DIY-Friendly Home Improvements for the Thrifty Homeowner

Blog 04/12/2019

DIY-Friendly Home Improvements for the Thrifty Homeowner


Whether you’re getting ready to sell or just looking to refresh your home, you don’t need a huge budget to give a noticeable boost to how your home looks and feels. With a modest investment, some DIY skills and a little bit of elbow grease, you can tackle these budget-friendly home renovations in as little as a weekend!





Clean your vinyl siding.
Many homes with vinyl siding can start to look dingy after a few years of exposure to our harsh Canadian weather. Get yourself a long-handled scrub brush, a garden hose, an environmentally-friendly cleaning product, and some good ole fashioned elbow grease. It’s best to wash your siding by hand rather than use a power washer as it may damage your home’s exterior. If you do decide to use a power washer, test it on a less visible area of your home first to ensure that it is not strong enough to cause cracks in the siding.





Repaint the exterior and update the front door.
A quick and inexpensive way to instantly boost your home’s curb appeal is to refresh the exterior paint color. Also, simply changing the color of your front door can make a huge difference. Try a bold color that compliments that of your home’s exterior façade but will stand out from the other homes on your street. To further enhance the curb appeal of your home, try adding new house numbers or a new mailbox, planters and updated landscaping to the front of your house.





Spruce up your entry way.
While curb appeal is what initially draws people in, the front entryway of your home makes the first impression. Spruce up your home’s front foyer with a beautiful new light fixture. To help eliminate clutter like shoes and bags lying about, install a storage system with cubby holes or drawers to keep everything organized and out of sight. Adding a wall mirror not only serves a functional purpose but helps reflect light, making the entryway feel more spacious, bright and airy.





Turn a closet into a powder room.
An inexpensive way to create a new bathroom in your home is to renovate an under-used closet into a new powder room. This can be easily accomplished using the Sanicompact system from Saniflo, a self-contained macerating toilet system which is used to create half-bathrooms in areas of the home where space is limited and in which no below-floor drainage exists. The Sanicompact is installed on top of your existing floor and is capable of pumping wastewater vertically. Its modern, tankless design make it ideal for tight spaces, and a second inlet in the back of the unit allows you to add a sink connection as well. If you’re handy and have some basic plumbing experience, you don’t even need to call a plumber. All you need is access to a water line, an electrical outlet, and some basic tools.





Add removable wallpaper.
Unlike hanging wallpaper in the past, which we can all agree was a frustrating experience, removable wallpaper is now mush easier to work with! This trend is a stylish and affordable way to update any room in your home with minimal investment. Since it can be easily removed when you are ready for a change, it is a great way to try a new color or pattern with little commitment.





Refresh your kitchen.
Two simple and budget-friendly approaches to refreshing your home’s kitchen are to update your cabinets and apply a new backsplash. If your cabinet doors are still in good condition, you can simply sand them down and repaint them. Then, swap out the old hardware with new handles and knobs to make your cabinets look like new. An easy fix for updating the backsplash is to pick up some peel-and-stick tiles from your favorite hardware store, which are surprisingly affordable and DIYable for homeowners.