Painting and Renovating Thoughts

Sometimes the professor and I laugh as we talk about why I should have named this blog "Shades of Gray." It seems that my world is painted gray and punched with accents of color. I like it that way. Gray is beautiful in an understated, minimal sort of way. Nothing looks bad with gray, accents of bright color sparkle on its canvas.

Every wall that we've painted in the two homes that we've owned have been gray. Warm, earthy, green-brown, organic grays. Inviting and soothing. This house's walls are adorned in Sherwin-Williams' "Useful Gray" (see above, lighter color) and accented with "Gray Area" (see above, darker color). The professor has painted many walls this summer... gray looks nice!

Last week Ruth asked how we manage and budget our home renovations. We've only ever owned fixer-uppers and we will probably always be fixing up... here's the method to our madness.

Each month we put XX amount of money into a bank account that is designated to cover renovation expenses. As long as we have money in that account we can fund improvement projects... when that money runs out then renovations stop while we regroup and save. From time to time the professor makes extra money doing freelance work which we always try to put into this account. Our economic stimulus check paid for a large portion of our new roof. We do not put ourselves in debt to renovate our home.

The professor does all of the renovating himself (save plumbing, felling trees, and re-roofing). He's handy that way, he enjoys the work, and it saves us money. Of course, doing it ourselves means that we have to invest time so projects are largely dictated by, not only money, but also available time. The busy fall semester has just begun for the professor... there will be very few renovations happening over the next few months. We are fortunate that his job gives him semester breaks... times of the year when work on campus slows down a bit and he has the opportunity to focus on the home front.

Last, and probably most important, we have a plan. "The Five Year Plan" is what we call it, goals for what we want to accomplish on the house each year. The overall goal is to have our home in sell-able, like-new condition in five years. We purchased it in the summer of 2005 so we're shooting for completion in the summer or fall of 2010. Of course, we may end up living here for 20 more years but we want to get the house into a condition that is worth showing so that when the time is right to sell it we'll be ready.

Considering that we didn't have the luxury of doing any work on our home before we moved in we've come a long way in three years, but we still have a long way to go. For us it's a satisfying investment of our time and money, and we're learning a lot along the way.