Guest Bathroom: The Numbers

Admittedly, it's a lot more fun to look at after pictures of the bathroom than it is to talk about the money we spent to make it happen.  But in case anyone else is in our position (and for my reference in the future), I figured I'd outline what we tugged out of our wallets for this project.

After adding everything up, I have to laugh at our initial $150 budget, which certainly limited us.  But with a 20% mark-up for incidentals, we were still only looking at spending $180.  Well, that didn't take into account the $160 we spent on drywall, new trim, plumbing, and other random stuff that it took to get the room from moldy to ready for paint. 

Really, when I look at the expenses in our original scope, we actually came in under budget:  less than $130 for the things I originally hankered for.  But the big number-- everything added together-- was just at $300.  Ouch.

Luckily, we already had some things to work with.  The vanity and top, sink and bathtub hardware, towel hardware and shower curtain rod, toilet and tub, paintable beadboard wallpaper, trim paint, and the mirror ($5 from a yard sale!).  Remember we had hoped to trim the old mirror, but it met its demise quickly.  Here's hoping for fewer than seven years of bad luck.  And I wrote about putting up the wallpaper here.

The source list is below, and I linked to company websites where possible.  If I didn't specify a source, it was purchased from Lowe's.  I swear we spend most of our lives in that store.

Drywall supplies:  $50
Dust masks, corner piece, drywall compound, lumber and drywall, drywall tools (like this drywall knife and mixer), and sandpaper
=$50.33

Paint supplies:  $53
Sample paint ($8 worth!), caulk, frog tape, and paint (Lighthouse Shadows by Valspar, color matched to Olympic One)

Wallpaper removal:  $14
Piranha remover and concentrate

Flooring and trim:  $75
Vinyl tiles, box of 30 (12x12, $26); a few individual tiles; baseboard and quarter round ($46)
We had hoped to reuse the old trim, but the water problem made that impossible.  We also bought enough trim for both bathrooms, so this number should kind of be divided between this project and the future master bathroom rehaul.

Plumbing:  $32
New toilet ring and other parts, plus a fix for the tub faucet
I accidentally over-torqued one of the tub's handles, so we had to pay $20 to fix the @#*% thing.

Overhauled vanity:  $14
Cabinet base (2x2 lumber, $6), knobs (IKEA Lindsdal), and wood glue

Pretty stuff:  $36
Shower curtain hooks (HomeGoods, $6), shower curtain (HomeGoods, $14), crates (family store), light fixture ($5 yard sale find!)
For the rest of the decorating, I just stole stuff from around the house.

Random things, like this door stopper:  $30

Total:  $305


Considering everything we had to do, that's really not bad.  We didn't bring anyone in for estimates, but I'm betting we would have paid at least twice as much for someone else to repair all the drywall.  And now Mr. GI is a drywalling machine!  He recently helped one of our friends drywall their house, and he might even be enjoying it.  Okay, that's a stretch.  Either way, we saved big bucks since the mister did that part.

The frightening fun thing is that we still have another bathroom to go.  We're hoping that one will be cheaper since we have everything on hand except paint and flooring for that room. 

Have you ever gotten over your head in a house project?  I guess that's the blessing and the curse of home ownership.  :-)


Follow along with the rest of our bathroom adventures: our dream, the before, mildewwww, every day we're drywalling (what a terrible pun), the our thrifted finds so far, ripping out wallpaper, making up my mind on a wall color, rehauling the vanity, an updated to-do list, a teaser of the floor, cleaning and wallpapering, painting, laying flooring, polishing up our light fixture, solving the mildew mystery, hanging some crate storage, deciding on a curtain plan of attack and installing a beautiful curtain, all the after pictures, plus my Pinterest boards for the guest bathroom and master bathroom.