Renovating before Relocating

Renovating our old home in Auckland in the heat of the summer seems a little crazy but I find myself loving every minute of it. The sad part is we are selling the house so wont get to enjoy our labours!! While we were away family members lived in the house but it needed a complete makeover to bring it up to scratch for sale. Pip and Nick and I are camping there without cooking facilities and only one operational bathroom!

I've been overseeing the project and swishing black paint on retaining walls and timber fences outside while Pip has manfully ripped up bathroom cabinets and old flooring, finagled bits of timber into edgings and skirtings for the bathroom and decking for the courtyard. Thankfully the interior painting should be finished today and flooring starts to go down this week.So we'll be getting stuck in yanking up the old carpet and getting into the landscaping which my parents have been chipping away at too.

Exterior of house as it was before.

Cousin Mark has helped with carpentry skills inside and out and Simon and Scott from Kitchens Refreshed have refaced the kitchen turning it from it from a wild blue 80's horror into a more acceptable white zone. They sprayed the existing carcases white and built new doors and drawer fronts with stainless handles. We opted to stay with the existing benchtop and sink for budgetary reasons but bought new stainless appliances.

The pictures above are of the beginning of the process, next week I'll have some progress shots.We aim to put some of our furniture (currently enroute from Antwerp to Sydney in a red container) in the house while it is marketed by the local real estate agency in Kohi in March.