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Budget-Friendly Bathroom Enhancements
Is your bathroom is leaving you less than flush with pride? Without question, beautiful bathrooms help sell houses and enhance homeowners’ enjoyment of their living space; an investment for the day when you’ll need to romance potential buyers with a knockout bathroom. Knowing what’s in and what’s out in bathroom design is important for homeowners deciding where to spend their hard-earned dollars. You can easily and inexpensively update your restroom with a fresh, modern look, without sacrificing style, by focusing on 4 key areas: Paint, the mirror, hardware and lighting.
Painting any room is a tried-and-true way to make a big impact with minimal cost and effort. Remember that color trends do change. Stay away from dated color choices, like mauves or pinks, in favor of timeless, like earth tones. Chocolate, aqua, olive and gold, all colors drawn from nature, are hot right now and promise more enduring style.
Mirror, Mirror on the Wall - If your home was built in the past decade, you probably have one enormous, unframed mirror, but unframed mirrors are out.
The mirror is the focal point of your bathroom, and frames complete the mirror, giving a bath a finished, updated look. You can remove the entire mirror and buy a new, framed replacement or you can frame your existing mirror.
When choosing a frame style, select a frame that reflects the style you would choose for a piece of artwork for the room. Easy Hardware - Few accessories shout “last decade” like outdated hardware. Fortunately, updating hardware is a quick, easy and cost-effective. If your hardware is mismatched, get yourself to a home supply store and check out their collections of matching drawer pulls and cabinet handles. Your hardware should also complement your metal fixtures.
If the finish is dated, like brass, replace it with new styles, like brushed nickel, pewter, antique or oil-rubbed bronze. These finishes coordinate well with current lighting and fixtures, bath bars, knobs, pulls, and switch and receptacle covers. These fixes pull a room together with one modern, cohesive look.
Make Light of Things – Lighting fixtures that add beauty and soft lighting with shades or sconces are in. They can run above your (newly framed) mirror, or flank it. Select a style that is right for you and makes a statement in the room. Strategic and cost-effective changes can go a long way to giving you the new updated bathroom you desire. |
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Beat the Back to School Crunch
The transition from the schedule-free days of summer to the more regimented requirements of school can create chaos in even the most orderly home. Planning and preparation can help streamline the back-to-school transition and safeguard your sanity.
Create a Family Calendar – Create a family calendar and post it in a central place in the home. A family calendar ensures that everyone knows what everyone else is doing...and when. Gather everyone together weekly and make updating the calendar for the week ahead a group activity.
Pre-route Travel - Planning the routes your family will travel to school, work and events can help save time and money. Use a navigation system or an internet-based traffic service to avoid traffic jams, detours and construction delays.
Create Time - Set the clock back by performing “morning tasks” – like organizing outfits, lunch boxes, and book bags – the night before. Fill the gas tank on the drive home instead of adding a stop to your morning commute. Each task may take just a few minutes to complete in the morning, but by bundling them together and moving them to the night before, you enjoy real-time savings during your morning routine. |
