Real Estate Investor Magazine South Africa December - January 2014 | Page 42

DIY

BY ANGIE REDMOND

Holiday Home Sprucing
Quick tricks to make your house sparkle

H

olidays are here, and while you might
be tempted to kick back in the garden
with a cold beer, there are niggling
thoughts of all the little home projects you
wanted to do but never quite got around to...
Never fear, even if that list is longer than your
New Year’s Resolutions. There are a few quick
and simple fixes that will have your spouse or
partner beaming with pride at your quick DIY
home sprucing.

Simple sprucing
With summer here one of the quickest ways
to get your home looking glorious is by paying
attention to the garden. Mow the lawn, rake
up old leaves, trim the hedges and then head
to your gardening store and buy some plants,
either potted or to plant. With just some simple
tidying and a few bright flowers, your garden
can go from drab to fab, and best of all you will
get some sun while making your garden shine.

Put some stripes in your bathroom
Your bathroom is the one room in the house
you cannot avoid being seeing by your guests.
So why not find a nice neutral colour which
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fits your scheme and paint vertical stripes on
the wall? It’s quick and easy and it will add an
instant wow factor to your previous stark white
walls. If your bathroom has tiles then leave a
white space above the tiles as a white stripe
and then start your stripes from there, this will
incorporate the tiles into the vertical colour
scheme and give your bathroom a very swish
look.

Sugar soap the walls
Walls get grimy over time, there is little you can
do to keep your walls in the same condition as
when you painted them, short of putting a layer
of plastic on them. What you can do to get them
looking close to just painted is get some sugar
soap and use it to give the walls a clean. It’s
cheap and can be found at any hardware store.
Just remember it is a chemical soap, so dilute
it before use and wear protective gear when
cleaning. You don’t have to hire a HAZMAT
suit, just wear some gloves and don’t get it into
your eyes or mouth.

Get rid of damp
If you have a damp problem anywhere in your
house, summer is the time to get rid of it! With

December January 2013/4 SA Real Estate Investor

the warmer weather you can dry and clean the
damp out before tackling the problem at the
root. Once you have gotten rid of the damp
it’s time for to damp proof the area and then
repaint. Not only will you get rid of the cloying
wet dog smell but also the unsightly spots of
mould will be a thing of the past!

Give it all a wash
If you are having the dreaded relatives over
and are NOT looking forward to the river of
criticism about your home, why not take the
words right out of Great Aunt Lucy’s mouth
and take down all the curtains and give them
a wash along with all the rugs. Another way to
get your home to sparkle is with carpet cleaner,
you can rent an industrial carpet cleaner for the
day and make sure your carpets don’t look like
a crime scene worth of CSI. It just takes a little
elbow grease and voila, clean, sweet smelling
carpets.
These simple and quick tricks to get your
home in order will let you start the New Year
off with a home that looks and feels great! By
tackling one task every few days, you can have a
holiday while getting things done.
www.reimag.co.z