My Home’s Value Increased by £230,000

A couple have revealed how they added £230,000 to their home after renovating and using clever hacks to transform their property.

Ellie Rimmer, 27, bought her two-bedroom bungalow in September 2021 for £400,000 and has since renovated it into a four-bed house – spending £120,000 so far.

She said they demolished the house to perfection and used clever DIY hacks to save money to transform their home.

And a clever hack saw Ellie save £4,100 by cleaning and painting her roof tiles black instead of buying a brand new set at an average price of £4,500.

Ellie and James couldn’t be happier with their handicrafts, saying it’s “satisfying” to DIY.

She bought her two-bedroom bungalow in September 2021 for £400,000 and has been renovating it into a four-bed house ever since – £120,000 spent so far (left, the roof before and right after)

Ellie revealed when she first bought the property that it was in a terrible state.

She said, “We immediately started stripping everything down. It was not habitable.

“It was built in the 1950s and I don’t think it has been touched since.

“We demolished the whole house to the bone.”

The clever couple created a loft conversion to create two additional bedrooms and bathrooms upstairs.

With the cost of their renovation rising, they wanted to find a way to cheaply repair the marked and moss-covered tiles.

Ellie said, “We always planned to clean them.

‘I saw that painting tiles is done quite a lot in Australia.’

Ellie revealed when she first bought the property that it was in a terrible state – and she and friend James immediately started stripping it back (left, the kitchen before and right after)

The couple are almost done with the renovation and have been living in their house for the past eight months (left, the bathroom before and right, after)

She and her partner, James Lawrence, 28, a company executive, came up with the idea of ​​painting them while strapped for cash while renovating their home.

Ellie researched and discovered that tile paint existed and bought £400 worth twice to coat their existing brown tiles.

The pair — along with Ellie’s father, Gary Rimmer, 60, a sales executive — cleaned each tile one at a time with a wire brush and spent about four 10-hour days painting the tiles.

Ellie, a project manager for the NHS, said: ‘I’ve done a lot of upcycling in the past.

“I just thought ‘you can definitely paint tiles.” I googled it and it did indeed exist.

‘To save money on new tiles, we cleaned them all by hand.

“The first layer—the tiles drank up the paint. We did two coats and all with brushes.

It matches the rest of the house.

“We’ve saved thousands.”

As part of their renovation, they cleaned each roof tile before painting them individually to change the look of their home (left and right)

‘While the roof was off for the extension, we cleaned them.

“They were all mix-matched and branded.

‘When the tiles went back on, the roof had changed in size, so we were short of a few tiles.’

Ellie managed to find the remaining 500 tiles on the Facebook marketplace of an old church for £150.

With the roof back on but the scaffolding still from their builders, Ellie and James worked tirelessly to paint them in April 2022.

Ellie: ‘It’s very windy where we live, so we couldn’t use a spray.

‘Some neighbors came by while we were working to tell us it looked fantastic.

“You have to trust the process. A year later it looks the same.’

The couple are almost done with the renovation and have been living in their house for eight months now.

They recently had their home appraised and were told it was worth £630,000 – £230,000 more than they originally paid for the property.

Ellie said they are starting the decorations for the last bathroom and should finish the patio next summer.

She said, “We managed the project ourselves. We did the research to find things cheaper.

‘Doing it yourself, that gives satisfaction.

‘We can finally enjoy it. There is light at the end of the tunnel.’