Living in your house during an extension: the eight-week logistics playbook

The most important pre-work decision is where the temporary dust and access barrier will sit. This is the wall that separates the active building site from the part of the home your family will live in. It needs to be structurally robust enough to stop small children wandering onto site, sealed enough to block most airborne dust, and installed within 24 hours of demolition starting.

Ask the builder to specify the barrier detail: a stud wall with plasterboard both sides is the gold standard. Plastic sheeting alone is insufficient for a live-in build. The barrier should include a lockable door that only site workers use, and should be sealed at floor and ceiling with foam or backing rod. Any HVAC ducts that cross the barrier line must be capped or diverted.

Locate the barrier so that the family retains at least one bathroom, all bedrooms, and either the existing kitchen or a temporary one. If the current layout does not allow this without opening a new internal doorway, the builder should do that at the start of the job as part of the site set-up.

For most rear extensions the existing kitchen either goes offline mid-build or is being replaced. Assume you will lose the main kitchen for six to eight weeks and plan a temporary kitchen accordingly.

A functional temporary kitchen needs: a working sink with hot and cold water, a portable induction cooktop or benchtop oven, a microwave, a bar fridge or full-size fridge relocated to the temporary area, a small dishwasher if space allows, and enough bench space for meal preparation. Set it up in the garage, in a spare bedroom, or on a wide hallway. Not in the same room the family sleeps in.

Test the temporary kitchen for one week before demolition. If dinner takes twice as long or every meal is takeaway, you will run out of patience quickly. Adjust the layout while the main kitchen is still working.

Even the best-managed ground-floor extension has a two to seven day window when the roof of the existing home is opened up to allow structural tie-in of the new addition. During this week the home is not safe for children or pets, and often not safe for adults either. Assume you will need to decant.

Options include: a hotel or serviced apartment, family who live nearby, an Airbnb, or an ambitious road trip if the timing works with school and work. Book the accommodation early so it lines up with the builder program. If the builder is vague about which week the tie-in will happen, that is a red flag; the program should be firm to plus or minus one week by contract signing.

Communicate with the builder daily during the tie-in week. Weather delays can extend the roof-open period, and if you have a return date locked in it is your problem to manage. Buffer two extra days into the accommodation booking as a safety margin.

Dust from a construction site penetrates everything if it is not actively controlled. Adopt three practices from day one and stay with them for the whole build.

First, every worker leaves the site by walking through the barrier with clean boots. Position a heavy-duty walk-off mat on the site side of the barrier and enforce a strict shoes-off rule crossing into the family zone. This alone cuts dust by more than half.

Second, wipe hard surfaces and vacuum floors in the family zone every evening. Do not wait for the weekend. Dust becomes concrete-hard once it settles for four or five days, and by then it has migrated into fabric and electronics.

Third, negotiate quiet hours with the builder. The typical residential construction hours in South Australia are 7am to 6pm Monday to Friday, and 8am to 5pm on Saturdays. If your household includes a shift worker, a young baby or a family member studying for exams, ask the builder to adjust the loudest activities (concreting, framing, demolition) to specific windows. Most builders will accommodate this if agreed at contract stage.

A building site is inherently more dangerous than a normal home. Children and pets need clear rules: never cross the barrier without an adult, always wear closed shoes in the transition zone, never touch power tools even if switched off. Older children should be walked through what is happening once a week so they feel part of the project rather than displaced by it.

On insurance, home and contents policies vary significantly in how they cover live-in construction. Some require notification and an endorsement, some exclude cover during major works, some are unaffected. Call your insurer, ask specifically about extensions with the family staying in the house, and get the answer in writing. Confirm the builder holds current public liability insurance and home indemnity insurance, and get copies of both certificates.

On the mental load, plan for one day per fortnight as a proper reset. Leave the house for the whole day. Go somewhere quiet. Living through a build wears people down slowly, and the households that come out best are the ones that plan the recovery days in advance rather than reacting to burnout.