Maximize Small Homes With These Smart Renos

One of the easiest and cheapest ways to give your home a makeover is to put on your favourite tunes and start painting. Using lighter colours create the illusion of space, making rooms look bigger. If you’ve considered the best paint colour for each room in your home and you still have your heart set on darker colours, paint the wall trims and mouldings in a lighter colour to make the walls seem further back. A lighter colour for the ceiling will give the illusion of height.

When you break down unnecessary walls, the space that you open up will look much bigger and lighter. Especially the kitchen, dining and living rooms can benefit immensely from an open-concept plan. Having all that open space to play with also means you can easily change things around when you want something new.

There can’t be anything behind it if you want to be able to open a door. When the door is closed, however, that means quite a lot of wasted space. So, take down the swinging doors and replace them with sliding doors: Barn doors for farmhouse chic, for instance, or glass sliding doors to let in plenty of natural light and make the space seem even bigger. There are plenty of ways to repurpose the old doors.

If your home has high ceilings, you have plenty of unused space. Why let it go to waste if you can add a whole new place to sleep? Loft beds are great for kids, who tend to love the adventure of sleeping way up high and who won’t bump their heads on the ceiling. Alternatively, you can vault the ceiling and turn the loft into a workspace for grownups.

If the house comes with a basement or attic, you have an extra bedroom or home office you never even thought of. Converting the basement or attic is a great solution when the kids are getting bigger and want their own bedrooms. Add a separate bathroom and entrance and you have an entire apartment that you can rent out for extra income.

Sure, that wide open porch looks very inviting but be honest: How often do you sit there? By enclosing the porch or deck, you have a whole new room that can become a mudroom, sunroom, home office or bedroom. You can still have cozy patio furniture for when you want to watch the world pass by on a warm evening. Just add French doors to the enclosed space and you have the best of both worlds.

See that awkward corner as the perfect storage space. You can add shelves for out-of-the-way storage or display spaces, for instance. A storage bench can provide extra seating and become a cozy reading nook. Or add some plants for greenery that doesn’t take up valuable space elsewhere.

There are endless possibilities for using the space under the stairs. If it’s big and high enough, you can turn it into a workspace or install a powder room. For smaller spaces, install shelving and you have instant storage space. Alternatively, turn it into a secret playroom for the kids or add stylish pet accessories and dog beds to give your furry family members a room of their very own.

A closet doesn’t just have to be a space where you keep your skeletons and clutter. If it’s close to the kitchen, add lots of shelving and maybe even an upright freezer and you have a pantry. Otherwise, add a floor protector, plumbing, a washer and dryer, a rod to hang things on and a folding table and you have a laundry room.

Anything that you can hang on the wall or suspend from the ceiling is one item less that takes up floor space. Add floating or suspended shelves, hooks for hanging everything from clothes to kitchen utensils, wall sconces for lighting, even vase stickers so you don’t need a table for that vase of flowers.