Ideas for Home Improvement on a Budget

If you enjoy doing things around the house, you're already on your way to saving money. However, with the appropriate design, you can completely transform the look and feel of a space for only a few hundred dollars.

Quick Home Improvement Ideas To Follow:

We've compiled a list of quick and easy budget upgrades to help you get started on your next home improvement project. Take a look at some of our simple home improvement ideas below.

Use Paint to Refresh Your Rooms

Simply by taking up a paint can and slapping it on your dreary, washed-out walls (or washing away your decorative sins with virgin white), you may give them a flash of stunning richness. A coat of paint has the potential to reconfigure your world. As a result, painting is the most common DIY home renovation project.

While you don't have to be a pro to learn how to paint like one, a decent paint job requires more than merely slathering colour on the wall. From the first scratch of the pole sander to the final feather of the brush, follow our how-to instructions to expertly coat your walls in one weekend.

Crown Molding Made Simple

Crown moulding is at the top of most remodelling lists because it adds beauty and value to a home, not because it's fun to spend a Saturday trying to get the corners just perfect. Fortunately, there is a simple solution to miter-saw frustration.

Trimroc moulding is a lightweight polystyrene foam coated with durable plaster by Canamould Extrusions. It goes up in a hurry with joint compound and slices neatly with a handsaw. There's no coping, no awkward angles, and ragged joints vanish with a smear of mud. So you can transform a simple room into an attractive environment in only a weekend—and still have time to complete the rest of your to-do list.

Set up a Low-Cost Stair Runner

Want to keep your footing on slick stairwells? Make your own runner. Jaime Shackford, a TOH reader, took the project into her own hands after receiving a quote for $2,500 to carpet her dangerously slick oak staircase. She made her steps non-slip by using two off-the-shelf woven runners ($125 each) and components from a home centre.

Buying a Dishwasher Can Help You Save Water

Your ancient dishwasher could be costing you a lot of money in terms of electricity and water. It's time to replace it with a new Energy Star-qualified dishwasher, which will save you over $30 in annual energy costs and about 500 gallons of water. If you don't have a dishwasher, you're wasting 40% more water by washing dishes by hand!

The most cost-effective of all? In an afternoon, you can install a dishwasher by yourself. There's no need for a plumber or an electrician, and you won't have to worry about blowing your retirement funds on a load of clean dishes.

Rewire an Old Entry Lantern

Many 20th century hanging lanterns were simple in design, appearing to be handcrafted by blacksmiths rather than machinery.

These rustic lanterns, popularised by tastemakers of the time like Gustav Stickley and the Roycroft craftsmen, showed a back-to-basics design mentality. You can urge guests to "come on in" by putting a vintage lantern back into action if you found one at a yard sale or have one stowed in the attic. Once you have the parts, the job is simple and inexpensive.

Paint an old floor to make it look new

Sara and Andrew's Massachusetts farmhouse master bedroom's burgundy crimson floor didn't match their fresh and vibrant personalities. On a tight budget, however, refinishing was not an option. To freshen up the area, they painted the floor in a light checkered pattern and warmed up the icy blue walls with beige and white.

Here, we illustrate how a little measurement and a couple of coats of long-lasting floor paint can give a room a lot of charm for a low cost.

Give your Kitchen Cabinets a Fresh, New Look

Because the black cabinetry have sucked all the light out of the room, your kitchen feels like a cave. However, a brighter makeover does not always imply replacing the dingy boxes with brand new ones. As long as the frames and doors are physically intact, you can clean them up and re-paint them to transform the kitchen from drab to bright in a weekend. Only a strong cleanser, sandpaper, a paintbrush, and a little elbow grease are required. What you don't need is a lot of cash, because the change will cost a fraction of the price of even the most basic new cabinets.

Get More Flowers 

Dividing perennials every three to six years is an excellent way to thin clump-forming species like the daylily, which blooms from late spring to late summer. This method can also be used to increase the number of specimens in a garden, control plant size, and stimulate growth. Splitting spring- and summer-blooming perennials in late summer or before the first frost is a reasonable rule of thumb.

Ditch the Expensive Bottles and Use a Water Filter

Because of worries about the quality or flavour of their tap water, millions of homes have converted to bottled water. Whether the water comes from a municipal pipeline or a ground well, such issues exist across the country. Installing an under-sink water-filtration system, on the other hand, is a simpler and less expensive option to obtain clean drinking water.

Refinish the Beautiful Wood Door in Your Home

The years and the elements had taken their toll on the 94-year-old, sturdy cypress door's exterior. In some places, flakes of varnish clung to the wood, but the majority of the surface was rough and dried out from exposure to water and sunlight. Wood entry doors are subjected to the same attacks all over the world, and many are discarded in favour of low-maintenance, mass-produced metal and fibreglass substitutes. However, with a few inexpensive components, you can give your old door a new lease on life.

Apply a New Bead of Bathroom Caulk

You've seen the warning signals of deteriorated caulk. The brown tinge along the borders was the first sign. Its once smooth and elastic skin has become brittle and broken, allowing persistent mildew colonies to take root or allowing water to seep through and turn the wallboard and framing mushy. It has to go, whether it's surrounding your sink, between a tub and its tile surround, or covering the shower stall's seams.

However, caulk is inexpensive and simple to use. You'll only need an hour, a few standard tools, and materials that can be obtained at any hardware shop. But, as simple as it is, if you don't do it correctly, you'll be caulking again next year, says Tom Silva of This Old House.

Stair Brackets Add Architectural Interest

The attention is focused on the newel post and balusters, whereas the exposed side of most stairs is usually overlooked. A plain stringer can be transformed into an exquisite eye-catcher with the addition of ornate stair brackets. We used easy-to-install, low-cost wood brackets that were attached using adhesive and nails.