As a result of the fabulous interest rate offered on a particular type of mortgage "rehab" loan, for which we qualified, we were able to tack some extra money onto our principal for renovations. This type of loan was designed to help first-time homebuyers purchase foreclosures and older properties that need lots of work, but that situation isn't a prerequisite for qualifying (our home was built in 2002 and was in immaculate shape when we bought it!). Believe it or not, what we added onto our principal was more than offset by the lower interest rate on this type of loan (versus the non-rehab loan we were considering) as far as our mortgage payment was concerned - doing the lower-interest rehab loan and adding some extra to our principal actually lowered our monthly payment as compared to the regular loan with no extra for renovations. So we said, what the heck! Why not?!
We really didn't even realize what little counter and storage space we had, not to mention drawer space, until we moved in and tried to unpack our stuff. Even moving from a small galley kitchen in an apartment, we couldn't unpack it all! Some of it is still in boxes in the basement! As I mentioned in my last post, our original plan had been to paint the cabinets white and do new floors and granite counters, but we quickly realized that we needed a lot more cabinet space. And counter space.
Shall we take the 360 tour...?
Luckily, we're starting out with relatively new (2009) stainless steel appliances, so that major expenditure is already taken care of!
We will be adding cabinets (top and bottom) and counter tops where the refrigerator is now, adding much-needed food-prep space near the stove!
We plan on adding a rolling cart/movable island that will live up against the window and can roll into the center of the kitchen for extra prep space as needed. The neutral linoleum flooring will remain for now, but we plan on replacing it with ceramic tile as soon as we're able.
This cluttered corner will be the new home of our refrigerator, as well as an extra-deep cabinet above. Don't ask me where all that stuff is going...
Plain, icky off-white formica will be updated to granite...
This heinous wallpaper border is history!
The divided sink (in which it is impossible to wash anything larger than a dinner plate!) will become one large undermount sink, 30x18x9, and the squeaky, stiff, boring faucet will be replaced by this lovely brushed-nickel one...
And those builder-stock oak cabinets will be replaced with custom 39" medium-brown maple cabinets. Wish I had a photo of them...
...But they're being delivered tomorrow, so hopefully I'll be able to add a photo before they're even installed! Oh, and one more disclaimer... those sweet window treatments came with the house. NOT my taste ;-) My ideal plan would be to add white plantation shutters on the lower half of the wall and make two solid fabric shades for the top half... maybe with a cool geometric fabric like this...
It's a super-easy project that I first learned about on The Nate Berkus Show. If you don't already watch it, you should. TONS of DIY ideas and they're almost all super-cheap. But I digress.
We also plan on doing a back splash at some point, but that's a relatively inexpensive and simple project for a weekend when we have some extra cash to blow (ha!).
So, the big project is scheduled to begin tomorrow with delivery of our new cabinets and demolition of the existing cabinets and counter tops. Then we'll be painting over the weekend while the cabinets are out, a nice neutral greige, after we remove the wallpaper border (gulp!). The new cabinets will go in Monday, and then Home Depot will be out to take final measurements for the counter tops before the stone is cut. I hope that isn't going to take too long, or we'll be without counters for a while!
For now, we need to get to work on clearing out the cabinets and getting everything out of the kitchen. We should have budgeted for all the take-out we'll be consuming over the next few days... wish us luck! More photos to come as progress is made!
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