Our House: The Before (Plus a whole-home to-do list)

Grab a snack, y’all, because this is going to be a long one.

In July of 2017, Michael and I bought our first home together.  Finding a home for our family of six (at the time, though we were hoping to add a baby soon after our April 2017 wedding) in our small town on our newlywed budget had proven challenging.  By God’s grace, a fixer upper on eight acres, only a few blocks from where we had been renting, became available at a great price! It was move-in ready, but definitely needed lots of cosmetic work and updates.

After the month-long process of closing, it was ours!  Immediately, my brain was working on a long, long to-do list.  Today I’m going to share our house as it was when we moved in, as well as the to-do list we started with.  Some things we’ve already checked off, but much of this is still in our future.  Keep an eye out for updates in future blog posts!

Downstairs

When you walk into the house there is a small entryway and immediately to the left is a small full bath.This bathroom needed a lot of love, as did all of the bathrooms in this house. With old, mildewy vanities and off-white, stained toilets, we knew at least a temporary update was in order to this front bathroom so guests weren’t creeped out when they came over!

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Bath 1 To-Do List:

• Phase 1: Cosmetic updates to have inviting guest bath
  • Paint
  • Temporary flooring update
  • Replace light and vanity
  • Replace toilet
• Phase 2: 
  • Replace shower
  • Tile floor
  • Create functional linen closet

Directly across from the bathroom, to the right of the entryway, is a small bedroom.  This became Noel’s bedroom at move-in, but we do have big plans to move all bedrooms around soon, which may include turning this into a guest bedroom, so keep an eye out for that!

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Bedroom 1 To-Do List:

• Paint
• Closet upgrade
• New flooring
• Eventually create inviting guest room that may double as a home-office

As you walk down the hall, to your right is our living room, and to the left was the staircase to the upstairs, and a small dining room with a small opening to an even smaller kitchen, with another very large living room/den beyond the kitchen.  Between the living room and dining room is a hallway with large double doors to two more bedrooms and two more bathrooms.

Living Room To-Do List:

• Create built-in entertainment center
• Purchase sofa/sectional to better suit room
• Replace light fixture

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Dining Room To-Do List:

• Refinish staircase
• Demolish old kitchen and open up to dining room to create a larger dining room
• Add a custom table to seat at least 8-10 people
• Replace light fixtures
• Add a fun, decorative door to the laundry room

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Kitchen To-Do List:

• Demolish old kitchen
• Relocate kitchen to large back living room/den
• Complete kitchen renovation with new cabinetry, appliances

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Hallway To-Do List:

• Refinish doors
• Wall off hallway
• Add sconces
• Replace/repaint AC vent

The first bedroom down this hallway only needs cosmetic changes similar to bedroom 1 above, and we have big plans to completely demolish the second bathroom down here and use that space to create a large master suite walk-in closet.

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Bedroom 2 To-Do List:

• Paint
• Closet upgrade
• New flooring

Bathroom 2 To-Do List:

• Demolish outdated bathroom
• Close off door to hallway
• Create opening into third bedroom
• Create large, custom walk-in closet

The last bedroom at the end of the hall is the future master bedroom.  It currently sits next to a small bathroom (“bathroom 2” above) AND has a small bathroom ensuite adjoined to a walk in closet.  We would like to rearrange this space to create a large master bathroom and closet.  The bedroom itself doesn’t need much but the bathroom will be a complete overhaul.

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Bedroom 3 To-Do List: 

• Paint
• New flooring

Bathroom 3 To-Do List: 

• Demo current bathroom and closet and knock down wall between them
• Complete recreate bathroom with large walk-in shower, soaking tub, double vanity, toilet closet and linen closet
• Tile floor

Off the dining room is a large laundry room, and through that laundry room was a garage that had been closed in. This indoor space still had a very “garage” feeling to it and was very unfinished still.

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Laundry To-Do List:

• Patch and paint walls
• New lighting
• Hide water heater and water pump
• Create functional storage
• Create cleaning zone
• Create laundry zone

Garage To-Do List:

• Convert to play room
• Carpet floors
• Patch and paint walls
• Large ceiling fan
• Update electric to add more working outlets (many were not functional)
• Swap AC for AC/heater

Upstairs

Phew, take a bathroom break and grab a drink, we’re headed upstairs and we’re almost done!

When we moved into this house the upstairs was an “in-law suite.” There was one large carpeted room with a small kitchen, small bathroom and large bedroom.  We knew we didn’t need this kitchen and have made big plans for floor plan changes to this level.

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Upstairs To-Do List:

• Demo kitchen, leaving space for a larger bathroom
• Create 2 additional bedrooms and a common area in the open spaces
• Update closet in existing bedroom
• Complete bathroom renovation with shower/tub combo, double vanity, and linen closet

Things That Need to Be Completed in the Entire House:

• Paint
• Remove carpets
• Replace all flooring
• Replace all baseboards
• Replace all windows for more cohesive look and energy efficiency
• Replace all hollow-core doors with something more substantial and nicer door hardware
• Replace all exterior doors (except the kitchen slider)

The Exterior

If yellow and green is your jam, please don’t be offended, but the color scheme of our house’s exterior was off-putting immediately.  I also didn’t love the steep spiral staircase with access to the upstairs, or the mismatched and oddly-placed windows and doors all over the house.  The roof was in great shape but was old, so we knew that would eventually need attention as well.

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Exterior To-Do List:

• Replace all soffits and attic vents
• Replace/patch siding where needed and paint house pale gray or white 
• Replace roof
• Replace all windows so they are cohesive (and energy efficient)
• Replace all exterior doors
• Brick the front porch and wrap beams with wood
• Brick the back porch and screen it in
• Brick the two small porches on the front of the house
• Lose the spiral staircase to the upper deck (my husband does not want this)
• Add a pergola to the back patio and refinish the concrete slab
• Add a driveway, likely pea gravel
• Refinish the upstairs balcony
• Landscape
• Paint the barn and create storage solutions and workshop spaces inside

Obviously we’ve got a LOT of work to do.  Some of these things we’ve checked off the list so far, and some items we’ve made temporary fixes until we’re ready to commit to a larger project.  Keep an eye out for future house updates, as in the next few weeks I’ll be sharing where we’re at now in our house and specifically one MAJOR renovation we’ve done that has taken the last TEN MONTHS to finally finish… Any guesses as to what project may have taken so long?