In remodeling, couples need to keep respect, communication in their toolbox

Building a life together as a couple often means building - or rebuilding - a home together.

But nothing can test a relationship or pull at its foundation more, according to a 2013 remodeling and relationships survey conducted by Houzz, a home improvement and interior design website. The survey reports that 12 percent of couples acknowledge considering separation or divorce mid-remodel. Now that's a reason to keep those avocado kitchen appliances for another year.

Issues arise when she likes French country and he likes contemporary. He wants to keep his old album covers framed on the wall, but she's already visualizing their move to the trash bin. Maybe one spouse makes a decision, or many decisions, without the other. Even couples who agree on everything could be driven to tears - and take it out on each other - just by the fact that their home, in its current state, is hardly a haven.

Onetime Queen Village resident Julie Davis, director of content and marketing for TotalHousehold, a Connecticut-based website for people looking for home improvement professionals, recently completed her own kitchen remodel. Even for someone whose work life is dedicated to the subject, she said, it wasn't easy.

Like many couples, she and her husband's design tastes differed. But things heated up when she immediately took the project into her own hands.

"My M.O. was to start a bit on the clandestine side," said Davis. She changed 45 cabinet knobs without her husband's knowledge. Once the shock of spending $300 for a box of knobs wore off, her husband agreed to go along with the project as long as she agreed to replace their old refrigerator with one that he wanted.

As the remodeling progressed, they learned to negotiate - or at least try.

"You have to go very gingerly with someone. You have to find the middle ground," said Davis. "The problem with any compromise is it's not really a compromise. It's who's going to win the argument."

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In remodeling, couples need to keep respect, communication in their toolbox