Full home renovations in Foios, with the respect a traditional village house deserves

Foios is a farmland village in l’Horta Nord, home to around 7,500 residents, which has managed to grow without giving up its agricultural roots. A stroll through its old town says it all: colourful façades, wrought-iron balconies, the odd modernist touch and, in the background, the tower of the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption on the village square. All around, the fields of the huerta and the tiger nut crop still set the pace of the town, while metro line 3 brings the municipality within minutes of Valencia without it losing its neighbourhood character.

That blend really shows when it comes to renovating. In Foios, single-storey village houses —thick-walled, with timber beams and a rear courtyard, inherited or bought to settle down in— sit alongside the family flats from the decades of expansion and the odd more recent townhouse. Each type calls for a different renovation: the old house demands that you look first at the structure and the damp rising from the ground; the flat usually needs worn-out services replaced and more light by opening the kitchen onto the living room.

At Batecs we work in Foios from our base in La Eliana, with over 35 years renovating homes across Valencia and l’Horta. We are not from the village, but we know its type of house well and how these farmland buildings behave when you lift a floor or knock through a partition wall. That is why we approach every home in Foios calmly and methodically, with our own team and a fixed quote that tells you from day one exactly what you will pay.

What changes here

What makes renovating in Foios different

Renovating in a farmland village has its own rules. These are the points that most shape the work and the budget when we take on a home in Foios, and that set this municipality apart from its neighbour Meliana or from any flat in central Valencia.

The village house and rising damp

In the old single-storey house, the first question is always where the water is coming up from. These buildings were put up without a horizontal damp-proof barrier, so it is common for damp to rise by capillary action from the ground and show up as bulging skirting, flaking paint or saltpetre at the base of the walls. You don’t fix it by painting over the top: you have to treat the wall at its base, ventilate well and choose breathable finishes. We assess it on the visit and resolve it before settling on finishes, so the work doesn’t have to be redone two years later.

Thick load-bearing walls, beams and courtyard

The Foios house usually has thick load-bearing walls, floors built with timber beams and a rear courtyard that is pure gold for bringing in natural light. Before knocking down a single partition it pays to know which wall is load-bearing and what condition the beams are in; from there, the most common move is to open the living area towards the courtyard and arrange the house around that void. Modernising without losing the building’s character —its ceiling height, its lengthwise layout— is exactly what we most enjoy about this type of home.

Family flats and worn-out services

In the flats of Foios, from the decades of the village’s growth, something else takes priority: plumbing and electrics that have run their course, closed-off layouts and small kitchens cut off from the living room. Here the renovation gains a lot from renewing all the services at once, opening up the kitchen to create a generous living area and unifying the home’s flooring so the space can breathe.

Permits from Foios Town Council

Any renovation of a certain size goes through its formalities at Foios Town Council. Work that doesn’t touch the structure or façade is usually handled with a responsible declaration or notification; intervening in load-bearing walls, altering openings in an old-town façade or extending requires a permit. We guide you and prepare the paperwork so the home is always above board.