It feels scary to put pen to paper and admit how naïve we were starting this project. We’ve renovated two projects before this – a 2 bed Victorian mid-terrace and a 3 bed 1930’s semi – but whilst we learnt a lot transforming those, neither one compares to the scale of the 4 bed, 400 year old thatched cottage we live in now.

We started off with about 40k (from the profit of our last house) and, one year on, the money has well and truly gone. This is not a pity party though. I want to be clear that we are fully aware how incredibly privileged we are to have a roof over our heads, as much space as we’ll ever need, my husband has a steady and generous income, we have food in our fridge, we’re all in good health and we can buy the kids their school uniform.

However, the truth is, we haven’t achieved nearly half as much as we’d hoped to and there is no boat in the garage for us to sell (a la Grand Designs) or family members who can drop us a spare 5k now that we’ve fallen short.

I often champion transparency around money, especially in the interiors industry where it can feel like everyone has a never-ending pot of gold, however, to my shame, it’s definitely one thing sharing renovation budgets when you end up making a sizable profit, and another sharing budgets where you’re still truly wondering how on earth we got it so wrong and where we go from here.

I have also included any details of PR products and PR discounts so you can see exactly how much items would cost for you; without the benefits I receive from the work I do on here and Instagram. It must be acknowledged however, that this is my job, and the products or discounts I receive are in return for work – creating content and marketing opportunities for a brand that is relevant to my audience. I hope the transparency around this is helpful.

So, I can’t teach you much about budgeting for a renovation, but what I can share with you is where our money has been spent. Please take from it what you will and apply it to your own home and financial situation. As always, if you have questions, I’ll be happy to help, just head over to my Instagram @theottohouse and you’ll find me hanging out there.

A quick summary of what we’ve managed to do in 12 months:

60+ beams sandblasted back to original wood

Replace all existing lighting (including 16 wall lights)

Install new water tank, new pump, new oil tank and new boiler

Decorate 2 bedrooms, a dressing room, hallway, landing and stairs

Replaster and decorate living room

Remove hazardous trees

Paint the whole exterior of the house and the summer house

Bespoke carpentry installed in four rooms

Kitchen makeover (ongoing)

Expenses room by room:

Total cost to us: £35,298

Total cost without the PR discounts: £38,585

If you’ve got through all those figures, well done!! A few worthy of particular attention is the almost £2k spent in generic hardware stores on items like paintbrushes, caulk, screws and sanding sheets. These are items you often won’t budget for but it certainly adds up! The cost of paint alone so far totals about £1.4k and our house insurance comes in at an eye-watering £1.7k due to the thatched roof. Wall lights (x16!) are not cheap and we ended up spending just over £1k on those alone plus another £1k to have them all installed!

The £10k we spent on a new oil tank, boiler, pump and water tank is something we hadn’t budgeted for, and it was a much more boring expense than a new bathroom which is what we had hoped to do instead. After spending the winter here, it was evident the 20 year old Rayburn (which worked as our boiler) was too temperamental to provide consistent heating and hot water so that was a third of our budget gone. We do now enjoy super hot showers with brilliant water pressure, which is something I have literally never had in any house I’ve ever lived - so whilst that may feel like a small detail to many, it is actually a HUGE win for us.

Looking back, we have achieved a lot already in a short space of time. When you live somewhere, it is very easy to just focus on the jobs still left to do rather than sit back and appreciate how far we’ve come. However, we do still have many high cost projects left, like replacing all the flooring across the whole house, replacing three bathrooms, installing a path from the house to the garage and replacing some kitchen units. That’s not to mention replacing the roof (!!!) and the work that needs doing on the studio and the garage.

We have no idea when these will happen (if ever!) but we are grateful everything is liveable as it is - even if that does mean carpet in the bathroom a little longer! We will continue to chip away at the differences we can make, and I have lots of ideas for resourceful upcycles and diys for the upcoming rooms we will be focusing on. I am fully aware that all the changes we wish to make are relatively superficial and hardly essential if the finances aren’t there for it!

I think the interiors and renovation world can trick you into thinking that renovations are all about quick transformations and I am fully aware that I contributed to this with our last renovation projects only taking a year each. Nevertheless, this time round, it is going to require a lot more patience, a lot more compromise, and a lot more creativity, and I think, when all is said and done, that is so much more REAL, isn’t it?!!

Thank you for getting this far, and I truly hope that a look at our budget will help you work out costs for your own projects or renovation. It is worth noting that we live in the South of England (an area with particularly high house prices/labour costs) and the work was carried out between February 2021 - November 2021.

If you enjoyed this blog post, please do check out a similar one from last year called ‘Budget details for a three bedroom family home renovation’ and ‘Budget details for furnishing a three bedroom family home’.

PS:

The eagle-eyed among you may notice I said all 40k had run out despite our expenses for the year totalling at just over £35k. Unfortunately with rising living costs, some expensive MOTs and other such reasons that are too dull to mention, the rest of the money has definitely disappeared! We have also really enjoyed hosting lots of friends and family throughout the year post lockdown (my latest count was over 200 different visitors) which has added significantly to our food bill! Again, no pity party here as it has been a joy to bless others with our space and this is something we will always prioritise over anything else!