Quizzed about the $1.5 million building consent issued by the council in December, Mr Morgan said it was mostly to modernise the building, with some alterations inside.
"We want to make it look a bit more contemporary. It will look great, that is the big reason we are doing it."
The eight-month construction project was expected to begin on March 1 in order that he and wife, Jo, will be in the new-look holiday home by Christmas. He said the concrete building did not have any weather tightness issues.
They hired Tauranga's Creative Space Architectural Design to modernise the building which he compared to an ammunition case.
The tired wooden panels will be replaced with ceramics and aluminium - the ceramics on the building's exterior cladding and the aluminium screens to keep out the sun on the windows.
He said the harsh marine environment meant the wood was "starting to look a bit crap" and they discovered that ceramics looked pretty cool.
The Morgans quickly found that because the wooden panels on their upstairs holiday home only extended two-thirds of the way up the big feature windows, they were "just about being fried alive" on sunny summer days.
"The aluminium looks smarter and is more functional," he said.
They were also replacing the roof covering but not reconstructing the roof, together with altering some of the bedrooms.
Their aim was to spend up to three months of the year living at Mount Maunganui whereas it was currently a bit over half that time.
"It is a nice contrast to Wellington," he said.
As for his Cats to Go campaign, in which he calls the animals "natural born killers" that prey on native wildlife, Mr Morgan said the public mood was swinging around to his way of thinking.
"I am not anti-cats but anti-wandering cats."
