Part 1 · Before you talk to anyone

Turn your wish list into a clear project brief

You already know what you want changed and why. Now put it into one clear brief you can hand to several people — so that every one of them is answering the same question.

A common homeowner question at this point

How do I describe what I want without sounding stupid? And how do I make sure everyone I talk to is even answering the same question?

Why one brief changes everything

In Chapter 1 you wrote your Starting Sheet: what you want to change, why, the problems you want solved, and what matters most. That page is for you. It is where you got your own thinking straight.

A brief is the same material, arranged for someone else.

Here is what happens without one. You describe your project to the first person in your kitchen, and you remember eight of your ten points. A week later you describe it to the second person, in a different order, and this time you mention the thing about the morning light but forget the storage. The third person hears a third version.

Each of them then goes away and answers a slightly different question — honestly, professionally, and about a slightly different project. When their answers come back, you have no way of telling whether the differences between them are real differences in approach, or just echoes of what each of them happened to hear you say.

The same brief, given to everyone, removes that entire problem at the source.

A pair of hands gathers scattered handwritten notes and scraps of paper together toward a single open notebook page on a kitchen table, next to a tape measure and a mug. — Everything you need is already written down — it is just scattered. This chapter is about collecting it into one clear brief.

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You still do not need to know the solution

This is worth saying plainly, because it is where people freeze up and start searching online for construction terms at midnight.

A brief describes what you want and why. It does not describe how it will be done. You are not expected to name a wall, a beam, a construction method or a trade. If you happen to know something about the house, include it. If you do not, that is completely normal and it is not your job.

Preferences are different, and they do belong. If you already know you want wood flooring, a particular cabinet finish, a certain style, or a fixture you have fallen for — say so. That is not prescribing the solution; that is telling people what you actually want, which is the whole purpose of the page.

Lior’s rule for this

Give the same core requirements to every contractor. They may still come back with genuinely different professional solutions to those same requirements. That can be completely legitimate — and because everyone started from the same brief, those differences become something you can actually compare later.

Overhead view of three identical blank sheets of paper laid side by side on a wooden workbench, each beside a different pair of working hands holding a pencil, reading glasses and a folding ruler. — The same page, given to three different professionals. This is the point of the exercise — and it is what makes their answers worth comparing later.

Same needs, different solutions

Here is what that looks like in practice. One brief, two experienced people, two legitimately different answers.

What the brief said

“The kitchen is dark and cramped. Two of us cook at the same time and constantly get in each other’s way. There is nowhere for the children to sit while we cook. We would like it to feel connected to the living room. Storage is a must-have; a second sink would be nice; the utility room can wait.”

One professional proposed

Opening the kitchen toward the living room and building in a long run of storage along the opposite side, with seating at a central counter so the children are in the room but out of the working path.

Another proposed

Keeping the rooms separate but widening the opening and relocating the main work area, so the two cooks stop crossing paths — with a window enlarged to fix the light, and full-height storage where the old layout wasted space.

The fact that they differ does not by itself make either one wrong — each still has to be understood and weighed. They read the same needs and weighted them differently: one prioritized connection, the other prioritized light and separation. Because they were both answering your brief, you can now have an intelligent conversation about which trade-off you prefer.

Without a brief, you would not even know that is what you were choosing between.

What goes in a brief

Eight things. Most of them you already wrote in Chapter 1.

1. The outcome, in one sentence

Start with where you want to end up, not with the work. One sentence, in ordinary words: “When this is finished, we want a kitchen two people can cook in at once, with somewhere for the kids to sit.”

If someone reads only your first line, this is the one that should survive.

2. What you want changed, and the problem it solves

Carry these across from your Starting Sheet, but pair them up. Each change sits beside the problem it is there to solve. That pairing is what lets someone propose a better answer than the one you had in mind.

Change alone“Take out the wall between the kitchen and the living room.”

Change plus the problem“We want the kitchen to feel connected to the living room — at the moment whoever is cooking is completely cut off from everyone else.”

3. Your priorities, marked as priorities

You already sorted must-have, nice-to-have and can wait. Now say so in the brief, next to each item. Do not leave someone to guess which is which — they will guess wrong, and you will not find out until the proposals arrive.

Marking the “can wait” items matters more than it sounds. It tells an experienced person what to leave room for, rather than quietly designing it out.

A lined notebook open on a table with colored sticky tabs marking sections and a pen resting across the page, while two people make notes at the same table. — Priorities only work when they are written down as priorities — grouped, and marked before anyone else sees the page.

4. What you already know about the house

Not a survey. Not an inspection. Just the things you happen to know because you live there:

Roughly when the house was built, if you know it.
Work that has already been done, and roughly when.
Quirks you have learned to live with — the outlet that never worked, the door that sticks in winter, the corner that smells damp after rain.
Anything you have been told before by someone who looked at it.

You are not diagnosing anything. You are handing over what you know, so nobody has to discover it late. If you know nothing, write that — it is a perfectly good answer.

A utility closet in an older house containing a water heater and an electrical panel, with a tape measure extended against the wall beside them. — What you already know about the house belongs in the brief — its age, its quirks, and anything that has been worked on before.

5. Photos and examples

Two kinds, and both belong in the brief.

Your rooms as they are now — wide shots from a couple of angles, including the parts that annoy you. A photograph shows a problem far faster than a paragraph describes it.

Things you like — anything at all, from anywhere. You do not need to know what the style is called or why you like it. This is the fastest way to stop everyone agreeing on a word like “modern” while picturing four different rooms.

A person photographs the corner of a dated, tiled bathroom with a phone, seen from behind their shoulder in ordinary daylight. — Photographing what you already have saves a great deal of describing. Include the parts you dislike, not the tidy corners.

6. The questions you still have

Put them in the brief as questions. “Is there a way to get more light in without moving the window?” is a perfectly good line in a brief. It signals what you want thought about, and it gives you something concrete to compare answers on.

7. What is agreed, and what is still undecided

If two of you are deciding, mark the things you have settled and the things you have not. This feels awkward to write down. Do it anyway.

An undecided item that is labeled undecided is a normal part of a project. An undecided item that looks settled is how people end up paying to change something twice.

8. What to leave out

Leave out guessed technical answers: structural conclusions, construction methods, engineering calls, and specifications you do not actually know — anything that tells a professional how to do their job rather than what you need from it.

Do not leave out your genuine preferences. The flooring you want, the cabinet finish, the fixtures you love, the style you are drawn to — those are yours, they belong in the brief, and stating them plainly saves everyone time. The line is simple: what you want is yours to say; how to build it is theirs to propose.

Leave out your budget as well — not because it is secret, but because it belongs in a different conversation, which the next chapter is about.

What a finished brief looks like

Outcome A kitchen two of us can cook in at once, with somewhere for the children to sit. One sentence. If only this line is read, it still works.

Change & problem Feel connected to the living room — whoever cooks is cut off from everyone else. The problem is stated, so a better answer is allowed to exist.

Priorities Storage — must-have. Second sink — nice-to-have. Utility room — can wait. Marked, not implied. Nobody has to guess.

What we know House is 1970s. Bathroom redone about eight years ago. Damp smell in the back corner after heavy rain. Observations, not diagnoses.

Photos Six photos of the kitchen as it is, four of things we liked elsewhere. Attached to the same page, so they travel with it.

Open questions Can we get more light without moving the window? Invites expertise instead of hiding uncertainty.

Agreed / undecided Agreed: more storage, better light. Undecided: whether the dining table stays in the kitchen. Honest about the unsettled part.

How long should it be?

Concise, clear and easy to share. About a page is a useful target — long enough to carry your needs, short enough that a busy person actually reads all of it. If it keeps growing, pause and check whether you have drifted from describing what you want into prescribing how to build it.

Write it in your own words. It does not need to sound professional and it should not try to. A brief that sounds like a homeowner is easier to work with than one that sounds like it was copied from a template, because the person reading it can tell what you actually care about.

Your free project brief

Eight sections, built straight from your Starting Sheet. Fill it in on paper, or type into it here and print it.

My Project Brief

Free, complete and yours. Nothing is saved and nothing is sent anywhere — if you type into it, print or copy it before you close the tab.

1. The outcome, in one sentence

When this is finished, we want…

2. What I want changed, and the problem it solves

Each change beside the problem it is there to fix.

3. My priorities

Mark each one must-have, nice-to-have or can wait.

4. What I already know about the house

Age, previous work, quirks, anything you have been told. “I don’t know” is a fine answer.

5. Photos and examples I am attaching

Your rooms as they are, and things you liked elsewhere.

6. Questions I still have

Written as questions. These are for the professionals to answer.

7. Agreed / still undecided

Two columns in one box is fine. Be honest about the undecided part.

8. Anything I have deliberately left out

Optional. Useful if you want to be clear that something is out of scope for now.

Give the same brief to everyone. Not a tailored version each time — the same one. That consistency is what makes the responses easier to compare.

Still not sure about something? Ask AI Mickey — it knows this guide and where you are in it.

The whole guide, on one page

Part 1 — Before you talk to anyone

Part 2 — Finding the right contractors

Part 3 — Proposals, comparing, signing

Part 4 — Building and finishing

Before you go on

Write the brief in your own words, and do not polish it — a rough, honest brief beats a beautiful one you never finish.

You may have noticed the one thing deliberately missing from it: money. That is next, and it is its own chapter for a reason.