5 Upgrades that will Transform Your Home
Well, we’re officially one month into homeownership and I’d like to think we’ve tackled quite a bit already. In our first month, we’ve: scraped popcorn off all ceilings, broken (and replaced) a garage door, installed recessed lighting, ran new electrical/updated switches and outlets, painted a few rooms, learned (a lot) about pool chemistry, started taking out some carpet, and currently knee deep in a kitchen cabinet makeover. Needless to say, we’ve been keeping ourselves busy over here!
Though we aren’t technically 100% through with all of our projects just yet, I wanted to share what we’ve learned so far and what I’ve found to already make a huge difference in our new home.
1. Paint
It really is crazy how much of a difference fresh paint can make.
We didn’t mind the paint that was in the house when we bought it, but we knew that a fresh coat would help brighten things up and boy did it really transform the space. (HUGE part of the transformation also due to our popcorn removal — thanks Dad and Chris!)
For the front room, dining, stairway and master, we decided to hire professionals to paint the walls, trim and ceilings, and to refinish the beams. They did such a great job that we ended up having them texture and paint the ceiling in our backroom and kitchen as well for a seamless look.
As for the rest of the house, we plan to paint the remaining bedrooms and bathrooms ourselves as the time comes.
Check out the paint colors we chose and a few other favorites below (click on images for product links):
2. Flooring
I’m not sure if I’ve had more decision fatigue picking out paint colors or choosing flooring, but luckily I’ve been saving tons home inspo on Pinterest for years now so at least I had somewhere to start.
We know we want the look of wood and decided it would be best to replace all the lovely 70’s shag carpet with a vinyl wood plank flooring. Because our dog Zeus is 1) dirty and sheds a lot, 2) loves to slobber his water all over the place, and 3) has long nails, we figured the vinyl planks would be best as they are easy to clean and maintain, waterproof and extremely durable.
We’ve gone to a few different flooring places and taken several samples home. It was really helpful to have these and move them around from room to room, to see how the light hits and at different times of day too. Once we found the color we liked best, we brought home a full box to “put together” and see how it looked as it started to fill the room more.
Learning moment: I was shocked to see that the box of flooring only contained eight planks… like, what!? Not sure how many I was expecting but it was definitely more than that… Regardless, having a few more planks pieced together helped us solidify our decision and now our next steps are to remove the rest of the carpets, vacuum and clean subfloors, and seal the concrete before we install the vinyl planks on top.
While these photos don’t quite show the true “after” of our floors, it gives you an idea of the progression so far. We’ve ripped out the carpet, vacuumed the concrete (what feels like 100 times), mopped and applied a coat of concrete sealer. Once all of the rooms are prepped and finished, we’ll be ready to install our flooring!
Until I have photos of the new floor in all of its glory, see some of our floor inspiration below:
3. Refresh cabinets
On top of painting the walls and changing out the floors, we figured the easiest way to freshen up the kitchen would be to paint the old cabinets (before we look into bigger, potentially remodel-type projects down the road). Plus, there’s no way I wanted to keep the wood colored cabinets knowing we’ll be installing wood plank floors not too long from now…
While we’ve made progress on picking out colors and getting the cabinets primed (see photo up top), this is another project I don’t quite have before and after pictures of yet. With that said, I plan to keep working on it over the weekend and will share the grand reveal with you soon!
Check out our kitchen inspiration for now:
4. Lighting
Whether you choose to update existing fixtures or get new ones, lighting is a fun and easy way to bring some charm and character into the space. So far, my dad and Chris have drilled holes and run electrical for recessed lighting in our kitchen, backroom, master and upstairs bedrooms. We’ve plugged them in and tested already and they are definitely game changers!!
Though we’ve committed to updating a lot in this funky ‘70s house, there are still some old elements that I look forward to keeping and incorporating into our style. A perfect example of this is the long hanging lantern that you see at the front entrance as soon as you walk inside. It’s a gorgeous glass and metal lantern that can easily be cleaned up with some spray paint and new bulbs.
And as you can probably guess by now, this is yet another DIY project currently “underway” and I’ll plan to post an update on it soon…
To give you an idea of what I’m going for, check out these lighting options below:
5. Appliances
Some houses come furnished with brand new appliances, and some (like ours) do not… so unless your place comes with those already included, read on for a few tips that we’ve got:
Be open minded. While we originally started dreaming up our ideal kitchen with all Samsung appliances (Chris’s favorite), we slowly shifted our focus to Craigslist, Offer Up, and Facebook Marketplace to find used (read: gently loved) appliances for a fraction of the cost.
So far, we’ve come up on a clean double oven to replace the old gross one in our kitchen and are looking for a “new” stove top and fridge next. Whether you choose to go this route like us or stick with new appliances for your home, they will definitely upgrade the house and at the end of the day, you’ll be all the happier for it.
Keep an eye out for sales (always). From the start, we both agreed that we wanted a brand new washer and dryer, so we were constantly searching through sales and promotions that Home Depot and Costco were offering. We snagged a really sweet deal on a Samsung combo early on and ordered them within a day or two of closing escrow.
Now last but not least, I need to give the biggest shoutout and all of the thanks in the world to our family and friends for being there for us day in and day out. Whether it’s helping us with cleaning, tackling our projects, or just feeding us when the day is done, we love you and appreciate you all!
Let me know if there’s anything more you want to see and stay tuned for more updates coming soon…
