Feb 11
17
by Dave Peniuk
Julie took off to Las Vegas with the Divas from Diva Money Club and left me here to entertain and educate you while she’s away. When we looked at the Top 10 Blog Posts of 2010 we discovered that you folks like pictures. You even like pictures that have absolutely nothing to do with real estate. 
So, today I’ve got pictures for you. We have FINALLY finished our 70′s house renovation project. The appraiser has gone in and we’re getting it financed at the new value – which came in almost $100,000 higher than what we paid for it so we’re pretty happy. Granted we spent more on the project than we planned … but at least we’re still ahead!! Plus, we have already rented the upstairs unit out and are in the process of filling the main floor unit.
The project was not perfect. It took almost 2 full months longer than we had hoped and it cost us more than we budgeted, but its worked out pretty well. We have created an exceptionally high quality rental property in an awesome location. It’s going to generate a nice cash flow for us and our partner and hopefully always be an easy property to attract great tenants to. Plus, we learned a lot in this project and have now put together a top notch team of tradespeople that are happy to work with us on any project – big or small – going forward.
No more delays – let me get to the stuff you love – the pictures! If you missed the upstairs suite before and after shots you can find those here: Rental Property Renovation Before and After Photo Show.
Now … showing the main floor suite is a little trickier as before and after because we created a suite. It was just the downstairs of the house before but I will show you what the rooms looked like before and what they became.
Laundry Room Before it Became the Kitchen:
The New Kitchen:
And when you turn around, we filled in what used to be a doorway where the upstairs connected to the downstairs, and created space for more cupboards, the fridge and the stove.
The Living Room Before:
Yes that room was something to behold. Here’s another angle on that same beautiful room. You’ll see a doorway in this shot. We filled that in because that goes into the entryway that the upstairs tenants use to access their home.
After Shot of the Living Room:
As you can tell – we made some very dramatic changes to this room. We had to rip down the wood panels, put up lots of dry wall on the walls and the ceiling and paint. We painted the fire place and put a little sticker tile on top of the hideous yellow tiles to make them more subdued without having to replace the tiles. It makes such a dramatic difference it really is hard to believe this is the same room!
Bathroom and Bedroom Before Shots:
We opened the bathroom up tremendously by replacing the shower with one that has a glass surround. And while our original plan was to keep the blue toilet and sink, once we had the new tiles in there and the new shower we just couldn’t bring ourselves to put the blue stuff back in there … so we spent extra money and put in some white ones instead. In this photo the toilet looks blue but it’s not.
We made some big changes to this room, moving the closet from the back corner to behind the door and opening up the wall so you can fit a bigger bed in here. It made a big difference.
There’s more to this project than I’ve shown here but this gives you a pretty good sense of what we did!!
And … even cooler … I was recently interviewed on TV and we used this house as the set for the interview. They only showed the upstairs in the news shot but it was still pretty cool for us and everyone in our family that played a role in making this place look as amazing as it does. Here’s the news clip in case you missed it. My favourite part is when they call me the Donald Trump of Vancouver Island.
**Sorry – the news station has taken the video clip down now but we’re getting it on DVD so we’ll share it with you then!!**
