Best Materials for Rental Reno
What are some good materials for renovating a rental. I want it to look good and be sturdy, but don’t want to put in a ton of money. What would you use for kitchen counters? Flooring? Appliances?
What are some good materials for renovating a rental. I want it to look good and be sturdy, but don’t want to put in a ton of money. What would you use for kitchen counters? Flooring? Appliances?
Thank you everyone. This is exactly the information I needed!
Arkady, that sounds very nice. Where were you able to locate the washer dryers — did you run a gas line and a vent?
I agree with rh…salvage what you can. lightly sanding and repainting cabinets and putting on new hardware can change everything. I try to stay classic…trendy stuff dates too fast. I use brass cabinet hardware from Moon River Chattel in Williamsburg. I use butcher block from Ikea for counter tops and subway tiles from Loews. Floors..cork is green, many colors available, waterproof and soundproof and goes nice with wood floors already there. If you want new cabinets I found Home Depot and Loews alot more expensive then Cabinet Factory. One is in Bensonhurst. They designed the kitchen from a gut and that service was free. Rosemary, I believe was her name and the installment was included and everything was under $5500. Cabinets went up to ceiling and the kitchen is L shaped with the “cage” for the fridge. Good experience.
I try to salvage whatever is there. If you have wood cabinets in decent shape, you can always reface them. Just a paint job!
Ceramic tile countertops is an inexpensive and decent looking way to go.
If you’re handy, check out this DIY resin option….
http://reclaimedhome.com/2009/10/29/brownstones-past-in-resin-counter/
I go with ceramic tile or tin ceiling backsplash.
Flooring…If it’s not such a large kitchen, you can try looking on Craigs for leftovers. Many people buy too much. I’ve done an entire bedroom, a hallway and a bathroom counter and backsplash from people’s high end leftovers. At a fraction of the cost.
Also, Weinstocks or Weinsteins (???) on McDonald Ave has overstock. I used some marble from them. It was a bargain!
AJ Madison or Drimmers for appliances.
A friend of mine just used Roca Packstone 12 x 24 tile in her kitchen and it looks beautiful and has a higher-end feel for the price. http://www.rocatilegroup.com/roca/products/packstone.html. For bathrooms, Dal-Tile has quite a few reasonable, attractive options. They even make decent subway tile at about $5/sq ft. Good luck!
I do ceramic tiles in the bath & good vinyl tiles, properly installed in the kitchen.
Ikea cabinets are 25 years old – don’t know what their quality is nowadays.
Color-core Formica countertops – more forgiving of scarring.
Decent appliances – normal, not apt.-sized stove w/ hood that vents to outside. Stackable washer/dryer – have had to replace 3 times in 25 yrs.
All the problems I have had in rentals relate to incorrect tile installation. To give one example, my landlady put in beautiful granite tile countertops in the kitchen. The installer left some holes in the grout, water seeps in, and now a year later some of the tiles around the sink are cracking.
I second the advice on Ikea cabinets. Per cabinet, they cost about the same as the crappy stuff HD has on the shelves and far less than the stuff you order. I woud only go as far as laminate floors if that is the market you are in. If you are just talking kitchen floor, go laminate, vinyl tile, whtever, but for the whole apartment, make it real.
I don’t know much about renovating a rental per se but I have some ideas. Why not try one of those laminate snap-in-place floors? I think IKEA has cheap ones that don’t need to be glued down…so cheap you won’t mind installing it in an apartment. Otherwise, there are more expensive, nicer materials like roll-out linoleum or cork.
For a backsplash, I think there are some stick-um products that are relatively cheap and easy to install.
For the counter: sad to say but go with Formica or whatever version of that that is available. It is really the cheapest solution and bright color can look kicky and really pretty sensational (red or orange). But, if you’re handy, probably a plywood base could be made and support either a homemade concrete counter or you could glue down tiles (if you get a good deal) and grout them. But these are only ideas! I have seen TV shows where these are being made and they make it look fairly easy and I have no real idea how difficult making a counter from cement might end up!
I heard that IKEA has dropped its line of furniture-like kitchen base cabinets that have their own stainless steel counters, sit on their own legs and don’t need any real installation. I’m not entirely sure though. They have a number of options.
I guess appliances are available all over. Just figure out the most affordable place for what you want.
Listen, do not move any sink or plumbing. And of course, if you have a gas cooker, don’t even think about moving the pipe. You didn’t mention it, but I hope you don’t think you can gut the kitchen and move everything around. Gutting really requires a permit too. Just do a light cosmetic “freshening” up.
And, yes, paint and color can do a lot for a rental apartment.