Affordable Ways to Transform a New House Into Your Personal Space

AFFORDABLE WAYS TO TRANSFORM A NEW HOUSE INTO YOUR PERSONAL SPACE

Moving into a new home is an exciting event. Everyone in the household gets a fresh start, everything is clean, and the load is lightened from the great moving purge. Then you get the keys to your new house and realize that it doesn’t feel like it’s yours. It takes time to get used to a new house, but here are some ways to quickly settle into your new house to make it feel like home.

Start with maintenance tasks, working from the outside in.

The yard can make your house feel welcoming or uninviting. By the time you move in, the grass and weeds will be unruly or the leaves will need raking. This is a good time to start from scratch with landscaping and planting seeds to grow your own herbs and vegetables. If you’re not in a drought-ridden area, install a sprinkler system to get the leaves growing, and you’ll see life sprouting in no time.

The house probably hasn’t had a bath in a while. The cleaner a home feels, the newer it feels, so give your home a proper flush and rinse. Wash the outside of the house and give the windows a thorough cleaning. Give the interior of the house a deep cleaning: floors, bathtubs, closets, cabinets, drawers, windows, air vents, and all the other things that often are forgotten. Touch up paint on both the exterior and the interior of the house.

Take care of the guts of the house. Have your heater and air conditioning system cleaned and serviced by an HVAC technician. Clean out the rusty pipes and fix the leaky ones. Replace faucets, showerheads and toilets.

Tackle any pest problem now, before all of your stuff is moved in. Hiring pest control to inspect and exterminate the entire house will get rid of old problems left behind by the previous owners.

And for a safety measure, replace your smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. This could be the most important thing you do.

Now that the dirty work is done, here’s where the fun part comes in: Decorating.

This is where you add new cabinet hardware, doorknobs, curtain rods, curtains and blinds. You can paint cabinets to your liking. You can paint the floorboards a contrasting color from the wall paint. You can paint the walls anything you want. Each room can have a color scheme or theme. Painting and swapping out hardware are inexpensive, easy tasks that can be accomplished in a day. If you need ideas for color schemes, check out HGTV for inspiration.

If you’d rather not paint, wallpaper is an excellent idea that offers you a universe of choices in colors, fabrics, designs and patterns. Through sites like Spoonflower, you can also choose the type of wallpaper, from traditional non-pasted to prepasted and peel-and-stick sheets. Selling points of wallpaper over paint include increased durability and the fact that many varieties are scrubbable. Plus, removable wallpaper allows you to take it down easily and even save it to be used again in the future for another project.

Once you have the framework done, you can start to fill in the details with color, style, and personality. Your home should reflect you while also being inviting and warm. Check out stores such as Home Goods or Amazon to collect all the vases, platters, candles, clocks, frames, rugs, and throw pillows that you need to make the place come together.

Humans aren’t the only ones who need to adjust and get comfortable in a new home. Don’t forget about the one member of your family who spends most of his time at home: the dog. He’s been uprooted from the life he once knew and thrust into an unknown environment, therefore, his comfort is important to consider.

Once you move, set up a safe space with your dog’s comfort items. Let Fido explore his new home and give him treats so he can associate this new space with a positive reward. This is also the time to teach him boundaries. If he’s not allowed in certain areas, you can train him to follow these rules in the new space. Slowly introduce him to neighborhood dogs. He might meet new friends on his first walk around the block. Sniffing the area will help him get acquainted with the smells of the neighborhood’s furry occupants.

Settling into a new house doesn’t need to demand much time, money or outside help. With these simple, inexpensive tasks, your house can quickly go from strange space to happy place. Make it a home that you and your family can make memories in together.

Charlotte County Realty offers personalized service with integrity, diligence and expertise. Learn more about how we can assist you by calling 941-883-4181.

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