Practical guide / Renovation Workbook 1.0
What have we approved, and what is still unpaid?
A cheap quote may exclude removal, tax or an allowance. A deposit may look like a second cost if it is copied into another list. This file keeps the scope, accepted commitment and actual cash separate, then brings them together for a review.
Your first useful result: Know what the next payment would cover. Follow the first task
Define and compare
Give each scope item an ID. Record quote components, inclusions and exclusions.
A quote total is UNKNOWN until base, tax and provisional figures are all numeric.
Review: Clarify missing scope and amounts before choosing.
Approve the commitment
Record the accepted contract. Give each proposed change a separate status and decision date.
Only approved changes through the review date alter the commitment.
Review: Keep undecided extras out of the approved total.
Follow the actual cash
Record deposits, other payments and actual refunds with contract IDs.
Net paid excludes future entries; outstanding equals approved commitment minus net paid.
Review: Review each balance before paying outside the workbook.
Choose and finish
Record a needed-by date and lead time for choices; keep snag observations open.
Order-by is needed-by minus your entered lead days. Closure needs a valid date.
Review: Confirm choices and close outstanding observations.
Check the assumptions.
- 100 scope items, contracts, decisions and snags; 200 quotes and changes; 500 payments. One project and one currency.
- Enter tax and provisional sums yourself; no tax advice, automatic estimates or quantity surveying.
- Accepted totals are manual decisions. The workbook does not choose a supplier, create a contract or authorise work.
- Dates and lead times are your inputs. No automatic construction scheduling, contractor booking or bank connection.
- Negative commitments or overpayments remain visible and require review. Native Excel and other spreadsheet-app compatibility remain unverified.
Keep a copy you can return to.
Keep the supplied clean and example files unchanged. Save your own working file with a useful name, such as renovation-workbook-2027-home.xlsx, and keep a dated backup before a large edit. A purchased ZIP is the blank source, not a backup of your entries.
If an input or formula is replaced
Undo the edit while it is still available, or return to a known good backup. If you need a fresh clean file, transfer only your records into its marked input cells and follow the setup guide again. Do not paste whole sheets over the supplied formulas, validations or reference lists. Check IDs, units, dates and linked results against the example before relying on the copy.
When the supplied rows are full
100 scope items · 200 quotes · 500 payments. Calculation ranges and validations have fixed capacities. A new row below a table does not prove that every linked result includes it.
For a separate period, project or volume, preserve the old workbook and start a named clean copy. If records must carry forward, record exactly which inputs you transfer, preserve their references and compare the opening and closing figures. Avoid copying historical activity as both an opening amount and a new movement. There is no automatic migration between files.
Inspect the workbook before you choose.
View its real sheets and a fictional calculation example.
Explore Renovation WorkbookWritten for version 1.0. Examples describe the supplied workflow; they are not customer results.