Nothing Like Deciding To Sell and Then Changing Your Mind
My husband and I have thought for quite a while that we might like to sell and downsize just a little in the yard. No so much the house, but our yard and garden are a lot to keep up and look beautiful like we like it. I took a good look around the house and knew that we needed to make some changes in color, some flooring, appliances and so on. This thought took a lot of time if that makes any kind of sense, plus we have been in this house for 17 years. We have a lot of "stuff".
I am a collector of dishes. I have never seen a dish or glassware that I did not like. I like books and have or had a collection of children's books and auto-biographies. Loved them all. Sometimes I will read a book two or three times if I really like it. I love to paint and have an enormous suppy of paints, canvas, paper and on and on. My husband has fishing gear out the wazoo plus he likes to refinish furniture so his shop is full and I do mean full.
So, here we are thinking of selling?? Where in the world do we begin. Cleaning out and decluttering...whew...a huge job. It has taken me around a year to do this and I am still not done I am sure. So what was my strategy? I began with deciding not only to declutter a small amount at one time (you don't really think a collector can do it all at once do you), and begin changing the wall paint throughout the house.
Yes I said the whole house, room by room. I became so confused on what colors I wanted ranging from greens, blues to brown tones. Now I am an artist and I know color and color theory, one would think I could figure it out, but no it does not always work that way. I called for the calvery, and the general's name is Maureen Bray of Room Solutions, a wonderful home stager that saved my ..... mind.
She came over with a colleague and we did a color consult. It was fabulous and the colors are perfect and very peaceful. It never occured to me that in choosing the colors I needed to remember we not only have walls and the ceiling, but there is the floor. So, now I have painted every room, along with woodwork. Now this was towards the end of 2012 and then we became more serious about perhaps selling. 
These are the things we did. New kitchen appliances, Gas stovetop, double ovens with the top oven being convection as well and a new dishwasher, all stainless. I had new lights installed under the kitchen cupboards which changed the whole look of the kitchen. We did not do countertops or cupboards, because I know we would not realize the money back if we sold.
We had new tile floors put into master bath from carpet and new tile in hall bath instead of vinyl. New vinyl in Laundry that looks like tile and new carpeting in Master Bedroom, Living Room and Dining/Art Room. Beautiful. What a difference. I also put new fixture in Hall Bath and Eating area.
So, now we have decided to put off selling and stay awhile. Talk about deciding to sell and then changing your mind. Here is a peek at the before and after, and by the way I am still painting woodwork, just a little to go I think. We all know when you do one thing it leads to ten others.....good thing we are staying for awhile.
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