I discovered I had a small talent for home design and decoration when I was a child playing with my Barbie dolls. Instead of requesting a Barbie Dreamhouse, I decided to use cardboard boxes to create my own one-story home for my Barbie. I had the best time designing the layout, putting it together, decorating each room and furnishing it. My mother recognized my interest and allowed me to decorate my own room, then the family bathroom, and then to provide input into the other rooms. After graduating with my bachelor’s degree in business, I went on to earn a two-year interior design certificate and then briefly set up an interior design studio with three other women I met in design school. I didn’t last more than a year after discovering that I loved design and working with contractors, but I disliked the arrogance, stinginess, or fickleness of the clients. I closed my interior design business after a year and decided to utilize my hidden talent at home and on behalf of family and friends for free.
And I have. I decorated each of my homes and every one of them sold in one day. I chose our current home for its perfect layout and its peaceful aura and then proceeded to gut and renovate it. A strange twist of fate allowed me to help design and fully decorate my small office building at the University and to provide design input on the layout and design elements in the new student union building. And then my daughter who trusted me with her homes, asked me to decorate her two office suites. The Woodland Hills office suite became part of the building’s rental brochure.
After living in our current home since 2013 and making several upgrades throughout the years, my husband and I decided to make a few major changes. Because of my design experience, I’ve always acted as my own general contractor, meaning I decide on the scope of the work, select products and vendors, find and hire the right tradesmen, negotiate schedules and prices and oversee the work. It’s helps that I’ve had hands on experience painting and wall papering and that I learned about materials and measuring techniques in school.
At our advanced age, deciding on the scope of the work we wanted to do proved interesting. My priorities came in this order: comfort, added real estate value, easy maintenance, beauty and price. There was a time when beauty came first followed by added real estate value and easy maintenance was last. With these revised priorities, we set a budget of $20,000 and decided on the work we wanted done.
I adore hard surface floors whether wood or natural tiles. However, hard surface floors are hard on older feet, ankles, knees, hips and backs. Our downstairs is all hard surface and I must always wear orthopedic slippers to walk around or pay a painful price. Although I dislike carpet, our stairs and entire upstairs was carpeted for comfort’s sake. This time, my husband insisted on wood floors upstairs and we argued. The compromise was wood hallways and wood in his office. New carpet was installed on the stairs (safer) and it is the same carpet as the bedrooms and my office. We upgraded the baseboards as well and I did the painting myself and my husband installed them (despite my protests because of his back problems.) Saving a mere $200 is not worth the pain he is enduring nor the additional time he is spending on the project. We replaced the upstairs guest bathroom tile with a beautiful (and expensive) porcelain tile from Spain.
In the kitchen, we opted for a beautifully veined white quartz countertop to replace the granite one. We had to purchase a new sink and opted for another stainless steel (sound padded) double sink, slightly larger than our previous sink and decided to reverse the side of our garbage disposal in the process. For fun, we selected a new faucet for its three different stream flow options. And finally, we are utilizing the empty space beneath our staircase for storage, having a decorative and useful shelving unit installed.
Taking on this renovation at this time has served as a much-needed distraction from the stress of this contentious and consequential election. We’ve already cast our ballots and continue to donate to the Harris campaign, but we are staying away from most of the media and concentrating instead of the renovation. Since we aren’t traveling as planned because of Michael’s back issues, we had adequate discretionary funds to redirect to the comfort of the homestead with an eye towards a higher resale value.
The six things I want readers to know about renovations, whether big or small, are: 1) Set your priorities; 2) Build contingency funds into your budget because unexpected expenses are a given; 3) Interview trades people and ask for references and portfolio pictures of their work; 4) Follow your gut feelings about decisions; 5) research care and maintenance details before deciding on a particular material; and 6) be patient and prepare yourself to live in a disaster zone for longer than expected.