Coquitlam homeowners are renovating at two very different timelines right now. On one side, the Westwood Plateau and Eagle Ridge homes built between the mid-1990s and mid-2000s are hitting their refresh window - oak cabinetry, original tile, and beige carpet are all due. On the other, newer Burke Mountain and City Centre owners are upgrading recent builds to match their tastes. And in between, decades-old houses across Central Coquitlam, Austin Heights, and Maillardville are getting the full reset they've been waiting for.
Custom Installations is a North Vancouver-based renovation general contractor that has been working across the Lower Mainland - including Coquitlam and the broader Tri-Cities - for years. We bring careful planning, real coordination of trades, and clean finishing details to kitchen, bathroom, and whole-home interior renovations. Same team. Same standards. Whether your project is in Westwood Plateau, Burke Mountain, Como Lake, or Burquitlam.
Call 604-818-4053 or request a free Coquitlam quote - send a couple of photos and a quick note about what you want to change.
In Coquitlam, the term gets thrown around loosely. Some operators advertising as general contractors are really single-trade specialists pulling in friends for the rest of the job. Others sub everything out and disappear once the deposit clears. A real general contractor is the person who owns the project - every trade, every decision, every detail - from the day you sign to the day you sign off.
On a Custom Installations project, that means:
Scope locked before demo day
We sequence materials, finishes, and decisions in advance, so the project doesn't grind to a halt waiting on a tile selection or a cabinet delivery.
Trades coordinated, not just hired
Plumbers, electricians, tile setters, drywallers, painters - scheduled in the right order with no idle days or compounding delays.
Job sites that don't look like a job site
Floors protected, dust contained, debris removed at the end of each day. Strata and neighbours kept informed.
Quality control that catches the small stuff
Straight reveals, square corners, level transitions. The finish is what people see; the prep is what makes it last.
Honest updates, every week
What's done, what's next, what we need from you - no chasing, no guessing.
We focus on interior renovations where the quality of the planning and the finishing decide whether the result looks like a real renovation or just a band-aid.
Kitchen Renovations
Plateau-era kitchens with oak boxes and tile counters. Newer Burke Mountain kitchens needing a finish upgrade. Burquitlam condo kitchens with footprints to maximize. We handle full layout changes, cabinetry coordination, countertop install, tile and backsplash, lighting, transitions between rooms, and the small details - toe kicks, side panels, scribe trims - that separate a polished kitchen from a kitchen that "looks new."
Bathroom Renovations
Bathrooms are unforgiving - moisture, traffic, plumbing - so the prep work matters more than the finishes. We do proper waterproofing, vapour control, niches, curbless showers, heated floor install, vanity and tile coordination, and the venting that prevents the next round of mould in five years. Coquitlam's climate is wet enough that bathroom waterproofing should be sequenced like exterior work, not as an afterthought.
Hardwood Flooring & Refinishing
Installation of hardwood, engineered hardwood, and luxury vinyl plank. Refinishing of older Plateau and Central Coquitlam floors back to bare wood and refinished to your preferred stain and sheen. We test substrates, check moisture, plan transitions to tile and stairs, and acclimatize material before install - because every shortcut here shows up as cupping or gaps within a few seasons.
Drywall, Painting & Whole-Home Finishing
From single-room patching to full-home repaints in 90s Plateau houses with high ceilings and complicated trim. We handle drywall demo, install, mudding, sanding, priming, and finish painting - interior. Properly sequenced, with the cuts and lines that distinguish a finished house from a hastily redone one.
Whole-Home Interior Renovations
When the project spans multiple rooms - opening up a closed Plateau floor plan, refreshing a tired interior before listing, or getting a newly purchased home move-in ready - we coordinate the full scope. One point of contact. One schedule. One walkthrough at the end.
Get Started
Renovating in Coquitlam isn't the same job as renovating in Vancouver or on the North Shore. A few things that genuinely change how we plan, quote, and execute:
Most of Westwood Plateau was built between 1995 and 2005. That housing stock is now 20–30 years old - exactly the window when oak cabinets, builder-grade tile, brass fixtures, popcorn ceilings, and beige berber carpet all start to feel dated at the same time. We do a lot of Plateau work, and we've learned which elements respond well to refresh-style updates (cabinet refacing, paint, lighting, hardware) and which areas almost always justify a full rebuild (the kitchen footprint, the primary ensuite). We'll tell you straight which is which for your house.
Burke Mountain homes are typically newer construction with modern finishes, but the terrain still bites. Hillside lots mean drainage matters, scaffolding costs more on multi-storey townhomes, and material protection during Coquitlam's wet winters adds time to exterior-adjacent work. We plan around the weather windows that actually exist, not the ones we wish existed.
Maillardville is one of BC's oldest francophone communities, and many homes around the Brunette and Marmont area date to the early 1900s. Central Coquitlam and Austin Heights add another large pool of 1950s–70s detached homes. On any house built before 1990, asbestos in flooring, vermiculite insulation, and lath-and-plaster walls all need to be considered before demolition begins. We don't pretend these aren't there - we flag testing, coordinate WorkSafeBC-certified abatement contractors when needed, and plan the renovation around real conditions.
Unlike the North Shore (split between the City and District of North Vancouver) or the City of Vancouver's notoriously slow process, Coquitlam runs everything through a single municipality. Residential permit applications typically hit first review in 15–20 business days, with most renovation permits issued in 2–4 weeks. That makes Coquitlam one of the more predictable jurisdictions to renovate in - provided your application is clean.
Coquitlam's policy environment has shifted in favour of adding rental space. Secondary (basement) suites have been allowed for years across most single-family zones. Garden suites - detached or semi-detached structures up to 968 sq ft in the rear yard - are now permitted on most RS-zoned lots, subject to setback and size rules. The City also runs a Secondary Suite Loan Program offering low-interest loans up to $40,000 for adding a suite at a below-market rental rate. We don't build new garden suites from scratch, but for basement suite conversions - kitchen, bath, egress, finishing - we handle the interior renovation side once the permit is in hand.
Since the Evergreen Line opened, the Burquitlam–Lougheed corridor has seen waves of older houses turning over to renovation-minded owners. The 1960s–70s homes along North Road, Burquitlam, and the Lougheed Highway side of Coquitlam West are often great renovation candidates - but, like all pre-1990 homes, they need realistic scope conversations about wiring, plumbing, and what's behind the drywall.
Why Choose Us?
We work across all of Coquitlam, including:
We also serve Port Moody, Port Coquitlam, North Vancouver, West Vancouver, and the broader Lower Mainland.
We are extremely happy with the work done by Custom Installations! They repaired the laminate flooring in our living room and installed new tiles in the entryway- we couldn’t be happier with the results. They were reliable, professional, and responded to all our inquiries promptly.
No - we're based in North Vancouver. We've been serving Coquitlam and the broader Lower Mainland for years and travel for the right project. If you'd rather work with a contractor whose office is in the Tri-Cities, we get it. If you want a North Vancouver-grade renovation crew that's worked extensively in Westwood Plateau, Burke Mountain, and Central Coquitlam, that's exactly what you're getting.
For most residential renovations, expect 2–4 weeks from a clean submission to permit issuance. First-review wait times typically run 15–20 business days. Coquitlam is meaningfully faster and more predictable than the City of Vancouver, and roughly comparable to North Vancouver. Complex projects (suite conversions, structural work, anything inside a Streamside Protection Area) take longer.
Not necessarily. A lot of Plateau kitchens have good bones - solid wood cabinet boxes, decent footprints, well-placed windows - and respond beautifully to refacing, repainting, hardware swaps, new counters, and a backsplash refresh. Others have layout issues that no surface upgrade will fix. We'll walk through your space and tell you which side of that line you're on, with realistic budgets for each option.
In most Coquitlam single-family zones, yes. Secondary suites have been permitted for years, and Coquitlam runs a Secondary Suite Loan Program offering low-interest loans up to $40,000 to homeowners who add a suite rented at below-market rates. Garden suites up to 968 sq ft are now allowed on most RS-zoned lots. We focus on the interior renovation side - kitchen, bath, finishing, egress - once permits and design are in place.
On any home built before 1990, plan for testing before demolition. Vermiculite insulation, asbestos in vinyl flooring and ceiling textures, knob-and-tube wiring, and lath-and-plaster walls are all common. BC regulations require WorkSafeBC-certified abatement when asbestos is present. We coordinate the testing, bring in qualified abatement contractors, and plan the renovation around what we actually find - not what we hoped to find.
Yes. We do significant work in townhouses and condos throughout the Plateau, Burke Mountain, City Centre, and Burquitlam areas. We know how to work with strata bylaws on hours of work, elevator and parking bookings, and sound and moisture protections required in shared-wall buildings.
Most of our renovations are quoted as fixed-price contracts once the scope and selections are locked in. That gives you cost certainty before we start. For projects with major unknowns - older homes where we can't see behind the walls yet, or undefined scope - we'll talk through the right pricing structure upfront.
Call 604-818-4053 or fill out the quote form below. Send a couple of photos of the space and a one-line note on what you'd like to change. It makes the first conversation faster and the quote more accurate.
Whether you're refreshing a Westwood Plateau kitchen, finishing a Burke Mountain basement, modernizing a Central Coquitlam home, or refitting a Burquitlam condo - we'd be happy to take a look. Honest read, clear quote, no pressure.
Phone: 604-818-4053
Email: [email protected]
Every project is different. Use these as planning ranges, not quotes:
|
Project Type |
Typical Range (Coquitlam) |
|---|---|
|
Cosmetic refresh (paint, flooring, fixtures) |
$20,000 – $55,000 |
|
Mid-range kitchen renovation |
$40,000 – $80,000 |
|
High-end kitchen renovation (Plateau / Burke Mountain) |
$75,000 – $140,000+ |
|
Mid-range bathroom renovation |
$22,000 – $50,000 |
|
Basement build-out / suite conversion (interior finishing) |
$55,000 – $100,000 |
|
Whole-home mid-range renovation |
$140,000 – $240,000 |
|
Premium whole-home renovation |
$240,000 – $400,000+ |
A few notes on these numbers: