Two first-time buyers have transformed their dated home by themselves for just £14,000 but have now increased the value of the property by £45,000.

Ellie Unwin, 24, an accountant, lives in Nottinghamshire, UK with her boyfriend, Harry Baines, 25, in their three-bedroom, semi-detached home that the pair bought in July 2020 for £135,000.

Despite the first-time buyers feeling excited about the features of their new home, which included a large living room with french doors, they knew that the property would need a lot of work.

Having never renovated a house before, the couple started by making a spreadsheet and estimated how much they wanted to spend on each room, alongside researching the best deals and materials which would save them money.

Ellie found inspiration by looking at Pinterest and other people’s renovations online but the pair came up with their own designs and made decisions together about how they wanted their dream home to look.

Thankfully, Harry was on furlough, meaning he was able to do a lot of the renovation – but the pair also roped in Ellie's dad, Paul.

“We discussed the basics and planned to redo the whole bathroom but to keep the units in the kitchen and replace everything else including the doors and worktops,” Ellie told Jam Press.

“Myself and Harry spent our evenings stripping wallpaper with a steamer and scraper, starting in the office and working our way through the bedrooms and downstairs.

“We worked on the main bedroom first and painted the walls, window sill and skirting boards.

“Harry sanded down the wardrobe frames, repainted them and used elbow grease on the doors, which took out all the yellow and they looked like new.”

After placing new hinges and modern door handles, they moved on to putting wallpaper behind their bed and removed the old carpets to put down new ones in all the bedrooms and the landing, which cost £1,063 overall.

In the living room, they removed the cheap electric fire and popped wallpaper on the remaining wall, while paying a plasterer to skim and plaster the ceiling.

They also purchased some laminate flooring from Costco, which cost £720.

She said: “We chose the Golden Select AC5 laminate and decided on this as my dad had this fitted in his living room and we loved it.

“We removed half the skirting near the radiator pipes where Harry used a multi-tool cutter and my dad laid the laminate which took three to four days in total.

“We filled the room with a TV cabinet from IKEA, table and curtains from Next and chairs bought separately from Dunelm.

“The last step was our sofa and chair arriving from Sofology and we got a great deal on these in the clearance costing £1,897 in total."

Overall, the pair spent £4,128 transforming their living room into a cosy space and moved onto the kitchen, where they ripped out most of the room bar the units.

As the units were discoloured, they applied edging and put fablon – self-adhesive plastic sheeting – on the back, which made them look brand new.

They purchased pure white shaker style doors from HomeStyle and fitted these to the units after the worktops were completed.

She said: “My dad used a router and jigsaw to cut the worktops [at an angle] which we bought from the Worktop Express, costing us £265 and fitted them onto the units."

Ellie's dad then tiled the walls with white metro tiles from Wickes (£35.97) before finishing these off with the Chrome Homelux trim from Wickes (£40).

After a new hob, oven and sink were fitted onto the worktops, the floor was tiled with a white marble effect and the boiler was boxed in using a larder unit from B&Q, with doors to match those from HomeStyle.

Old shelving was removed in the pantry and a unit from IKEA was installed with a white worktop placed on top, along with some blinds – one of the only aspects done by professionals.

In total, the kitchen cost £6,852.

For the bathroom, the couple ripped the entirety of the room out using a bolster and after laying out the pipe work, a frame for the shelf in the shower was constructed along with waterproof boarding that was painted with waterproof paint.

After tiling the space, they decided on a black shower tray from Heat and Plum.

Asking Ellie's dad for help once more, he tiled the walls around the shower, put cladding on the roof and fit a new toilet, sink and heated towel rail, as well as glass in the shower and a tray.

Meanwhile outside, the couple cleared their once forest-like garden by cutting down all the trees and using topsoil from B&Q before laying down the turf, which was bought from a local company for £120.

Finally, they moved onto their conservatory and office which were completed in a few simple steps.

She added: “We taped up the conservatory with frog tape and painted it dark green.

“We had vinyl light herringbone style flooring from our local carpet company and they glued this down on top of the concrete which cost £180 – this simply transformed the conservatory even though not a lot was done to it.

“The small spare room was turned into my office because I work from home most of the time and this gave me a space to work comfortably and also be a craft room.

“I already had a corner desk from IKEA from the Micke range and bought an extension to keep my circuit machine and sewing machine."

Looking back on their renovation journey, the pair have a few regrets, which includes ripping out the bathroom first as there was no other toilet in the house and they had to use Ellie's brother’s a few doors down, as this was the last room to be completed.

Originally, the couple wanted to buy a modern house, but everything that was within their price range was the wrong fit and new-builds didn't feel right either, which is why they settled on an older, cheaper home to make their own.

However, they believe it was all worth it in the end and estimate their house is now worth around £180,000 – which is a £45,000 increase from the price they paid.

Ellie said: “When we first got the keys, it was like a building site and we could not live in the house as it was.

“The house was very old and outdated, it looks like a completely different house now.

“We lived at my mum’s down the road so it was a lot of hassle going back and forth -–but we have now been in the house together for seven months and are happy to be comfy in our home together.

“[Next on the list to complete] are fences to swap, mainly garden maintenance - but we need to save up for this."

In total, it took the pair about a year on their DIY project, with the biggest project the garden, due to weather issues.

Although they originally budgeted £10,000 for their renovation, they also had £2,000 gifted from family and saved up an additional £5,000 whilst waiting for their keys.

Overall, they used their money wisely and overspent by just £900.

Ellie’s top five tips for other DIYers include:

1. Do as much as you can and feel comfortable doing.

2. Make a budget and look at how much money you have to spend and split this out into how much you expect to spend on each room.

3. Save up extra money for unexpected costs.

4. Check the main areas of the home such as electrics, boiler and windows as these are areas that can be really expensive to fix if they go wrong.

5. Search around for the best value and deals.


BUDGET BREAKDOWN
Main bedroom: £1,063
Living room: £4,128
Kitchen: £6,852
Bathroom: £1,629
Garden: £120
Conservatory: £206
Office: £254