Citeste articolul in romana → Cum renovezi un apartament de bloc vechi: ghidul pe scurt
Renovating a communist-era bloc flat comes down to seven decisions in a fixed order: check the building and the flat, know what's legal, decide the layout, define what the renovation includes, set the budget, choose who does it, and plan the order and the time. Get the order right and most of the surprises disappear. And a designed renovation doesn't need a luxury budget.
In short
Start with the building, not the finishes. Its seismic status, its structure and its shared installations decide what's possible inside your flat.
"No seismic risk" usually means "never assessed". Check the official list and the land book, and avoid buildings still listed under the old U1–U3 categories.
Know your building type. Panel blocs fix most walls; cast-concrete and brick blocs usually leave more freedom. Only an engineer can confirm which walls carry load.
Most of a renovation needs no approval. Moving a wet room, touching the riser, changing a non-structural wall or closing the balcony needs a notification. Anything structural needs a permit.
What you can't change: structural walls (without a permit), the riser, the façade, the ceiling height.
A full renovation of a two-room flat: roughly 70,000–120,000 lei with standard finishes, and 6–10 weeks of works (2026 market ranges).
Design first, then build. Decisions made on paper cost nothing; decisions made on site cost a crew day and a repair.
Where are you starting from?
Two starting points, same route. The difference is which step comes first.
I'm buying: start with step 1. Check the building and the flat before you make an offer. Everything you find there is either a cost to subtract, a point to negotiate or a reason to walk away.
I already own it: start with step 2. Find out what's legal for the works you have in mind, then work through the layout, the scope and the budget.
What kind of bloc do you have?
Three main types. The type tells you roughly how much the walls will let you change, before an engineer confirms it.
Panel bloc (bloc din panouri prefabricate): walls and floors made of factory-cast concrete panels. Structural walls run in both directions every few metres, so most substantial interior walls carry load. The layout is largely fixed; the work is about using it well.
Cast-concrete bloc (bloc monolit, or frame): concrete poured on site, with columns, beams or structural walls carrying the load and infill walls between them. More walls can usually move, but the structural ones aren't always where you'd expect.
Brick bloc (bloc din caramida): typical of the 1950s and early 1960s, often with higher ceilings. Load-bearing brick walls can sometimes take an opening with a lintel, after an expert assessment.
How to find out: ask the administrator for the building's technical book (cartea tehnica), look at the building's year, and ask an engineer. Knocking on a wall doesn't tell you.
Is your building safe in an earthquake?
Every building has some seismic risk. The question is how much, and the building's year and its official status tell you most of it.
"No seismic risk" in a listing almost always means nobody has assessed the building. There's no "no risk" class.
The year matters most. Buildings designed before the 1977 earthquake were built to codes engineers call "low". The rules became stricter from 1978, and again from 1992.
The four classes, RsI to RsIV, come from a technical expertise. RsI is the most vulnerable; RsIV behaves like a new building.
U1, U2 and U3 are not risk classes. They're old 1990s deadlines for strengthening, long expired. A building still listed under a U category was found to need strengthening and was never re-assessed. Avoid it.
An RsI class has legal consequences. Flats can't be rented until the building is strengthened (Law 212/2022, art. 5 alin. (3)), and the class is recorded in the land book.
How to check:
the building's year;
the city's official list of buildings at seismic risk;
part III of the land book extract;
the technical book kept by the administrator.
Walk away from an RsI class or a U category with no strengthening funded and scheduled. In an RsII building, read the full expertise before you decide.
The seven steps
In this order. Each step depends on the one before it.
1. Check the building and the flat. Clean papers, a safe building, and installations you know the state of.
Building: its seismic status (above), the roof or terrace, the risers and the repair fund.
Papers: the land book extract, the cadastral plan compared with the flat, and the association's certificate. The seller's debts can pass to you.
Flat: the electrical panel, aluminium wiring, old steel pipes, the windows, damp, and signs of removed walls.
2. Know what's legal. Since 25 August 2026, every job falls into one of three routes.
No formality: finishes, new fixtures (even moved within the room), installations that don't touch the riser.
Notification: extending a bathroom or kitchen, the riser, non-structural walls, closing the balcony like the rest of the building. About five to six weeks from filing to start.
Building permit: any opening in a structural wall, plus an expert assessment and the association's vote. A notification is on your own responsibility, so have an engineer check any wall first.
3. Decide the layout. The riser, the floor height, the flat below and the structural walls set the limits.
Bathroom or kitchen: they move a little, rarely a lot. A bathroom can never sit over a neighbour's living room, bedroom or kitchen (Order 119/2014, art. 18).
Open kitchen: it depends on whether the wall is structural, and on gas. Induction avoids the gas rules.
Balcony: closing it like the rest of the building is a notification; merging it into the room needs an engineer.
4. Define what the renovation includes. Full means back to the concrete; partial keeps what's sound and fits the plan.
Full: every installation new up to the risers, new screed and plaster, windows, doors, bathroom and kitchen.
First the furniture plan, then sockets, lights and pipes follow it.
Spend on what's hard to change later: installations, waterproofing, windows, floors.
5. Set the budget. Installations and the bathroom move the number most.
Full standard renovation: roughly 1,400–2,400 lei/m², and more in Bucharest. For a two-room flat, about 70,000–120,000 lei.
Big lines: a bathroom roughly 10,000–25,000 lei; design typically €30–60/m².
Contingency: 10–15% on a defined scope.
6. Choose who does it. A good crew for cosmetic work; design first for anything more.
Signing: only an architect (or an interior architect with signing rights) and engineers can sign approval documents.
Building: works that need approval have to be done by a contractor.
Always: a written contract with the scope, the price, staged payments and the warranty.
7. Plan the order and the time. Structure first, installations second, finishes last.
Duration: about 6–10 weeks of works for a full two-room renovation, plus the waiting for design, orders and approvals.
Living there: possible with phasing. Do the messy whole-flat stages while you're away, then finish the rooms one by one.
Neighbours: no noisy work between 22:00 and 08:00, or between 13:00 and 14:00.
Not sure where your flat sits on this list? Book a free 45-minute Office Hours session, tell us whether you're buying or already own the flat and what you want to change, and we'll help you work out your first step and what to check before you spend anything.
What can you change in a bloc flat, and what can't you?
The building sets four fixed limits. Inside them, almost everything can change.
You can't change, or only with a permit and the association:
Structural walls. In panel blocs, many interior walls carry load. An opening needs an expert assessment, a building permit, and the agreement of two thirds of the association plus every directly affected owner.
The riser (the building's shared water and drain stack). It's common property. You connect to it; you don't move it.
The façade. You can replace the windows in the existing openings, not move them. Insulating the outside is a building decision, taken by the association.
The ceiling height. Every layer of floor build-up comes off it.
You can change, with a notification:
non-structural walls;
extending the bathroom or kitchen;
work on the riser connection;
closing the balcony the same way as the rest of the building.
You can change freely:
finishes: paint, floors, tiles, doors;
sanitary fixtures and the kitchen, in the same rooms;
the electrical and plumbing installations inside the flat, as long as the riser isn't touched;
built-in storage and furniture.
Gas is the hidden limit. Any room with gas appliances has to meet the gas rules, and an open kitchen makes the whole open space one room for those rules. Switching to induction removes the problem.
What are the most expensive mistakes?
Five, and they come up in almost every renovation that skips the steps above.
Removing a wall without an engineer. In a panel bloc, many interior walls carry load. A notification is on your own responsibility.
Finishing before testing. Tiles laid over pipes that were never pressure-tested, and walls painted over wiring nobody checked.
Buying without reading the building. An unassessed or high-risk building, debts to the association, or walls removed without papers.
Pricing without a scope. Whatever isn't written down gets priced on site, under pressure.
Putting the bathroom where the neighbour's bedroom is below. It breaks the hygiene norms and puts a leak risk over someone's bed.
Does a well-designed renovation need a big budget?
No. What makes a flat work is the plan, not the price of the finishes.
Much of what you'll read online prices a two-room renovation at the high end of the market: custom joinery, imported materials, showroom design. That market exists, but it isn't the only one. With mid-range finishes from the big retailers and a proper design (storage built in, one floor finish, light where you spend time, materials chosen once), a full renovation costs a fraction of it and lasts as well.
Find your first step
In a free, 45-minute Office Hours call, an architect looks at your flat or the one you're about to buy and tells you where to start: what to check first, which works need approval, what's realistic in your layout, and what it's likely to take in money and time.
Bring: the listing or the cadastral plan, photos of the rooms, the bathroom and the electrical panel, the building's year and type, and a short list of what you want to change.
Renovating in Romania: all articles
Before you buy
Rules and approvals
Planning the renovation
Room by room
Houses and land
