The New Guest Room

Since daughter Cherron has moved into her own place, her former bedroom has been empty. I wanted to turn it into a guest bedroom so we had a proper place to put family and friends when they visited -- but with the job situation being what it is, we didn't have a big budget. However, since when do you have to pay a fortune to get a really great look?

I knew I needed all of the furniture, artwork, and accessories. The only thing I already owned was a television and the window coverings that Cherron left behind. The paint was a pretty color, but there was some damage in a few places on the wall. Luckily, Cherron had purchased a quart of new paint to add to the paint we had leftover, as she had wanted to paint the bedroom in her new place the same color. She was kind enough to give me the remainder of that paint to use to touch up the walls in the new guest room.

I became a Craigslist stalker (in a good way -- looking for anything at a great price that might work for me). I was able to purchase the queen size bed and boxsprings, bedroom furniture, and some artwork in this manner. I visited garage sales and picked up a lamp and shopped thrift stores to find the shade and some accessories. I used 50% off coupons at hobby stores for some additional artwork and accessories, and I got all of the bedding on sale. I purchased some fabric (with a 50% off coupon, of course) and I used it to make the accent pillows. I bought a few forms at thrift stores and for the rest, I used old king size pillows we no longer used, cut down to size. The bedroom furniture was in rough shape, so I filled the dings with wood filler, sanded, and painted. I also had to find two finials to go on the footboard, as the originals were missing. I picked up some at the hobby store that were on sale for 66% off and painted them to match. On the nightstands, I tiled the tops to make them more durable and to give them a really great and unique look.

After I touched up the paint on the walls, I found that the new paint was just a tad darker than the old (or the old paint had faded a bit). You could see the blotches on the wall where I touched up -- so I bought some glaze, added it to some of the paint, lightened it up just a bit with some cream color paint I had, and then I did a faux finish on the walls with a sea sponge. The results were great!

Here's where the money went, the total cost, and pictures of the result.

Queen size bed and boxsprings: $80 (from Craigslist)
Four post bed and two nightstands: $40 (from Craigslist)
Finials for bed footboard: $15 (66% off at craft store)
Molding and tile for nightstands: Free (leftover from other jobs)
Paint for bedroom furniture: $30
Paint for bedroom walls: Free (from Cherron)
Glaze & supplies for painting bedroom walls: $30
Candle holders on nightstand: $8 (50% off at craft store and one from thrift store)
Lamp: $4 at garage sale
Lampshade: $4 at thrift store
Bedding (comforter & sheet set, mattress cover and mattress pad): $65 (on sale at various stores)
Bed skirt: $2 at thrift store
Pillow forms: $6 at thrift store and the rest free from old pillows
Accent pillow fabric/thread: $15 (using 40% off coupon at fabric store)
Large flower artwork: $20 (50% off at craft store)
Small flower pictures: $20 (from Craigslist)
Small mirror and hooks: $12 (thrift store and Target)
Floral arrangement: $15 (using coupons and sales at craft store)
Magazine basket: $7 (70% off at craft store)

The grand total: $373

I am still checking Craigslist often, as I would like a small chest or armoir to put inside the closet. That way, there will be storage, as well as a place to put a television (and guests can just open one closet door to watch television from the bed). I don't want to pay more than $25 for this -- so with paint (if needed), I may need to spend another $35 or so. However, I'm so pleased to get this beautiful, comfortable room for around $400! I think it would be easy to spend 10 times that much to get the same look!

Some Days Are Better Than Others

Last week Mike was informed that the purchase of his company will not go through after all. Apparently, the delay in financing was just too much and the senior stockholders in the company demanded that the company refile for Chapter 7 and be liquidated instead of saved. So, Mike is officially unemployed at this point.

We had a tough few days as we attempted to process the information. While we always knew logically that this could happen, we always felt that the company would be saved (and thus were in some denial about the possibility of unemployment). Of course, this happened in the middle of the re-plumb of the house and remodel of the master bathroom.

I'm happy to say that the re-plumb went fairly well, passed the city inspection, and now we're just waiting for their drywall guy to patch up all the holes. What wasn't so great was that when we did the initial quote/walk-through with the owner of the plumbing company, he indicated verbally that most of our master bathroom plumbing (for the remodel) would be no extra charge, as they would already be doing plumbing in that area. However, once the re-plumb started, he indicated that the two jobs were to be entirely separate (due to the class action claim), and he would give us a quote for the master bathroom when the re-plumb was done. That is supposed to happen today -- so I'm crossing my fingers he is a man of his word and that no outlandish fee is quoted, as we just can't afford another huge cost just now (we had to spend $2000 of our own money to hire this particular company, as opposed to the company the class action people usually use (we were not impressed at all with them), to use the materials that every plumber we talked to recommended (instead of the materials included in the class action claim) and to continue the re-plumb to the street so that we would not have a possibility of future leaks under the slab (which is an expensive problem with the substandard pipes).

We spent the weekend productively, doing taxes to figure exactly how much we owed and making a spreadsheet of our finances, including current income, money that is expected in soon, unusual expenses (like the bathroom remodeling costs and taxes), and a regular monthly budget. It made us feel a lot better to see that we'll still have some savings left after our unusual expenses and that we'll be bringing in enough to live on if we are careful with our spending.

Mike was able to get into the dentist for his cleaning before the benefits expired at the end of the month (the kids and I were just in last month). Our health insurance continues, as it is military and not through his work. We were also informed by the company (two days before the end of the month) that we had to use up any money in our FlexPay account by 2/28, or loose it. So, we had to go on an unexpected shopping spree to purchase over the counter medications and other covered items so that we could submit a claim for the amount we had paid in this year. We'll use all of the items eventually, but it was frustrating that the company did not let us know about the situation until two days before the deadline.

I'll be happy to see the progress on the drywall patching when I come home from work today and hopefully the quote from the plumber for the master bathroom plumbing is not horrible. I'm so eager to have my house put back together again and items put away. Living in chaos, especially during this particular time and situation, is stressful -- and we need as much peace of mind as we can get just now :)

Remodeling on a Budget

We purchased our first home about 18 months ago. It was on the brink of foreclosure and in desperate need of some attention and love. We continued living in our rental house for five months, with me spending just about every day at the new house (as I work from home), painting and staining, and my husband (Mike) joining me on the weekend, to demo and do some of the work that, quite frankly, intimidated me.

What a journey it has been -- and it's not over yet! We totally gutted the kitchen and the downstairs bathroom, changing the floor plan slightly for the kitchen (making the attached dining room into an unattached office and closing up a sliding glass door so that we could put a built-in banquette in that corner). We read a lot, watched a lot of HGTV, and took some classes at the local home improvement stores. Overall, we're proud of how things turned out and we're especially proud of the fact that we saved tens of thousands of dollars by doing so much of the labor ourselves.

I've always been a bargain shopper, so I was in my element as I hunted for materials and fixtures. I was able to buy a beautiful free-standing vanity with a hand painted glass sink online for nearly 75% off, as the online store was going out of business. I got all of the accessories for all rooms on clearance for 75-90% off, and then added a bit of creativity to some to make them into real works of art. We spent about $25,000 overall on all of the work we did, which included repainting the entire interior of the house, purchasing and staining new baseboards for most of the rooms downstairs, buying new light fixtures for most of the downstairs rooms, putting in two new windows, framing in and installing French doors in the new office, buying a new toilet and vanity for the powder room, totally revamping the kitchen (with new cabinets, tile backsplash, tile floor, built-in banquette, stainless steel appliances, and granite countertops), and then doing some neglected maintenance work that the old owner left for us (and of course did not disclose), such as the new waterheater that was needed, the roof patching that was needed in two locations, and the new plumbing manifold that had to be installed.

We had saved for nearly two years so that we could pay cash for most of the remodel. We did end up charging about $2000 at Home Depot (mostly for tools and things like molding, drywall, and lumber), but put it on an interest free for a year plan and then made sure to pay off the entire balance before that year was up. The one thing that we DID go over budget on was the granite countertops. Quite frankly, by the time we got to that stage, we had used up most of the savings and we did not have the cash for the granite counters we had always dreamed about. We discussed the other options, like the granite-look alike laminates or a solid surface counter. However, we really felt that if we put in a laminate counter, we would just replace it in a few years with granite -- and then we would be paying twice on the same project. So, we bit the bullet and charged the granite -- something I would not recommend to those in an "iffy" financial situation. It's taken us some time to pay down that credit card bill -- and I've probably paid more in interest than I saved on my beautiful bathroom vanity. However, everytime I walk into the kitchen, I do LOVE those countertops -- so for us, this was a good decision (although how I hate being back in debt for any reason!!)

For that reason, I opted to get a full time job so that we could pay off the credit card the rest of the way and start saving for the NEXT project -- which is the master bathroom. We will probably start that project in the next few months, as we've been approved as part of a class action claim and our house will be totally re-plumbed (a normally $10,000+ job -- at no cost to us!) We figured that would be a good time to tackle the master bathroom, as the plumbing and walls would be torn up anyway. We had a remodeling firm come and give us an estimate -- $20,000-$25,000 if we only replaced the fixtures (no changing of the floor plan) or $40,000-$50,000 if we moved any walls or fixtures!! I could hardly believe the quote! So, as nice as it would be to let someone else do all the work -- we plan to roll up our sleeves again. We figure we can make the changes we want (which will add about 10 square feet to the room), put in the materials we want, and keep the cost between $7000-$9000.

So, the search begins for bargain priced vanities, tubs, toilets, and tile! I'll share what I find and, if you have any great suggestions, please let me know! I welcome all the help I can get!