I’ve made no secret of the fact I love to save money when it comes to home improvements. Those of you who follow me on Instagram will know that I prefer to retouch, repurpose and recycle where I can. If my carpets are looking tired, I’ll try to revive them before I even consider replacing them.
I’m currently working on my garden and although my fence has seen better days, a lick of paint seems to have brought it back to life for another few seasons.
Below are my best tips for improving those bits of the house guests see, without having to replace anything! I always work on the bits people see, as I view that as a priority. As long as your downstairs looks good, you can save to improve the upstairs. Also, lots of these tips can be applied to other areas of the house!
Improving the Lounge
This is usually one of the rooms that gets the most use. If you’ve got a family, it’s likely to be one of the rooms that deteriorates quickly too. Kids have a habit of spilling things on the carpet spreading things on the walls. You can clean all you want but certain tings will always stain.
That’s why I would recommend being prepared to refresh the paint work every so often. Having plain walls can look boring, but they have the bonus of being simple to refresh. I find one wall always takes the brunt of sticky fingers and felt tip pens. By keeping the room painted in a plain colour, it means you can get away with only painting the wall that needs it, and it will still blend seamlessly with the rest of the room.
To keep the carpet looking fresh I would recommend two things. The first being a large rug to cover the room and add a bit of glamour. The second is buying your own carpet cleaner – trust me, you’ll get a lot of use out of it. The Bissel ProHeat 2X Advanced Carpet Cleaner is a good one to invest in and you can often spot offers to buy it at discount price. It’ll deep clean your carpet and help remove stains too.
Some carpet cleaners work as upholstery cleaners too, but to really protect your sofas, it might be worthwhile to cover them in throws and cushions.
Give your bathroom a facelift
Bathrooms are notoriously hard to keep clean. If the grout isn’t getting discoloured, you mirror is smudgy or your drain is clogged. For me, the easiest thing is getting into a routine that not only cleans the bathroom, but keeps it looking good.
Buy a special grout cleaning brush to keep the tiling looking fresh. If the grout is too discoloured to revive, consider getting a grout pen or two. I buy mine from the local pound shop and they’re a real blessing!
When it comes to flooring, you don’t always need a professional. It’s on trend to have patterned tiles, but tiling your floor with ceramic can be difficult and costly. Thankfully, lots of DIY brands have got our back and brought out vinyl floor tiles with self-adhesive backs. These allow you to lay the tiles yourself for a durable, stylish finish. It’s so much cheaper than hiring someone to do it.
All kitchens are improved with storage
Kitchens are another place that quickly become tired-looking. They can feel a bit crammed and you can often spend your full day chasing around the house telling the messy family members to put their dirty dishes inside the dishwasher.
Buying storage solutions can help you keep your kitchen organised and looking great. It’s really satisfying to fill the storage too, there are even full TikTok accounts attached to it!
People like to see a clutter-free kitchen, so my plan (and I think it’s pretty flawless) is to keep buying organisational containers and fill them up until the clutter is gone.