I have big plans for this renovation. We’re gutting the entire existing main floor of the house plus we’re adding a 2nd storey. All on a very, very tight budget. We know that we’ll be doing quite a bit of the work by ourselves, and having family members help us out where possible. But the fact is, we still have a heck of a lot of materials that we have to purchase in order to get this done – and building materials have either become hard to find or have increased significantly during or as a result of the pandemic. That means I really need to be resourceful and search for as many “bargains” as possible if we’re going to make this happen. Fortunately, bargain hunting happens to be my superpower!
Kitchen Cabinets
Obviously, kitchens and bathrooms are the most important and the most costly when you’re renovating. Fortunately, I was lucky enough to find a great source for kitchen cabinets a few years back – an auction place about 45 minutes from Woodstock called Bryan’s Auctions. If you read through my Mississauga blog posts, you’ll see the before and after from the kitchen that I renovated there using a set of cabinets that I bought from there. I also renovated my apartment above the pub I owned using a set from another online auction. Well… this time, I bought what they call the “Dream” kitchen. For the upper cabinets, you have the standard 30″ cabinet, and then above that, there are 12″ tall cabinets that have glass doors. You can display your pretty, less used dishes in those upper cabinets. It also has 2 tall cabinets – one is a 24″ wide pantry, and the other can be either used for a wall oven or, in our case, we’ll use it for our microwave oven.
The best part of buying cabinets from an online auction is that it is a SIGNIFICANT cost saver. If you go and order wooden cabinets special order from Home Depot or something, this kitchen would probably cost $30,000. I paid about $11,000 including the tax and auction fee. You truly can’t beat the pricing. The catch, of course, is that you get what you get. You have to be pretty confident that the cabinets that you’re getting are going to fit your space, or you have to be able to “make do”. For example, in Mississauga, I ended up using a 36″ base cabinet in a corner – just removed the door on one side as it was going to be tucked behind the other cabinet. In the apartment, I had a 30″ base cabinet cut in half because I only needed a 15″ cabinet in the space. If you’re willing to make adjustments or compromises like that, it is a super great solution. In this case, since I am designing my kitchen from the ground up, I’m going to be able to use pretty much every cabinet exactly as it is designed. Can not WAIT to see it all come together!
Vanity
I really love this vanity from Costco. I don’t, however, love the fact that it is listed at over $2000! That’s just not going to work with our baby budget.
I started watching Facebook Marketplace and searching for a dresser that would work for the same purpose. Fortunately, I found one that is just the right size! It’s an older, solid wood dresser manufactured by Kroehler Furniture, and a woman outside of town had painted it royal blue. I bought it for $150. I then purchased a heat gun and started to strip off the royal blue paint. I’ve never used a heat gun before, but I’ve watched lots of episodes of Restored where they use them quite often to remove years of layers of paint. Here’s a quick sample… you can see just how great it works!
We have a cool Antique Mall and Vendor’s Marketplace here in Woodstock, where I picked up a jar of Fusion Mineral Paint in a colour called Champness and am refinishing this dresser to look much like the lovely one from Costco. I ordered a granite Vanity top from Home Depot with an integrated sink and had it delivered for about $450. So by the time it’s done it’ll cost me about $650.00 (plus my labour) to get the same look I’d have had to pay well over $2000 for!
Windows and Doors
Kind of an important part of building an addition, right? We want it to be light and bright – and we want to be able to get in and out! 🙂 Part of the plan is to add French Doors from the new dining room, leading out to the covered porch. The cheapest French Doors that you can buy from home reno stores are about $1200 for a set. Well, you’re starting to see the theme here – that’s too much for me! Once again, I started searching Marketplace and then bingo – I found someone selling not just one set, but 4 sets of French Doors!! We went to Oakville and met a lovely woman named Barb. She has a beautiful home that is about 15 years old. 2 of the windows in the house – the ones in her main bedroom and her daughter’s room – started to lose their seal, so they decided that they would replace all of the windows and doors in the house. She figured that she’d be able to get something for the 4 sets of French Doors (2 in the master bedroom, 2 in the kitchen), so she posted them to Marketplace. We were the first to get there and check them out, and we chose a set from the Master Bedroom as it had been seldom used. She only wanted $200 per set. As we chatted with Barb, she told us that the windows were being replaced, too, and I inquired as to whether she’d be willing to sell some of those, too. Bottom line, we ended up getting the doors and 6 windows PLUS California shutters for all of the windows and doors, for a total of $1000. I was thrilled with the deal. That left only one more window to acquire – that was a transom-type window for in our new walk-in closet. We found that on Marketplace, too. A family had their home damaged when a tree fell on it and were selling their windows, so we picked that one up for $50. Hopefully we won’t have any issues, and we’ll be able to make all of the reused windows and doors work well throughout the house!
Kitchen Sink
There are several bargains that I’ve acquired so far, but none were quite as much of a challenge as the kitchen sink! I really love the look of farmhouse sinks – they’re pretty much the only thing you see now on home renovation shows. Everything from beautiful hammered copper finishes to the stunning white fireclay finishes. The thing is, the budget will not allow me to go for stone countertops – and that’s what you need if you’re going to install an undermount sink. So, therefore, no farmhouse sink. Well, then I also found a few listings on Marketplace for sinks with integrated drainboards. Super cool vintage farmhouse style sinks – either in cast iron or porcelain – seemed to be stupid expensive ($600 used) or in really crappy condition. Or, perhaps required wall mounting. Not what I wanted. Then I found one about 25 minutes away in Norwich, listed for $250.00. I messaged the seller to ask for the dimensions, and tell her I’m interested. She replied that it is pending pickup. NOOOO! She did say that if she didn’t sell it, she would let me know. Well, about a week and a half or so passed by and the listing was still up, but she didn’t get in touch, so I messaged her again. This time, she told me that it hadn’t been sold BUT they’d broken off a piece of it when they removed it.
Yeah, they broke a huge chunk of the corner off of it. So she said she’d sell it for much less, if I wanted to try to fix it. Of course, I did a Google search – how to repair porcelain sink/tiles, etc. Turns out a tube of Gorilla Glue Epoxy Gel and a porcelain repair kit will do the trick, so I thought why the heck not! It’s worth a try. Well… honestly… I definitely had my work cut out for me. When I picked it up, the old plumbing was attached, as well as the faucet. I set about pulling it all apart to clean it up. Well… I haven’t seen that much disgusting filth since I bought an old, filthy pub. It looked as if whoever had owned the house prior to this young couple buying and renovating had just shoved tons of dirt down the drain and left it there. After I dug a lot of it out, I put the whole sink overtop of my current sink and just ran water into the drain holes for about 30 minutes straight – that’s how long it took it to run clear. GROSS!! I then got the epoxy gel glue out and was worried that it wasn’t going to work – it actually fell off once. I braced it up and taped it with some scotch tape and left it overnight and it seems to have held together perfectly. Then I applied the porcelain repair cream and let it set overnight. I just have to sand it with the 800 grit sandpaper that came with the repair kit and it should look great. I’m really hopeful that it will be amazing when it is done! If it does – it’ll be about a $200 total investment (plus my labour) and they’re selling for about $1500 (or more) new!!
These are just a few of the bigger bargain purchases that I’ve made so far. The list is long… and I didn’t even mention the fact that I bought beautiful hardwood flooring for the entire house from the auction place for a fraction of what I’d pay at retail! I’m worried about the budget, definitely… but so far, I’m really happy with the stuff that I have bought and the prices that I have paid have been extremely reasonable. The builder started just yesterday to frame up the walls and make the structural updates necessary. Tomorrow he’s supposed to start ripping off the roof!! It’s starting to move forward, and it is SO exciting!!
