Euclid Street Airbnb Week 0: Planning Phase

As true to my nature, I put together a few lists for this completion of this airbnb project. When we renovated our 1870’s home several years back, we found how helpful it is to make a list and to have a master plan. It is very important to celebrate your little wins, so write it down and cross it off. With reno it always gets worse before it gets better, so having a visual to show that you are moving forward is crucial for morale. It’s also important to make sure everything is getting done it the right order and writing it out helps get things straight.

For this project we are aggressively projecting 5 weeks. Kasey’s new availability to make this a full time project, is what makes this possible. The high level steps are below as well as the floor plans currently and with reno (Shout out to my sister Sara for putting the floor plans together! A perk to having an architectural designer in the family)

• STEP 1: Clear out the space and planning. The basement is currently our wine making space as well as our workshop. We need to find new spaces for both of these. The wine equipment is moving to a side room that is currently just storage. We should have space for both in this room if we are smart with the organization. This can be locked up as private owner space. We need to add a sink to make this space work for my wine-making. The workshop is going to the garage. We have 3 bays, one will become the workshop. The garage needs electricity wired and also some Marie Kondo style organizing.
• STEP 2: Demolition. Straightforward, get rid of old carpet, old cabinets, completely gut the bathroom. Let’s get to our blank canvas
• STEP 3: Restructure. Add and update electrical plugs, lights, plumbing if necessary, add a hallway to the master bedroom. Everything is open at this point, now is the time to really make sure the space is laid out the way you want. Think this through and try to stick with a plan from this point on.
• STEP 4: Build it back. Walls, tile in bathroom and kitchen, refinish cabinets, ceiling (sound proof insulation in the ceiling), trim, some painting
• STEP 5: Finishing touches, AKA the fun part. Paint colors, shelves, furniture, art, other details that don’t require as much planning at this point.

That makes it sound easy… if only it were true. Old house are charming, but man demo is always like opening a Tupperware container that has been in your fridge for an unknown amount of time. It could be okay, but most of the time it all needs to be pitched and remade. Below is the week to week plan. I will repost with before and after pictures and updates to how we are sticking to our plan.

WEEK 1: Wine Room and Workshop Displacement

• Clear out our stuff from the side storage room
• Scrub and Kilz paint the walls and floor
• Rebuild shelving structure to full use space and create room for wine equipment
• Add a double basin sink. This includes connecting a drain up to the main stack (luckily right next to it. We are also lucky to have water hook ups.
• Move wine making table and equipment into the new room
• Get electricity run to the garage
• Move work bench to garage, along with tools
• Look at flooring options (vinyl laminate, laminate, or ceramic tile, refinished concrete floor)

WEEK 2: Demo Week

• Remove carpet (a lovely maroon polyester blend from the early 1980’s) and assess the flooring options (sometimes you might find drains, or the concrete below could be cracked and uneven, this might change our approach to the floor)
• Measure and order flooring
• This also means we have to move a fridge somewhere
• Rip down tile and shower partition in bathroom
• Take out the very gross counter top from the kitchen area
• Clean out the very retro steel and porcelain kitchen sink/ cabinets. The cabinets will need to be stripped and repainted, but we will save this one for later
• Repaint the walls that are not being demo’ed, aka the stone foundation.
• Add plugs to on either side of the bed at night stand level
• Paint the drop ceiling cross members white (currently black)
• Prep for flooring
• Order the tile, the fixtures and possibly the toilet for the bathroom

WEEK 3: Floors, New Entryway and Bathroom start

• Lay floors
• Put doors and locks on the wine areas
• Re-insulate the ceiling where the drop tiles are and put the tiles back up (We had taken them down to do electrical and plumbing when we first moved in)
• Pending no crazy plumbing changes once its open…Put the bathroom walls back up, replace with hardy backer so we can run tile
• Add sliding door on the bathroom
• Consider pouring concrete steps from the street up into the back yard (pending weather)

WEEK 4: Bathroom Tile and Kitchen

• Bathroom Tile (Shower and wall)
• Bathroom fixtures
• Replace toilet if needed
• Strip and paint the steel cabinets over the sink
• Kitchen back-splash
• Wooden table project, using old wood from our house reno to replace the counter we removed
• Repair kitchen plumbing and replace fixture

WEEK 5: Outside week and finishing touches

• Motion lights outside
• Facade around deck
• Clean out under steps up to deck
• Add stepping stones to basement entrance
• Wireless keypad locks
• Hang blinds
• Finishing touches and furniture (expand upon this when we are closer)