Ten tips to improve your home on a budget

The cost-of-living crisis and rocketing property prices mean many homeowners are choosing not to move just yet – although that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re happy with their homes.

Indeed, research by the local services marketplace Airtasker has found that while 43 per cent of people don’t plan to move over the next five years because of high property prices, 63 per cent of them intend to do home makeovers over the next year instead.

But what’s the best way to spruce up your home for as little money as possible?

“A lot of people want to update their homes by decluttering, reorganising or redecorating, but don’t necessarily know where to start, and that can be quite overwhelming,” observes Charlotte Reddington, one half of celebrity home makeover experts, the Style Sisters.

And Gemma Lilly, the other half of the duo, who have decluttered and reorganised the homes of celebrities including Amanda Holden, Rochelle Humes, Vicky Pattison, Mark Wright and Vogue and Spencer Williams, adds: “People are looking to declutter, reorganise and just keep costs down and make the best of what they’ve got at the moment. Mortgage rates are rising and we’re in a cost-of-living crisis, and I think people feel they can’t move or spend much on improving. And that’s why we want to help people improve the spaces they’re in.”

The pair – who aren’t actually sisters, but best friends who met at school – offer these tips to spruce up your home affordably.

1.  Write a list

To create attractive order in your home, your mind needs to be in order first – so write a list of things you need to do, suggests Ms Reddington. “Think about what you need to tackle in the home – it can be quite overwhelming and daunting and we tend to end up putting it off. So our first protocol would be to either list it by room, and detail what you’d like to achieve in that room, whether it’s detoxing your wardrobe or going through the kitchen cupboards.

“Just by having it down in a list and slowly ticking it off gives you those small wins to keep you motivated to continue.”

2.  Identify affordable but effective updates

Ms Lilly says people need to think about how they use the spaces in their home, and what might need updating.  “Could your kitchen cupboards do with a fresh lick of paint?” she asks. “You might not be able to afford to completely get a new kitchen, but there are ways to update your existing rooms on a budget. You can do that by changing handles, painting cupboards and so on.”

3. Think about changing the room function

Swapping what you use rooms for can add a fresh take to your home, explains Ms Lilly, who says: “You might have a dining room and a living room and actually, the rooms might work better vice-versa. Even just rearranging the furniture can make it feel like a new space and make the room flow better.”

4. Invite the outside in

If possible, try to make your main living space near the back doors and the garden if you have one, to make the most of the sunshine. “The back doors can be opened so you’re letting the outside in, just making your space work for you and your lifestyle,” suggests Ms Reddington.

5. Don’t neglect outside space

Gardens, or even front or backyards, are still part of your home and should be kept as tidy as possible, say the pair. “Give your front garden kerb appeal and make it look nice, and give your front door a lick of paint if it needs it,” advises Ms Reddington, who points out that it shouldn’t cost much to hire someone to help out in the garden if you haven’t got green fingers yourself.

6. Neutral tones with pops of colour

The Style Sisters agree they generally prefer more neutral tones on interior house walls, but they stress it’s very much down to individual taste. “Colour schemes are entirely up to each person and their tastes – this is your home and you live in it and you’ve got to enjoy it,” stresses Ms Lilly. “We tend to stick to more neutral tones, but you can add a pop of colour or you can wallpaper a feature wall, for example.

“If you’re living in quite a small space, we always tend to steer clear of colour on the walls because that can make the room look smaller. Save the pops of colour for small bathrooms, maybe, because you can get away with being a bit more adventurous in there.”

7. Make smaller rooms look bigger

If some (or all) of your rooms are small, Ms Lilly says mirrors are great to bounce light and make spaces appear a lot larger. In addition, lighter-coloured flooring can make a big difference to the perception of space in a room, she points out. “The number of times I’ve seen light sucked out of the room because of a dark-coloured flooring, and instantly once we change the flooring and make it lighter, it makes the room feel so much bigger,” she says.

“And even if you’re not in a position to change the flooring, it could be that you get a lighter-coloured rug and instantly that would lift the room. Or you could simply paint the floorboards lighter.”

8. Be careful with curtains

Look at your window dressings or curtains – curtains sometimes cover a lot of the light in the room, making it feel more closed in and darker, explains Ms Reddington. “We always say to position curtains either side of the window rather than on the window, because it just gives the illusion of the space feeling a lot bigger.”

9. Memory boxes to help decluttering

Decluttering is a vital part of making a home more attractive, say Ms Reddington and Ms Lilly, who point out that often the problem with clutter is that it has sentimental value and people are reluctant to get rid of it.

“With items that people tend to struggle to part with when they’re really sentimental, we’ll recommend creating a memory box because it’s a safe place, it’s not taking up prime space in the home, and you can put it into a loft or storage,” says Ms Lilly.

10. Take pictures of precious but often unattractive items

Rather than allowing things like children’s artwork or other sentimental items to overrun your rooms, the Style Sisters recommend you take pictures of them and create albums, and have a bookcase of pictures of these sentimental items before storing them away.

“You’ve still got the memory there, but they’re just not taking up so much space,” says Ms Reddington, who suggests another alternative is to take pictures of items and create a digital memory book on your phone, so they’re physically taking up no space at all, but you can still look at them.

Do you have any DIY projects on the go right now? Let us know how you want to improve your home in the comments section below.

Also read: Planning some home improvements? Expert tips for spending wisely

– With PA