Hi wuff, I'm so ouch of touch with the price of classes/courses now. I did my classes 22 years ago. Once you get some classes and experience you could look around for a co-op community group of lead lighters and join them to work on your own projects. Our local council run classes at the local living and learning centre and there is an instructor and other participants who have different skill levels this is a cheap and enjoyable way to keep learning. Good luck and now you've got me thinking that I should do something with some lovely pieces of beveled glass I still have in a box.

As a ballpark starting figure use around $1800 - 2000 per square metre. This just a ballpark figure to use as as starting point and can easily vary either side. So for $150k for that size dwelling is only around $600 per square metre...... Contact a local designer (the good ones understand budgets and costings) and start from there. Material and product choices will vary the cost to construct greatly so keep that in mind. Building costs are always increasing not going down.

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Just like birth, death and taxes, renovation surprises are guaranteed. I think Micheal Bell's suggestion to add a contingency is a good one. Also finalising your design before looking for your builder will save on mid project variations. For those interested in estimating the cost of their renovation before going too far into their plans, try this renovation and extension cost calculator. Good luck. richard@makeovergroup (Melbourne)