the build. For the full approval walkthrough, the documents the committee wants and how to avoid months of back-and-forth, read the strata approval guide for NSW renovations.

Step 3: Design, certifier, and DA or CDC

Finalise the design and selections while approval is running, and check early whether you need a council approval on top of strata. Most internal apartment renovations do not, but it is not automatic. Work that meets the State Environmental Planning Policy standards can go through as a Complying Development Certificate (CDC) via a private certifier, which is faster. Work that does not meet those standards needs a Development Application (DA) lodged through the NSW Planning Portal, which is slower and adds weeks. Strata approval and council approval are separate processes, and you may need both.

This is also where the compliance detail gets drawn, not just the look. Wet areas have to be documented to the National Construction Code, which references AS 3740 for waterproofing, and acoustic underlay has to meet your building's star rating. Getting these into the drawings now is what makes the build and the sign-off go cleanly later.

Step 4: Choose a licensed builder

Only sign once the scope is fixed, and only with a builder who holds a current NSW builder licence. You can check any licence in seconds on the Service NSW register. Fine Touch Group Pty Ltd holds NSW Builder Licence 151772C. In a strata building the licence matters more than in a house, because the owners corporation, the strata manager and often the building's insurer will all ask to see it before they let work start.

The contract law in NSW is firm, and it protects you. Know these three things before you sign.

Step 5: Book the building

Reserve the building's access before the first day on site, not on the morning of it. This is the step a house renovation simply does not have, and forgetting it can cost you a wasted day with a full crew standing around. There are four things to lock in.

• 1. Lift booking. Most buildings require the service lift to be booked and padded for deliveries and rubbish removal. Some only allow it at set times.
• 2. Loading dock. High-rise and larger blocks run a dock with time slots. Stone, joinery and skip bins all need a window.
• 3. Work hours. Strata schemes commonly restrict noisy work to weekday business hours, often 8am to 4pm, no weekends. This is set by your building's by-laws and it directly stretches the timeline.
• 4. Neighbour notice. Give written notice of start and finish dates and a site contact. It is good manners, it is often required, and it heads off complaints to the committee mid-build.

Step 6: The build

The on-site work runs in a fixed sequence, and the order is not negotiable, because each stage has to be signed off before the next can cover it. Waterproofing is the pivot point: once it is in and certified, everything tiles over it, so it cannot be rushed or skipped.

Step 7: Sign-off and handover

The job is not finished when it looks finished, it is finished when you hold the paperwork. At handover you should receive the compliance certificates that prove the work was done legally and that protect you if anything goes wrong later. Do not pay the final amount until you have them.

Behind the paperwork sits your statutory protection. Under the Home Building Act 1989, your builder carries a warranty of 6 years for major defects and 2 years for other defects. That cover only means something if you used a licensed builder under a proper contract, which is why step four matters as much as it does.

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