When it comes to renovating your home, you will be doing it either to improve your living conditions or to tack some extra value onto the property ahead of a sale. In either case, renovation is rarely lamented when done well and within budget.
And despite what you might have heard about super-expensive and stunning home renovations, the cheaper end of the spectrum not only exists but it can also be a significant value booster. Furthermore, if you are renovating simply to improve your living experience, this can also be done without breaking the bank – and you can tailor it much more to your personal tastes, as well.
Regardless of why you are doing it, there is no denying that it is the kitchen which presents a special case for home renovation. CityHome Collective, a real estate brokerage that also specializes in interior design services in Salt Lake City, offer two words to describe how a kitchen should be renovated – functionality and high-tech.
Whereas other rooms in the home can very often sport a winning ensemble of retro and even antique fittings, the kitchen is where you are cooking and eating. That means a kitchen that looks old-fashioned (however quaint it might be) will give the impression that cooking, washing up, and dinning is going to be more laborious than need to be. Nobody wants to give that impression.
To be clear, this is not to say that you cannot make some more old-fashioned aesthetic choices, but the kitchen renovations that tend to add the most value to a property are those which prioritize the latest appliances, sleek tech, and large, elegant, and essentially “modern” spaces. The impression of pokey old-fashioned kitchens is just too strong – certainly in the minds of buyers.
Renovating Your Kitchen on a Budget
Of course, though, this can present a problem. If the kitchen should be sleek and high tech, how on earth can that be cheap? Certainly, the latest dishwashers, ice dispensing fridges, smart washing machines, and so on are not going to come cheap. However, there are certainly inexpensive ways to move in the right direction when it comes to kitchen design. And ones that will add significant value too.
Here follows then some value-boosting kitchen renovation ideas, specifically for those with budget constraints:
Add Some Natural Wood Surfaces
The elegant white or chrome kitchen is solidly in fashion and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, but that’s not to say that you can’t increase the elegance by adding some (much cheaper) wood finishes. It is definitely a cheap way to add value.
Update the Smaller Finishes
And by smaller finishes, we mean things like door knobs, faucets, and other finishes. These fittings might be small, but they can date very quickly in kitchens. These are relatively inexpensive to replace and, if you have some old-fashioned ones, updating them is a solid choice.
Experiment With the “Open Concept” Format
This is a particularly modern way to upgrade your kitchen, and it need not cost a lot. The days of kitchens being sort of “behind the scenes” spaces are firmly in the past, and you can certainly alter some of the smaller details to make the kitchen blend better with the rest of the property’s main floor. Generally speaking, open plan looks good.
Among property experts, the kitchen traditionally defies the interior design rules of the rest of the house. Nevertheless, while the imperative for high tech is well-known, there are cheaper ways renovate the kitchen and see value added. Or, if not that, simply a better cooking, washing, and dining space created.