How To Renovate Your Home On A Budget
 
May 02, 2018
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Wherever you happen to live in Asia, or in the world, your home is always going to be important to you. That’s why you’ll want it to look its best, but renovating a home and making it look wonderful can feel like an expensive task and can be rather daunting. Don’t worry, though; there are many ways that you can renovate your home on a budget, and here are just some of them to get you started.

Your Budget

The first thing you’re going to need to consider when you want to work to a budget is what your budget is. Do you have a certain amount of savings that you can use, for example? Or will you speak to Bonsai Finance about a personal loan? Perhaps you intend to work overtime to pay for the changes that you want to make. It’s best to know how much money you’re going to have and fit your purchases into that budget rather than adding up everything you want to buy and trying to work out how to pay for it all.

Once you know your budget, you can start planning, but until the sums are worked out, it’s best not to get started. You don’t want to begin something that you just won’t be able to finish. It will also be important to know things like Who pays for title insurance in Florida when considering your overall house costs.

The Architect

Not all home renovation projects are going to need an architect, but for the larger ones, the ones that involve, for example, moving walls or adding rooms, they are highly useful, assuming your budget can stretch to one. If not, there are alternatives that you can try. To begin with, you could draw up the plans yourself. The only difficulty here is that if you get something wrong and the builders start their work based on what you have drawn, you could end up having to fix a costly mistake. This is why an architect has trained for many years; they won’t make mistakes, but if they do, they are well insured. However, if you are confident that you can do it, this can save you a huge amount of money which can then be used to buy high-quality materials. And if you're thinking about converting your house into a loft, be sure to check out Visionary lofts for top notch services.

Shop Around

When you want to buy supplies and materials for your new bathroom, kitchen, living room, or anywhere else in your home, you may have a few brand names come immediately to mind. These are fine, and they may be very good, but don’t only go to these companies because of their great advertising and slick brochures. Once you have their prices and you can gauge the quality of the items they are selling, take some time to shop around for alternatives. The smaller suppliers may not have such a big marketing budget, but that doesn’t mean their products aren’t as high quality, or even better than the big brands. You could find that you can save a lot of money when you look around and compare prices.

Reuse Old Materials

When you are changing things in your home, you might be able to save a lot of money and make your budget go much further if you can reuse some of the old material. Often there will be nothing wrong with it, and all it will take is a coat of paint to make it look new and improved.

If there is nothing in your home worth reusing then take a look at salvage yards because you can find all kinds of great bargains there that will look just right in your renovated home. You can buy them at good prices although they may need a little work to bring them back to their former glory. Taking the time and effort to do this will pay dividends when you see how much money you can save and when you realize how they finish your home off perfectly.

DIY

It’s a nice idea to bring someone in who understands how to paint perfect walls and join shelving so that there is no gap, but it’s not always possible when you don’t have the money to do it. Therefore, whatever you can do yourself, you should. It will take longer if you also have a full-time job, but sometimes that is the sacrifice that will need to be made. You can find out how to do many of the more simple jobs using books you can borrow from the library, so you don’t even need to spend money on buying them, or from watching videos that other people have put up on YouTube. Learning these skills can help you now and in the future, saving you money and giving you a great sense of satisfaction when you look around your home and see what you have done.

For the larger jobs, it might be best to bring an expert in to help, but if you have done the smaller jobs yourself, your budget should be able to cover hiring someone for the harder things that you don’t want to worry about yourself.

De-Clutter

De-cluttering is something you’re going to need to do in your home anyway, no matter what kind of renovation you’re planning, big or small. It will make painting or wallpapering, putting in a new carpet, or any other kinds of changes much easier. It may also make them less expensive. That’s because, when you de-clutter, you can see what the room looks like and it might be that it doesn’t need as much work as you thought it would.

Smaller Changes

Rather than making huge changes and completely re-doing entire rooms, making smaller changes can be just as impactful yet much less expensive. That could be simply changing the hardware on your kitchen cabinets, for example, or even painting the cabinet doors rather than replacing them. Just because they no longer look fresh and modern that doesn’t mean they are no good, they only need to be changed cosmetically.

Outside you can paint the trim on your home instead of painting the whole house. Of course, painting the trim could show up how much the rest of the house does need painting, so bear this in mind, but it’s a good start, and it could motivate you to do more yourself if you feel confident enough to go ahead.