The Home Renovation Thread

[T2GRN18]

Longest remodel ever continues lol.

Drywall is done and they came in and spray-primed yesterday, which means we can paint this weekend. Going to be a big job, but since the doors, ceiling, flooring and trim aren't up yet we shouldn't have to worry about too much cutting in or taping.

Positive is that it looks really freaking good. Like an actual living space.

Should start doing trim, ceilings, and doors next week. Then appliances in the bathroom.

Flooring not sure about yet. not sure we can afford it at the moment unfortunately. I have some cheap carpet that I used before, so may have to go with that for a couple months.

If your going to use tape for anything when painting get the frog tape. The yellow is for soft paint meaning up for less than 24 hours. The green for paint that hasn't been up for more than 24. It's a little expensive but saves you from aggravation in the long run.

 

[Hawk]

Good luck NO. It gets old quick.

Kev, we got lucky and I only had to tape about 12 feet of surface, all around the shower. Rest was smooth sailing since none of the finish work was up. Painted almost 1000 square feet this weekend and it sucked lol. From 8pm Friday until yesterday around 2pm. It's all done though and looks freaking good. Drywall guy did good work.

GC is in the house this morning working on doors and all that good stuff. We are going to bite the bullet on flooring and pick it out tonight.

As a bonus, I had a sewer line back up yesterday and that just got fixed a short while ago. Luckily was just a clog and nothing serious. Also, lucky that the floor wasn't installed yet lol.

 

[Agent Jay]

There is SO much I want to get done to my place. The list of wants and needs is long.

Wants:
Refinish kitchen cabinets
Tile the kitchen floor
Tile the Master Bathroom
New Carpet in all buy one of the 4 basement rooms
Wife wants a fence and a pool, which I'm going to VETO until most, if not ALL of the needs (below) are checked off the list.

Needs:
Replace the roof shingles...there is some minor hail damage from the past (before I owned it), plus some are cracked and faded
Need to add a few (probably 6) celling/roof vents to help get the heat out of the house in the summer.
Really should get new replacement windows in the entire house.
Probably should put more/new/better insulation in the entire house

 

[Boston_golfer]

I demo'd my basement, and re-finishing the basement begins today. Nothing fancy, just some space for the kids to play, a laundry nook for the wife, and a full bathroom.

I'll most likely bring dow my current living room furniture that my kids have messed up and upgrade my living room and dining room set.

I'm redoing the kitchen and bathrooms next year.

 

[Hawk]

Doors and baseboard installed. Looks fantastic.

Hoping to hear from floor guy today.

 

[deuce]

Wife wants to sell this house and move into a bigger one, especially with the foster/adoption paperwork coming to a close. The minute the paperwork is done, I know they'll request us to accept a placement. Problem is, I bought my house as a single guy, so it's a starter home with three bedrooms (one of which is currently an office) and almost zero closet space. Not wanting to lose too much money on the sale of this one, I need to do some repairs/upgrading before it goes on the market (hopefully early next year).

1. Totally redo back porch
2. Repair and repaint front porch
3. Kitchen - strip wallpaper and paint, replace countertops, repair pantry door and some door moulding that my crazy anxiety-fueled dog chewed.
4. Master bathroom - repaint and install molding around ceiling.
5. Guest bathroom - install molding around ceiling
6. Master bedroom, hallway, living room - last painted 8 years ago, probably time for a fresh coat
7. New screen door on front of house
8. Repair exterior sills on a couple of windows, and a couple sections of the eaves.

For #2, #7, and #8 I have a guy at church who I'm going to have do that work. Going to tackle #1 in June. #3 through #6 will most likely get done this fall/winter.

Owning a home can be a real pain in the tookus.

 

[Hawk]

That makes me tired just reading it.

 

[deuce]

That makes me tired just reading it.

I know. *sigh*

#1 and #3 are the biggest efforts (wife likes to paint so I may just tell her to have at #6) and will probably take an entire weekend each to do. I thought about pulling the popcorn off of the kitchen ceiling but then realized I'd be an idiot to do all that extra work just before moving. Instead I'll just repaint and install two new light fixtures. The moulding's in the bathrooms should be easy to do, just need the time to do them, especially now that I have all of the tools I need.

 

[sparksjr]

That makes me tired just reading it.

me too. we are staining our back deck this week, thankfully the weather is perfect to allow us to spread it out over a few days after work.

 

[Hawk]

That's on my list as well. Blaahh.

 

[Ole Gray]

We did a total redo on the inside of our home. Now we and mostly KellyBo are working on the beauty aspect of the yard. She REALLY has our yard becoming a show case.. I've had several folks in our neighborhood stop me during my daily walks, (with Roxie our dog) with complements on how our home has come so far.

 

[dcbrad]

Hawk, I am in the middle of finishing our basement as well. I did all the framing and soffit work and my dad and i did all the rough electrical, hvac and the plumbing. The nice thing about our basement is when they built the house, they roughed in a toilet and shower drain, so there is no busting up concrete.

I've got a few minor things to finish in the next week or two before drywall starts, running some low voltage cable and just adding a few nailers for drywall that I missed. I am just contacting a few drywallers to come and give me an estimate.

 

[Hawk]

Nice dude. I hope you like dust lol. Ugh. Having the plumbing in place is a big bonus, because that cost us a bunch of money. It'll be worth it though. I figure we'll get almost all the money back in the value of the home.

 

[dcbrad]

We were they same way in thinking about the value. I'm not good at estimating, but for the money we'll have in it, and the work I was able to do myself, it is going to be a huge selling point. My wife had the idea to put a little playhouse under the stairs, and it has really come out well, it'll be fun to see the finished product. I'm chomping at the bit to see the drywall up and finished. Takes it totally to a new level

 

[sparksjr]

We did a total redo on the inside of our home. Now we and mostly KellyBo are working on the beauty aspect of the yard. She REALLY has our yard becoming a show case.. I've had several folks in our neighborhood stop me during my daily walks, (with Roxie our dog) with complements on how our home has come so far.

when you are done head this way. we have zero curb appeal.

 

[JohnSinVA]

Doors and baseboard installed. Looks fantastic.

No pics, never happened :sarcastic:

I have all of the tools I need.

Impossible. The first rule of DIY home improvement is that each new project requires a new tool :smile-big:

 

[Hawk]

I'm waiting for the finished product! When you see where it started you'll know why. The transformation is pretty ridiculous.

 

[Wake]

We did a total redo on the inside of our home. Now we and mostly KellyBo are working on the beauty aspect of the yard. She REALLY has our yard becoming a show case.. I've had several folks in our neighborhood stop me during my daily walks, (with Roxie our dog) with complements on how our home has come so far.

That's a great feeling isn't it?

My yard still needs alot of work. I'm not a yard person, and I have alot of tree cover so its an uphill battle the whole way. That being said our house was incredibly ugly before we bought it, so what I have done has made a huge difference.

 

[Bullitt5339]

My yard is huge, 1.5 acres of grass and weeds. I absolutely want a beautiful yard, but with my work schedule, college classes and the normal schedule of a dad with 3 kids, it's lucky that the grass even gets mowed. I built a huge fire pit over the winter, I just need to put the capstone on top of it and then I am going to build a nice seating area, but I'm struggling to get everything accomplished and still have time for golf.

Sent from my SM-G925V using Tapatalk

 

[deuce]

My yard is huge, 1.5 acres of grass and weeds. I absolutely want a beautiful yard, but with my work schedule, college classes and the normal schedule of a dad with 3 kids, it's lucky that the grass even gets mowed. I built a huge fire pit over the winter, I just need to put the capstone on top of it and then I am going to build a nice seating area, but I'm struggling to get everything accomplished and still have time for golf.

Not sure how your property is set up, but if there are large areas away from the house, why not throw a southeast wildflower seed mix (or something like red clover) into those areas? They shouldn't get too high, and will be nice and colorful pretty much all year round. With the red clover (planted in early spring), you can get a double cut which will bloom twice a year, grows to about two feet, produces beautiful red flowers and will attract a lot of bumble and honey bees. It'll stop growing once it gets over 100 F.

 

[KeyserSoze]

Had the rest of the crown molding completely installed last month, I've just been caulking/painting it as time fits. Master Bath vanity is here and everything else will be installed in the next week or two. Next month I'll order the tile for the master shower and schedule that to be installed. The new HVAC and whole house fan, windows and insulation are doing a kickass job at keeping heating/cooling costs down. It's already cracked 90 degrees here in Sacramento and the AC (Lennox XC21) set at 74 won't kick on until around 4pm. We are lucky here in that it can be 100 during the day and it will be 60 at night with a breeze a lot of the time so running AC at night is only during a few days of August.

Got a new RV gate/fence scheduled to be built along with a garden door and some fencing for the newly poured front patio area but that's it for this year. Allocated cash budget blown and credit cards on fire.

Outside the front/back yards are a mess still and I'm letting the weedy lawns die and doing the "wildflower" thing in the fall. Next years plans are to budget for both of those (will include terracing/planting/irrigation but nothing too crazy) as well as pimping out the garage. I really miss my old insulated garage. Oh, I should probably get the house painted as well. Meh$

 

[T2GRN18]

Hawk, I am in the middle of finishing our basement as well. I did all the framing and soffit work and my dad and i did all the rough electrical, hvac and the plumbing. The nice thing about our basement is when they built the house, they roughed in a toilet and shower drain, so there is no busting up concrete.

I've got a few minor things to finish in the next week or two before drywall starts, running some low voltage cable and just adding a few nailers for drywall that I missed. I am just contacting a few drywallers to come and give me an estimate.

Not sure how the pricing is up there, but around here I can get drywall installed start to finish for $50 - 54 a sheet. Which includes all materials and is paint ready when they're done. With a point up after priming.

 

[jim54]

I do all my own work and have completely rebuilt my house inside and out. The only thing I hate is coming behind the wife and resanding and fixing the joints after she compounds them. But she enjoys the painting which I hate. 25 years and still making changes, next is all new kitchen counters.

 

[dcbrad]

Not sure how the pricing is up there, but around here I can get drywall installed start to finish for $50 - 54 a sheet. Which includes all materials and is paint ready when they're done. With a point up after priming.

I had one guy quote me $.90 a square foot too hang finish and prime the walls. Not sure if that's considered a fair price or not. But hopefully in the next week or two, the bids will be rolling in.

 

[T2GRN18]

I had one guy quote me $.90 a square foot too hang finish and prime the walls. Not sure if that's considered a fair price or not. But hopefully in the next week or two, the bids will be rolling in.

48 sq ft per board for 12' board, 32 sq ft for 8' good. Does that include materials? Drywall, mud, tape, corner bead, screws, glue