HomeFinder.com Opening Doors Blog

This month, I am going to share with you a big project we recently undertook in our home, and show you how my family and I handled our kitchen renovation with a budget of about $15,000.

We kept it simple and kept the same floor plan. Moving walls and moving the locations of the sink, stove, and major appliances, would have resulted in the additional costs of plumbers, electricians, and carpenters. That’s when budgets start going through the roof.

You can see that the floor plan didn’t change in these before and after pictures:

We kept the existing corian counters and sink. When I created the new kitchen layout, I made sure that the new cabinets would fit with the existing counters. This helped save over $5,000 on new counter tops. Even though I would have loved to go with a different solid surface in a different color, I just couldn’t justify the additional cost. We did order additional counter top for the new wall of cabinets, but this small addition was under $100.

We shopped for deals on custom cabinetry. If you look for deals at home improvement stores, you can save thousands of dollars depending on their sales and credit offers. We happened to find a deal that included 10% off our entire order, a free sink base, and a nice hardware upgrade. A value of almost $4,000. Most home improvement stores will have great deals at least twice a year. If all new cabinets aren’t an option, you may want to consider new cabinet doors. You can always paint the outer shell of a cabinet and create new doors to match.

We saved a huge chunk of our budget by doing most of the labor. We only called in the licensed professionals when it was absolutely necessary. This does usually mean that the project will take at least ten times longer, but, keeping your eyes on the prize may just be enough to make it worth it.

We went with classic, timeless materials that will stand the test of time. For the backsplash we chose inexpensive subway tiles and did the tiling ourselves. It pays to learn something new and it feels good to be able to put another feather in your cap!

Keep in mind that you don’t have to go nuts with all the fancy trims, lighting, and moldings all at once. If you choose a classic cabinet material, you can add some bells and whistles at a later date when your budget allows.

The bottom line: Big changes can happen with a smaller budget if you keep it simple. You can see more of our home renovations by visiting my blog at http://kelledame.blogspot.com