2 Weeks and $1000

It's been a good few days on the flip front.  Friday, after 2 weeks of scrambling, I got Frankie all staged and ready to show off for his Saturday showing.  The Saturday showing lead to a second showing Sunday and an accepted offer!  And Hubby and I sighed a collective sigh of relief.  We've learned several expensive lessons with this house: 1- purchase price has to be right for the neighborhood.  2- the best offer is the one you have in front of you.  We would have made more profit if we took the first offer... ce la vie. and 3- staging is totally worth the time and money (plus it's fun). When faced with a non-selling house, we didn't want to sink any more money into renovations, so reluctantly we agreed that staging was the way to go.  We had resisted previously because we weren't convinced that the time and cost were worth it (spoiler alert: they are).  I may be able to envision furniture in the space, but sometimes I forget that not everyone sees a space that way.  So I gave myself the challenge- 2 weeks and $1000.

Admittedly, it was trying to rein myself in- I wanted to design the whole space with the absolute perfect pieces!  I had to force myself to do just enough to make it feel cozy and to work with the pieces that I could get from craigslist for next to nothing.

I hung IKEA curtains in all the bedrooms using Sarah M. Dorsey's hook method and they totally helped the entire house feel finished.

If you didn't see on face book, I'm kind of madly in love with the mid century modern twin bedroom sets (yes, setS) that I found.  Eventually they'll get refinished, but the lines are dreamy and they're SOLID.  Sadly, the nightstand was missing it's original knob.  I may have to find a suitable replacement in the near future.

This dresser may end up being a future project too- polish up the knobs, repaint it (the finish is the victim of a poor refinish attempt) and add legs which apparently were there originally.

I shopped my own house for the majority of the accessories including lamps and trays.

My absolute favorite view is the view you get when walking down the hall:

It certainly doesn't look like a house that's lived-in, however just adding the furniture and a few strategic accessories, help to make it feel like it could be a home.

Aside from the kitchen/dining witch I had staged when we listed, I totally met my own challenge and was able to furnish and style a living room and 3 bedrooms for under $1000

Here's the cost breakdown:

Living room:

Sofa, craigslist-$50

Side chair, craigslist-$50

Rug, craigslist-$40

Lamp, already owned-$0

Side tables-$30 + spray paint

Living Room TOTAL: $170

Bedrooms:

2 twin beds, 2 dressers, 1 nightstand, craigslist-$100

Queen headboard & metal frame, craigslist-$50

2 Twin mattresses, craigslist-$50

Queen mattress, craigslist-$25

Queen split box spring, craigslist-$FREE

Nightstand, tag sale-$5 + spraypaint & new knobs

Dresser, craigslit-$30

Bedding, pillows, & accessories-$328.33

Bedrooms TOTAL: $588.33

TOTAL STAGING COST: 758.33

Frankie Update

Frankie, oh Frankie.  Why must you break my heart so?  Frankie the Fliphouse (our second flip) still hasn't sold.  Great house on a good street on the wrong side of town.  Live and learn.  Without dropping the price yet again, we need to take action to get this guy gone! In the words of Sir Tim Gunn:

That saying's kinda a thing with Hubby and me.  I still need to frame this print that I purchased from ScoutMob and hang it properly, but I love the positive reminder.  I dare you to not hear Tim's voice when you read it!

Craigslist will be sick of me by the end of the next week or so- We've decided this house needs to be staged to help market it better.  I'm hunting, scavenging, and haggling for the best deals possible for furniture to stage an entire house.  That means mattresses, beds, dressers, etc.  I'm hoping to furnish the entire house quickly on a shoestring budget and make it look like it wasn't done on the cheap.  So far I've only set a time to pick up this guy on Saturday.

I know it's blue, but the style is pretty simple, it's clean and neat, and above all else, the price is right.  $50 for a sofa in good condition?  I'll take it!  Since I'm going blue on the sofa, I'm looking for a more neutral colored chair with interesting lines to accompany it.  Here are the current front-runners:

Now the race is on to see who responds to my e-mails.

I'm sure I'll come up with a quick DIY or 2 to help stage once I get some of the larger pieces procured.  Until then, I'll be that girl on my iphone every 5 minutes looking to see if anything new has been posted.

Let the staging begin!

Frankie: Week 15

I hope you enjoy these weekly updates as I learn to navigate through the business of flipping houses.  Check out other posts about Frankie the Fliphouse HERE. This is your last teaser post before Frankie's big reveal next week!  Are you excited!  I am!  So excited, in fact, that I may overuse the exclamation point in this post.  Don't say I didn't warn you.

Come hell or high water, I WILL have this house done and ready to list by the end of next week.  Especially since as of today we'll own 3 houses... what what??  #1, our house...#2, Frankie...and #3.....

That's right, flip #3!!!  Another ranch!  My specialty apparently.  Hubby's named him Grover (following our naming convention of using part of the street name).  I may just end up calling him Grove.  We shall see.  We won't be starting in on the house right away, so I'll have time to finish Frankie and take a short breather before jumping in with both feet.  Until then, I'm going to start dreaming about ripping out this delightfully modern bathroom.

Woof.  It even matches the exterior... as it should.....  My sledge hammer is going to be my bff.

But anyway, back to the current flip!  Frankie is almost all grown up and ready to leave the nest.

It's honestly hard for me to believe the transformation here- he's really a looker!!  I've got the upstairs at about 95%, just some touch-ups, cleaning, and minor staging needed.

Just look at all those check marks!  That's what flipping dreams are made of.

Thankfully, I was able to fix my botched grout job with another layer of the same unsanded grout, now it's pretty and smooth as it was intended.  Yay! As the kitchen cleaning commenced, I started peeling the protective film off the appliances.  It was like unwrapping presents to reveal a sparkly kitchen.  Almost as gratifying as painting/refinishing furniture.  Almost.

The bedrooms and bathroom all got inexpensive blinds for privacy.  My secret for making them look less cheap and more custom: trim them to fit inside the window frames!  No more messy bunch at the bottom!

After touching up all the window trims and sills and polishing up the floors, I can't help but show you a teaser of the living room.

When I started on this house, my goal was to make it clean, functional and livable- three things it was not before.  This house cleaned up better than even I expected- it just puts a smile on my face, and hopefully the next owner's.

My To Do list pretty much has one thing still left unchecked: the basement.  I have to tackle it with lots and lots and lots of paint, so I anticipate being covered in paint next week... maybe I'll even get a bit on the walls.  It will be so worth it, though, trust me!

The end is near!  I can't wait to show you guys Frankie's full transformation next Friday!!