Things have been rather hectic around these neck of the woods since we purchased our first home. Given we brought a classic kiwi ‘do-er upper’ we had A LOT of things we wanted to do. To be honest that list is still incredibly long, but we are pretty close to having the inside complete enough to be livable.
I thought it would be fun to do a post on the Things I Learned while Renovating. It’s been a fun ride and the end result is SO worth it! But boy, oh boy I learned some things I never thought I would! I also learned some things that deep down I knew but didn’t want it to be true for us!
// Everything takes longer than expected
I mean EVERYTHING, I always watched programmes like The Block NZ and House Rules and wondered why they were always rushing around at the end and it’s because everything takes forever. Putting a coat of paint on a room you would think would be quick, next thing you know three hours have passed.
// Putting your body on the line
You will get blisters in random places (on your fingers from sanding anyone?), you will have a constant stream of paint through your hair, clothes and body and being on your feet all day is more tiring than I would have ever thought. If you ever have trouble sleeping, try spending the day sanding, masking up and painting a room and I’m sure you’ll be out like a light, I sure was!
// Color selection is a b!tch
I always knew this would be a hard one for me as I don’t really care that much about small details. Put three shades of light grey beside each other and I’ll struggle to tell you the difference. This is the thing I was least looking forward to when it came to renovating. This is why our whole house is the same two colours, white for the skirting, ceiling and scotia and a light grey (Dulux Manorburn is the colour) for the walls. In reality I don’t think it would make that much of a difference if we’d gone a couple of shades either side of what we ended up choosing.
// Quote, Quote, Quote
I couldn’t believe the prices differences between some quotes. We have done everything ourselves on the house renovation with the exception of some electrical work, plumbing and carpet laying. We obtained quotes for all of these items and the variances for massive. For similar carpets our quotes varied in price by around $1,000, for exactly the same electrical work we also had quotes varying in price by $1,000. Both of the first quotes we received for each were the highest, obviously we saved ourselves $2,000 by getting more quotes and going with the lowest that still met our needs!
// Costs add up
We knew there was going to be a lot of expense and luckily we had money put aside for the renovation. However going back and adding up all the receipts and things have added up quickly! I was shocked at how much we had actually spent and we haven’t gone overboard on anything. All those little expenses add up quickly, $20 here, $80 there etc and next thing you know you’ve burned through a few grand easily!
// You will have TWO homes
I’m pretty sure Mitre10 Mega should have been paying us a wage with the amount of time we have spent in that store over the past two months! We could almost tell you which aisle to go to for anything to do with renovating! It feels as though it’s a second home to us, we’ve entered their draw to win the Hilux so many times that they might as well just drive it and park it in our driveway right now.
// Everything will be disordered
Having somewhere to put your rubbish will be a godsend. We’ve been using our shed which needs to be torn down and rebuilt and now it is pretty much full. We’ve swept up and vacuumed our house so many times during the renovation yet it never seems to be tidy which is a bit stressful. Learning to go with this and knowing everything will have its own home when you are done will save you a tonne of stress.
// You WILL need rest days
There will be days that you can’t stand the thought of going to the house and doing more renovations, you just want to get away from it and enjoy some time without being covered in paint, looking for tools and making decisions on kitchens, curtains and paint colours. When you start feeling like this take a day or half a day off and go and do something (anything) else!
// You will learn more than you care to
Dark based paints cost more than light. 240 grit is a fine sandpaper, 80 grit is coarse. I now know what the heck a gable-end is as well as a soffit. All things that I don’t really think needed to go into my brain but I now know. While most of these new things you’ve learnt will have no use in day to day conversation it sure does make you feel smarter when talking to tradies and buying the relevant equipment for the renovations.
// Stripping Lino is the WORST
No exaggeration. If I had to pick the worst thing about renovating our house – 100% stripping the lino off the kitchen, bathroom, toilet and laundry floors. You have to rip up the Lino which is a bitch by itself, we were lucky (enter sarcasm here) to have two layers of lino! Then you have to take out all the nails and staples, remove the layers of cardboard underneath (yes, cardboard!) and then finally remove the glue. Then you can start making your floors pretty by sanding and putting down polyurethane.
Have you ever renovated before? OR would you consider it? – Comment below and let me know, I love hearing from you!