The house with the red door- How we updated the front of our house for just $38.85

The week of move in

 Remove giant trees and Rejoice ( I HATED those things!)

We recently bought an older, completely white home. We compromised on buying a house with updates because we figured we would do them slowly and the neighborhood and deal were amazing. With that being said, everyday that I pulled in to the house, it depressed me. Plain white, messy landscaping- there was just no curb appeal. After getting in a tizzy one night about it, I decided to start small. My husband and I ripped every single plant out of the front yard and added red mulch. Next we ripped out two tall skinny palms and planted some free trees we got from the city (our city does this twice a year where you get two free trees per person- we got 4 this year!)


We added some birds of paradise we got at the local home improvement store and violia, a new look. The Problem was that there still was not enough curb appeal and we could not afford the 3-5k we were quoted to paint the entire outside of the home. Even if we could, we were just not sure what color to paint it. Being as indecisive as we are, we knew it needed something.

All prior bushes and plants gone, birds of paradise and mulch added

After much research we decided we could paint the door a bold color and add some cheap vinyl shutters from Lowes or home depot for the finishing touches. - We have still yet to do the shutters so that is not included in the price here and we will update with a new post at that time.

Have cute lawn crew *aka Hubby and son* fill in holes and plant free trees

 Price Break Down:

2 BIRD OF PARADISE- $10.00 each (Was $15.00 but they were on sale) = $20.00

Red Paint- $9.00 for a small bucket (with lots left over too!)

Red mulch - used 5 bags at $1.97 each from Walmart = $9.85

Tree removal- FREE, used our truck and cut it ourselves with tools we owned.

Total - $38.85

Paint door and Be proud of the outcome

In the future, we may paint or update more, but right now, we have to stick with what we can do and cheap. We are ecstatic with the the progress and we will be painting the mailbox and refinishing the House Numbers with items we already own. Pinterest was not much help here because we had no clear VISION other than we wanted to do something to our incredibly plain Jane house. I hope this can give you some ideas.

Side note: you do see "new" items in the front but rest assured we owned them already- the American flag (My husband put this up before putting our BEDS together!) The alligator flag (my son's pride and joy of the front yard) and the sleeping gnome (this goes way back to the first house we owned together and will never leave our front yards no matter where we go) The lights were also ours but as a reference they were .97 a piece at Walmart.