May 14, 2009 10:53 pm US/Eastern
Renovate & Redecorate Your Home For Less
BOSTON (WBZ) ―
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Joan Allen was able to get a new kitchen for less than $3,000.
WBZ
These days, it's tough to sell a home and few can afford those pricey renovation projects that were so common just a few years ago. Now, people are looking for easy and inexpensive ways to give their home a fresh, new look.
We found three home improvement projects that will make a big difference without the big bill.
REDECORATE A BEDROOM
We start with Marissa Bachand of Sudbury. She has been bugging her dad for years for a new room.
"My room was done when I was really young, and now I'm twelve," she said.
Her dad was not thrilled about the thought of spending a ton of money, but Laurie Heffernon of
Done in a Day Decorating said she could do it for less than $300.
Heffernon and Bachand decided to change the walls from a light blue to a purple color.
"We have a different quilt that we are going to use," Heffernon explained.
Bachand's father agreed to repaint the red drawers in her dresser, and he found an old armoire in the garage.
Two weeks later the pre-teen's room was done.
"It's really cool," she said.
The red drawers on the dresser are now a fresh green and that old armoire is painted to match.
Kendra Weldon of
Weldon Interiors made curtains from scraps of fabric that you can find at a fabric store for about $5 a yard. She sewed them together with $5 shears from Walmart. She also made throw pillows out of napkins.
"They are just simple napkins that happen to be the right color," she said.
Bacharnd was thrilled with the results. "
I knew it would be good, but I didn't know it would be this good," she said.
Watch: How to redecorate a room on a budget.
BUILD A NEW DECK OR PATIO
Rick Fritz and Laurie Warren of Norton tackled a much larger project. They wanted to build a new deck and replace their concrete patio with bluestone. But when the estimates came back, they had sticker shock.
"You look at the price and you think, we can't do that," Laurie said.
That's when Monique Allen of the
Garden Continuum in Medfield got creative.
"We decided to work with what we had," she said.
Instead of the blue stone, they enlarged the patio with more concrete and gave it a special treatment.
"We were able to stamp it with these large rubber mats," Allen explained. "It gives you that nice texture like you'd get with the blue stone."
Instead of a new deck, they resurfaced the old one with composite decking and widened the narrow, pressure-treated stairs.
"This was easily about a third the cost," Allen said.
Watch: Gardening tips for your yard.
GET NEW KITCHEN CABINETS
Joan Kieran of Falmouth wanted new kitchen cabinets.
"I hated those cabinets and I put up with them for 23 years," she said.
But instead of replacing them, she hired Robin Pierson of
Robin's Nest Interiors to paint them.
"There's no need of throwing away your cabinets, putting them in a landfill and spending $12,000 to $15,000 for wood cabinets that you already have," Pierson said.
In three weeks Kieran's kitchen was completely transformed. She added new hardware and a new sink. Joan thought about getting new countertops, but the cabinets made such a dramatic difference, the old countertops looked like new.
She got a new kitchen for less than $3,000.
"I love it. I absolutely love it," Kieran said. "It changed the whole appearance of the house."
If you're willing to invest a little sweat equity, Pierson said you could do the job yourself. Your only expenses are the painting supplies and the new hardware.
Watch: How to repaint your kitchen cabinets.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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