What we did to our last place

So... it's not an investment property, it was our primary residence but I thought what the hey, this is the only experience I've got... this is what we did to our place before we sold it...

 

Amazing transformation! @UrbanPlanner would be interested

 

Oh... here's some the pics the RE Agent took... (they were awesome BTW).

I'm pretty proud that we did it all ourselves. We used contractors only for the glass splashbacks, installing the gas heating etc. That's about it. I learned a lot in that time, but no real desire to do it again... not own home anyway.

 

Massive change! I like how it wasn't over the top (ie nothing structural) but really made it more attractive and probably sold much easier and for more.
Good job!

 

Looks really great and also like alot of hard work went in. Do you plan to do more renos?

 

Well done Shawn. We're working on a couple similar ones at the moment (simultaneously, do not recommend!) And hope they come up as good.

Paint, flooring, landscaping, kitchen replacement. 10k reno that makes 40k difference.

 

Looks great! If you can do that kind of work yourself it saves a fortune.

I love a good before and after

 

How much did you sold it for? How much did you gain from it in the end?

We've just started our first renovation and we don't want to go over budget. A little daunting as we're not too sure how long it would take to complete the work. May I also ask how long it took for you to complete it?

Thanks for the inspiration. It looks amazing.

 

Thank you everyone for the kind words!!

@Westminster
Yes, not much structural. The only thing there was we extended the pergola, extended the kitchen out to a sort of butlers pantry (using some of the lounge room) and extended the laundry (making it part of the inside, it was outside the back door). Yes, certainly made it easier to sell!

@ellejay
That's the million dollar question. I don't really want to do more renos as time with kids is the priority. However, I'll have to assess that when we buy our investment property depending on what contractors charge. I also found for the few jobs I did get contractors in, I just wasn't happy with their quality of work generally speaking.

@D.T.
Yes, I can imagine two would daunting... bugger that! Good luck with it, how much longer to go?

@Dangsta
We sold it for $330K... yep, that's Adelaide prices for you I guess... We bought it for $220K but it's hard to say how much we made because we were in it for 9 years. The market actually went down in that time though, so I'd say a large part of the difference was due to renovations.
The majority of the renovations were spread throughout the 9 years, but the tiling of the back room, rendering, painting inside and out including roof, re-varnishing floors, replacing gutters and front gardens were all done within the last 8 weeks or so. It was a nightmare 2 months, but well worth it.

 

In one of them we've painted internally (massive job fixing up cracks and gaps!), installed a new kitchen, hung curtains and built a wall to divide the lounge to change it from being a 3br to a 4br. Still to go : Installing flooring, painting exterior woodwork and landscaping.

In the other, we had the FIL paint internally. We've done front and back landscaping and demolished the old kitchen. We've bought a bathroom vanity from Masters for cheap just before they shut down, but havent installed it yet. Still to go - find/install a new kitchen, do flooring and curtains.

Luckily the 2 are near to each other, so we do what needs doing based on weather, materials available, funds available, assistance available etc.

 

Looks fantastic. What paint colour is on the walls may I ask?

 

Shame allot of us do this stuff before we sell rather than enjoying it ourselves.

Great designer ideas & DIY

 

great renovation. you should be incredibly proud!

 

Sorry.... I tried to find the colour and couldn't find it anywhere. It was a dark ash grey with a blue tinge for the feature walls and then a half tone for the rest of the walls.