THE 4 HOME RENOVATION PROJECTS ANYONE CAN DO THEMSELVES

It’s been about 3 years now that we’ve been renovating our first home and I’m pretty sure we still have a couple years worth of projects ahead of us. Since day one, we’ve had our minds set on the idea that we’re going to do all the work ourselves. We wanted to prove to ourselves that we could do the work and as a result we have learned so much about the process. (Plus it’s hard to convince ourselves to hire someone else to do work that we are fully capable of doing ourselves.)

Some projects were surprisingly easier than we expected (dare I say even enjoyable?!?) while other projects were a pain in the gluteus maximus. We’re going to continue to do as much work ourselves as we can in our current fixer upper, BUT if we ever tackle another fixer upper home down the road I think there are a few projects that we will happily pass on to someone else.

With that being said, over the next week I’ll be sharing a few home renovation projects that you can definitely tackle yourself as well as a few projects that you could do but should hire out instead. Today is all about the fixer upper projects anyone can do themselves!

LAYING ENGINEERED HARDWOOD FLOORS

If you have already ripped out the old flooring and the subfloor is level, good news – the hardest part is done! Laying engineered hardwood floors was surprisingly much easier to install than we expected. Of course, there are various types of engineered flooring and installation methods, (some require gluing the floor down and tamping the planks into place) but if you’re dealing with floors that simply snap into place with one another then it’s a breeze.

Just be sure to leave a small gab between the edge of the floor and the wall for expansion when the weather changes. Don’t worry, your floor trim will cover up the gap!

REPLACING/INSTALLING FLOOR TRIM

If you have access to a chop saw you can easily replace your existing floor trim! Carefully pull the existing trim off and do your best not to damage the walls. It’s best to paint/stain/seal the new trim before installing it. Trust me, this will save you from a lot of tedious work later! When the trim is dry and ready to install, use finish nails and/or a nail gun with brad nails to secure the trim into place. You’ll see obvious holes where you nailed it into place but fixing that is easy. Just use wood filler to fill in the holes and depending on your finish, you can either paint over it or touch it up with stain when the wood filler is dry.

Also, no home is perfectly straight so you’ll most likely have some gaps between the floor trim and the wall. Paintable caulking is your best friend! Fill in the gaps with caulking, wipe it smooth with your finger, and let it dry. Then paint over the caulking and you’d never know there was a gap!

GETTING RID OF POPCORN CEILINGS

I’ll admit we don’t personally have experience doing this project but from the many conversations we’ve had with people who do have experience, it seems to be a project anyone can take on. It’s a messy job that will leave you dusting for weeks to come, but the actual task of removing the popcorn texture from your ceilings is fairly simple. Just spray the ceiling with water, scrape the texture off with a taping knife, prime the ceiling and then paint it with your desired color/sheen.

INSTALLING MOSAIC TILE SHEETS

If you’re intimidated by the idea of installing tile, I suggest using tile sheets since they’re much easier to work with. Typically the sheets will have mosaic tiles that form some type of grid so when you’re laying them out, the sheets interlock with one another. When it comes to cutting the tile, you can just cut the mesh backing with a scissors which makes fitting the tile within your space much easier. Laying individual tiles and trying to make sure you’re spacing them evenly can get overwhelming so if you’re new to tiling, mosaic sheets can be a much less intimidated project to tackle. Do your research to learn the correct installation steps and channel your inner perfectionist when you start laying the tile!

 

Next up – I’ve got 4 more home renovation projects that you technically could do yourself but I recommend you hire them out instead. Check it out!