Tag Archives: condo

There have been so many points where I said the renovation on my condo was done. When I moved in, there were still a few things to do but pretty much everything was completed. Then when we worked on the fix-it list and discovered the floors had to be redone, getting the new floors felt like the end of the renovation. There were still a few things to get done after the floors, but that was the last really big thing that needed to be completed for the remodel. But now, I think I might actually be done with the renovation.

A few things happened in the past week. The contractor came back with a crew to finish the last few things on the list. These were all pretty minor things such as some paint touch-ups, repairing one broken tile that was in the kitchen, straightening a handle on a cabinet, and cleaning up some of the stuff they had left on my patio. These were all very quick and fast fixes, but they needed to be done so the project felt complete. And all of this work was able to be done in a single day, so it felt like it was done really fast.

The one thing that wasn’t done the same day as the rest of the work was getting the leftover stone from my kitchen counters. I now have that on my patio after it was brought over and we are looking at seeing if we can turn it into a coffee table for outside. But at least it’s off to the side of my patio and out of the way. But it was the last of the leftover materials that we were waiting on (I have the leftover paint and tiles in my storage space in my garage already).

I also finally got my curtains installed last week. This was separate from the contractor because I used a chain curtain/blinds store. I had picked out the curtains about a month ago and I knew the installation would take a few weeks. Fortunately, this was only for the back slider door because the rest of my windows have shutters. So I wasn’t lacking privacy in my place, but I wanted to have this done since I didn’t like having such a big open window that others could see into at night. This installation took longer than expected, but I was just working while they were doing it, so it wasn’t a big deal. And having curtains added really made the space look finished.

I still need to organize and get my new couch (and get rid of my old couch), but having curtains made a big difference. I didn’t know it would feel that big, but I think having something that feels homier and makes my place feel cozy is helping a lot. And I like that the sheers I picked don’t completely obscure the view so I can still see into my patio. Eventually, I’ll have furniture out there too, so that will be nice.

And the last step to the renovation was getting my place cleaned again. I had done this before I moved in, but since fixing the floors got this dusty, we asked the contractor to bring a cleaner in so I didn’t have to pay for another one. I am debating about setting up a monthly cleaning service (it feels like a splurge, but I think it would be worth it), but it was nice to not have to pay this time when the reason we needed the cleaning wasn’t something I was in control of. And of course, it was nice to have a super clean place, which is why I’m considering a regular cleaning service now.

My parents still want to see all the fixes and work before we officially say that the renovation is done and they will be back in LA this fall. So being officially done might have to wait until then, but I still consider the work done. There are no projects left that are not being done by me or by someone I might hire directly (such as building a murphy bed). The keys the contractor had to get inside were turned into me so they do not have access to my condo anymore. I’m making plans to change my locks, which I had to delay while the work was being done. And I’m buying new furniture and storage systems so I can finally get more things out of boxes. It really feels like it is done now.

And I’m so excited to see things coming together. When my new couch arrives, that will be a big change. I’m looking at getting a new tv and some nice display cabinets for my living room to fill out the space. There will be some things and projects that I have to wait on due to finances, but I’m taking steps to get them done. And every day, I’m feeling more and more like I am home and less like my old place is home. It’s been a process to get to this point, but I’m so glad it seems like everything paid off. And even if the renovation process took much longer than expected, I’m so happy with all the choices we made. Now, I think I can finally sit back and enjoy the home I have helped to create.

You Might Also Like

One More Design Choice (or I’m Ready To Be Done With The Renovation) Seeing My New Home Come Together (or This Feels Like We Are Starting The Last Renovation Stage) One More Step Closer To Being Done (or I Can Finally Add In More Furniture) Into The Next Stage Of The Renovation (or Seeing Things Come Back Into My Place) 2 Busy LA Days (or Getting More Renovation Planning Done) Now Things Are Feeling Real (or So Far, We Are Ahead Of Schedule)

While the bulk of the renovation on my condo was done before I moved in, there have been a few things that needed to be completed after I moved. Most of these things are things that we noticed after I moved in such as a cabinet handle needing to be adjusted or other minor things like that. I’ve been told over and over that having a punch-up list after a renovation is normal, so I had expected this. It did feel sometimes like I had a really long list of things to have done, but most of them were very small things I wanted to be corrected so they weren’t a huge deal.

But there was one thing that needed to be fixed that was a bigger deal than others. My floors had to be redone due to an error with the installation. It wasn’t something that made my floors too horrible while I lived with them before they were fixed, but if they weren’t redone they would have had much bigger issues in the near future. So there was no other option than to have them done again. And my contractor agreed, so he ordered the new floors and we had to wait for them to arrive since they were being shipped from overseas.

The arrival date of the floors was up in the air since there were so many travel factors to consider, so I had no idea when the floors would be done until a few days ahead of time. And because I am living here now and I wasn’t going to stay at a hotel or anything else, I knew I would be living through it.

Fortunately, the contractor brought in a very big crew to work on the floors so they were able to do the majority of the intense work within one day. They had to remove my floors, sand down the concrete because there was glue on them, get the new floors, plan out the pattern, lay them down, and put my baseboards back on. There were other things that would need to be done after that, but they were able to get all of that done within a single day so I wasn’t living without floors for a few days or anything like that.

It was weird seeing the concrete after they sanded down the glue. I had seen the concrete plenty of times during the renovation, but this was with my paint on the walls, and my furniture and other decor. Things were moved around so they could work on the floors, so that was a bit odd too. When you are used to something being in one place and it’s in another, you just feel turned around. But I’m glad the floors were fixed and I have the exact same floors as I had before, just now the issues that were happening are gone.

There are still a few more things to fix around the condo, but nothing is as big as getting the floors done. So I can finally start working on getting even more set up in here. I have put off getting some new furniture or delaying the delivery of things I have ordered while I waited for the floors. But now they are done, I can finally work on getting my new stuff here. And it does feel like there is an endless supply of new things I am getting. I am learning more and more that some of the furniture I have had for a while doesn’t really work in the new space. I don’t have to replace everything right away and I am going to live with some things for a while until I replace them, but I am shopping and looking around. If I find a good deal, now I know I can order something and have it come because I don’t have to wait for the floors to be done again.

I’m hoping the rest of the punch-up list gets done soon because I am really ready for everything to be done. It feels like I’m so close to having it done, but I also know that as a homeowner there will always be an endless list of things to do, fix, change, or plan out.

You Might Also Like

One Step Closer To Moving (or My First HOA Meeting) Having Issues At Both Places (or I Know These Are Small Problems, But They Add Up) A Transition Of What Feels Like Home (or Getting Even Closer To Moving) It Doesn’t Take Much To Upgrade A Space (or A Multi-Day Furniture Build) Not Fully Able To Unpack (or I Think The Move Prepared Me For This) Another Sunday Of Condo Hunting (or Being A Bit Clueless For The Next Step)

There have been so many decisions I’ve had to make regarding the renovation. It has been stressful, but it’s also been really amazing to see my place come together. And all the fear I had that the choices I was making would clash were unfounded because things really did look good. I still think it’s a bit of a miracle that I didn’t end up with things that looked mismatched, but since so much of what I picked were neutrals in the same color tones, I guess I set myself up to have that happen.

I do still have to buy a few more things for my place, but for the most part, the design work has been done for a while. Most of the design choices I made were actually before the renovation started, so it was done a while ago. But there have been a few things I’ve still had to figure out. I’m still planning a bit of a design for my living room, but I know that will happen once I get my new couch delivered. And once I buy some of the display cabinets I want to get, I will need to style those, but that feels less like design since I’m going to be using things I already own.

But one thing that I have been needing to do but have been waiting on was getting curtains for my slider door in my living room. I put shutters on my windows, but to do shutters on the sliding door would have been really expensive so I didn’t do that. I knew I wanted to at least have sheer curtains there since that’s what I had when I got my place. But getting regular curtains too would be nice in case I wanted to make my living room a bit more private.

When my parents have been in town during the renovation, they helped me out by meeting with some companies that could do curtains. But they were either too expensive or didn’t have fabrics we liked. I didn’t want anything too crazy for curtains, just something basic that went along with everything else that I had in the room. And even though I wanted to have some more privacy, I didn’t feel like I needed to rush to get more appointments set up. But I realized that I just needed to make a plan and go for it, so I scheduled an appointment with a company that could come to my place with samples and helps me decide on a design.

I had the appointment the other day, and I went into it thinking I might not find what I want. But I lucked out and I think I found something that will look nice. For the sheers, I went with the most basic white ones they had. I didn’t want them to be ivory or to have a design. I just wanted something simple and bright to go along with some of the accent paint in my living room. But picking out regular curtains was a bit harder. I didn’t want a big design, and a lot of the samples seemed to be too bold for me. But I think I found something that will go nicely with my paint as well as the new couch when it’s here.

It’s nothing crazy or fancy, but it will add a bit of texture and color to the room. And since they will mainly be off to the side because I’ll only have the sheers closed, they will not be a huge focal point in the room. I think it will look nice when they will be installed!

I got everything ordered during the appointment and the installation will hopefully be sometime next month. But since I wasn’t in a rush to get it done, I’m ok if it takes longer to get them. I just want to keep moving forward with getting my place finished and feeling like I’m really living in here and not just still moving in.

I know that there will always be more projects to work on, but at least for now, I think I’m done making big design decisions and can focus on the smaller things I need to get and style.

You Might Also Like

Into The Next Stage Of The Renovation (or Seeing Things Come Back Into My Place) Seeing My New Home Come Together (or This Feels Like We Are Starting The Last Renovation Stage) Making More Decisions For My New Place (or I Didn’t Realize Paint Was This Hard) 2 Busy LA Days (or Getting More Renovation Planning Done) A Transition Of What Feels Like Home (or Getting Even Closer To Moving) Feeling A Bit Unsettled (or I’ve Written About This A Lot)

Ever since the first time I saw this condo, I knew it would make an amazing home for me. For a bit, I tried not to get my hopes up because I knew it wasn’t a guarantee that it would be ours. When we put in an offer, we knew there were multiple people offering similar amounts to us. I still think I’m so lucky that this became my home and I didn’t have to keep searching for a place. I really think I couldn’t have found a better place for what we were looking for (the only thing I’m not 100% happy with is having people who share walls with me, but I’m getting used to that).

And it seems like I find the silliest little things to be excited about. Before the condo was officially ours but when we were in escrow, I made a comment to my mom that I’ve never really lived somewhere that had a hallway besides the house I lived in growing up. When I lived in the dorms, those were basically single rooms with a door. The hallway that everyone shared didn’t really count. My first apartment didn’t have a hallway. My second apartment, which was a 2 bedroom that I shared with roommates, had almost all the rooms off of the entryway so there wasn’t a hallway. And my last place pretty much flowed from one room to another without a hallway. Now, I have a little hallway off of my living room that leads to the bedrooms and bathrooms. It’s a weird thing to be excited about, but I am. It makes it feel more like a home and less like an apartment, which I know some condos can really feel like.

I also still get a kick out of having a little yard in the back. It’s not private, but it’s still green space when I look out of my living room. While I would have loved to be on the top floor (and I think about that as I hear my neighbor upstairs sometimes), those units only have balconies and not yards. I get so much more space and I don’t have to look onto rooftops or powerlines. That’s something else that makes it feel like a home. And I was thinking the other day of the condo we looked at about 5 years ago that I loved. And something I loved about that unit was that it overlooked some grass and trees. It didn’t click with me until the other day that I got something that I loved so much at that other place I looked at.

And of course, having significantly better appliances is nice, but having appliances that I didn’t have before makes me smile all the time. Having water in my fridge instead of using a purifier pitcher makes my life so much easier and I never realized how much that difference would affect me. I lived without a dishwasher for 12 years and I wasn’t sure how much of a difference it would be to have one. But doing dishes after meals is so much easier since I just have to rinse them off instead of spending time doing dishes. And of course, having my own washer and dryer is one of the biggest game-changers for me. I don’t have to worry about getting quarters, I never have to wait for a machine, and I don’t have to worry about how I’m dressed while doing laundry since nobody else will see me.

I think that most of these things will keep bringing me joy since I’ve seen how I haven’t taken things for granted in other places I’ve lived. And it’s only going to continue to get better as I get myself settled in and finish creating the space I’ve been wanting to have since the first day I saw this condo. It’s getting closer and closer every day, but I’m at a bit of a standstill now because there is a chance that all my floors will need to be redone (I’ll write more about that when I know what’s happening). So I’m not getting more furniture that I’ve been planning on just yet. But I can still enjoy all these little things that make me happy and be so grateful for the joy that this home brings me.

You Might Also Like

Getting More Settled In (or Really Feeling Home) 12 Years At One Place (or My Last Anniversary At My Current Place) Seeing My New Home Come Together (or This Feels Like We Are Starting The Last Renovation Stage) A Transition Of What Feels Like Home (or Getting Even Closer To Moving) I’ll Have A New Home Soon (or The End Of The Condo Hunt) It’s Finally Goodbye To My House (or Closing This Chapter)