Furnished turnkey handover: arriving at a home ready to live in

What does a turnkey renovation with furniture and styling include?

Three layers: construction finish, installation of furniture and equipment, and setting up daily life. The last layer turns a flat into a home you can arrive at with one suitcase: beds made, kitchen stocked, lighting set to scenes and art on the walls.

The boundary is set by the contract, not by the "turnkey" slogan. For some companies the "key" means the final finish, for others it includes furniture, for others textiles and tableware as well. So the owner's first step is a written list of exactly what will be in the flat on arrival day and who is responsible for each item.

Who buys the tableware, linens and small items?

Whoever you name in the contract. The construction crew does not normally do it, so you need a designer, a stylist, a personal assistant or the owner. Without a named person the details are left to the last week and bought in a hurry.

Draw up an equipment inventory room by room. In bedrooms: mattresses, bed linen, throws, pillows, hangers. In bathrooms: towels, mats, dispensers. In the kitchen: crockery, cutlery, pans, knives, textiles, small appliances. A rule of thumb for guest bedrooms: two sets of sheets per bed and three towels per guest. Embroidered linen and made-to-measure textiles take several weeks in practice, so they are ordered once bed sizes are known.

Settle three things: a budget per item, who approves the choice and whether unsuitable items can be returned. If you live abroad, the easiest way is to review the selection in photos and approve it in writing.

In what order is the home finished before the owner arrives?

First the dust goes, then large furniture comes in, then equipment and lighting, and textiles, art and flowers arrive last. The reverse order damages both furniture and schedule.

In practice it runs like this: final post-works clean; furniture and built-in elements; appliances and connection; lighting and smart-home commissioning; curtains and rugs; textiles, tableware and objects; art and mirrors; flowers and scent on arrival day. Art goes up once paint and lighting are final, because only then do you see how shadows fall. Mattresses come last, still wrapped.

Leave a buffer between handover of the works and your arrival. In practice one or two weeks are set aside for placing, replacing items damaged in transit and adjusting. When the schedule is tight, the buffer disappears first and you arrive to a half-finished home. It is better to move the arrival date than to live in something unfinished.

How do I check lighting and appliances in one evening?

Go by systems, not by rooms: water, electricity, climate, kitchen, connectivity, doors and windows. With a list, two or three hours is enough.

Water: run every tap, check pressure and how long hot water takes, flush every toilet and listen for gurgling drains. Electricity: every switch, every lighting scene, dimmers, sockets, chargers and a distribution board with labelled circuits. Climate: underfloor heating or radiators and air conditioning in each room, and noise at medium speed. Kitchen: oven, hob, extractor, dishwasher and washing machine on a short cycle. Connectivity: Wi-Fi, televisions, door entry, alarm. Doors: all keys, locks, curtains and blinds.

Ask for test cycles of the appliances to be run before you arrive and bring a snagging list for the first week. Put in writing who fixes what and when.

What should an owner on a short visit do on day one?

Collect the keys and the document folder, walk through the house with the person responsible for the works and photograph everything that raises a question. The first evening is not for arguing about cushion colours but for checking what works.

The folder should hold: a diagram of the services, the location of the stopcock and the distribution board, alarm and Wi-Fi codes, appliance manuals and warranties, contacts for the site lead, the cleaner and service providers, and material data sheets with care instructions for stone, timber and finishes. Count keys and remotes. Run all lighting scenes at different times of day: the house looks different by day and by night, and lighting comments appear in the evening.

Make a snagging list by room and hand it to the site lead. For short visits it helps to agree that small items are fixed while you are away, so the next visit finds everything in order.

How do I leave the home unattended after completion?

The home needs someone who opens it regularly and a few simple systems: leak, temperature and access monitoring. An empty coastal flat with its humidity behaves differently from an occupied one.

In practice leak sensors go under basins, by the washing machine and in bathrooms, with a phone alert and a solenoid valve on the water supply. Thermostats stay on minimum settings so the home neither dries out nor gets damp. In the humid season a dehumidifier runs in the closed house. Once a month the taps should be opened and the toilets flushed in rarely used bathrooms; otherwise the traps dry out and a smell appears.

Nominate a key holder and a manager who airs the home, collects the post and lets tradespeople in, and check that the home insurance covers periods when nobody is there. Stone, timber and lacquer prefer a steady temperature, so the climate is not switched off completely.

How can BCN YARD help?

We run renovation and interior design, and one person responsible for the site stays until handover. If you are arriving at a finished home, we discuss where "turnkey" ends in your case: furniture, equipment, textiles, lighting. Payments follow stages under the contract and the exact price is set after the visit and measurements. Write to us in Spanish or Russian and we reply within an hour.