The Carolina Contractor Show
The Carolina Contractor Show
Reimagining Home Spaces: The Art and Science of Renovation
Renovation or rebuild? That's the question many homeowners face when their current space no longer meets their needs. In this episode, Donnie and E break down the fundamentals of home renovation, sharing insider knowledge that helps you make informed decisions about transforming your living spaces.
The kitchen remains renovation central for most homeowners, but approaches have evolved. Rather than gutting everything, strategic updates to cabinets, countertops, and backsplashes can deliver dramatic results without breaking the bank. Small changes like hardware upgrades or cabinet painting offer budget-friendly alternatives, though Donnie cautions that even seemingly minor updates can add up quickly when multiplied across an entire kitchen.
Master bathroom renovations reveal fascinating shifts in homeowner preferences. The once-coveted soaker tub is rapidly losing popularity, with many choosing to replace these rarely-used fixtures with expansive walk-in showers. This transformation typically involves converting the tub area to a shower while repurposing the original shower space for additional storage – a perfect example of how renovations can improve both aesthetics and functionality.
Perhaps most surprising is the dining room revolution. As formal dining becomes increasingly rare in busy households, these spaces often sit unused. Creative homeowners are converting dining rooms into valuable additions: extra bedrooms that boost home value, expanded kitchen areas with island seating, or oversized pantries that keep countertops clutter-free. These adaptations reflect evolving lifestyle needs while maximizing every square foot.
For exterior updates, deck renovations deliver exceptional return on investment. Donnie shares a brilliant hack from a viral Instagram post: flipping weathered deck boards to expose the less-damaged underside, then sanding and sealing for several more years of life. It's this kind of practical, money-saving advice that makes renovation accessible to more homeowners.
Whether you're considering minor updates or contemplating a complete rebuild, this episode provides the guidance you need to approach your project with confidence. Visit thecarolinacontractor.com to connect with Donnie and submit your home improvement questions for future episodes.
Welcome to the Carolina Contractor Show with your host, General Contractor Donnie Blanchard. Let's talk about the elephant in the room, Donnie. Football season is back. It's an exciting time. It's the most wonderful time of the year, isn't it?
Speaker 2:It is man, I can't lie, this is my absolute favorite sport to watch on TV and I think they put us through baseball, baseball, a hundred and some games a season on purpose all summer, just to make football that much better.
Speaker 1:You're right, yeah, a hundred and a sixty two, sixty four games. So I do want to mention I don't like having to pay, and when they made NFL red zone have commercials and they tried to justify the commercials, I'm like that's it, I'm not going to do it. So I don't know if I can get this on camera without pulling out TV.
Speaker 2:Look what I bought. What in the world do you got there, rabbit ears, oh my gosh Old school, so a lot of people don't realize.
Speaker 1:With your HDTV you'll have an antenna plug-in point and that picks up those over the air HD channels and I got a first sweep. I got like six, next I got like 12 and now I got 26 channels. But I got all the networks and plus already have Amazon prime so I can watch Thursday night games, I can watch the college football on Saturdays, I can get Sunday games, I can get Monday night. I'm like I ain't paying a dollar and I got technology from the fifties Nice and I paid a $14 for that thing and it works like a charm. Your mileage may vary, but if you want to save some bills, buy a little UHF thing and you don't have to pay ESPN or red zone to watch their commercials.
Speaker 2:Best tip of the show E thank you for that.
Speaker 1:There you go, and and this isn't about technology for TV viewing and football it's the Carolina Contractor Show, and for those of you going, I can't see anything. Well, we do a YouTube show also. We will record the show and it's on the radio. We make it a podcast. We also put it up on our YouTube channel. Now, to make things simple, donnie made this website called thecarolinacontractorcom, and it has links to all our podcasts. It has links to the YouTube page, the Facebook page, the IG page which I'm going to get on in a minute and it gives you a basic idea of what we do. Donnie's a general contractor. I work in sales of construction materials, so we kind of know about your house, building it, renovating it which will be something else we'll discuss in a minute Upkeep, maintenance inside, outside, all sorts of stuff, and we just like talking about it, and hopefully you do too. Donnie also came up with this great thing called From the Construction Site to the Studio Mic, because basically, donnie, you just came from work, right?
Speaker 2:I did, I did. I don't understand how I sign myself up to do the show after hours. You know, I hit five o'clock and feeling like my brain is fried and somehow we muster up the mental energy to put it together every week. So thankful for that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's some work. It looks like it's all glory and wine and roses but there's a lot of stuff that goes on behind the scenes. But that website has everything you need. It also has a ask the contractor button. So if you have a question about your house, donnie is real good at answering those questions directly and we'll do some upcoming shows which we just answer a whole bunch of questions and rapid fire forum about your house Again, whatever it is, the inside, the outside, the roof house Again, whatever it is the inside, the outside, the roof, electrical plumbing we will do our best to answer it. But you got to start at thecarolinacontractorcom. Now I mentioned the YouTube page and the Facebook page. We also have an IG page. So if you just search the Carolina contractor show, you can find it. Kudos to Donnie. It is a team effort on our show.
Speaker 1:But Donnie put up a viral video. What three weeks ago, two weeks ago, two weeks ago? Well, he put up a video. It went viral. It's now got 264,000 views. We've got a lot of new people that have started following us. So welcome aboard. And this is a weird fact. Uh, and it's, this is a weird fact. You can see all the the uh specific stats of your video and your page, our IG page. 3% of our audience from down under Australia.
Speaker 2:At least they speak the same language. They can understand what we're saying. I wonder if they try to imitate our accent.
Speaker 1:Oh, they probably make fun of us, and I'm perfectly fine with that because we have a sense of humor.
Speaker 2:Exactly no a for clarity. I know a lot of people IG acronym for Instagram. So it seems like, out of all the popular social media sites, that Instagram is the one that promotes videos pertaining to what we do every day. You know, if you put something on Facebook, I think that's a generally an older audience, generally an older audience, and it's more about Facebook. I think it's more of like a um, uh, social place between people that want to air out their personal lives kind of thing, and I think Instagram is tailored more towards businesses. So if you want to get tips and tricks, you know that seems to be the place to go.
Speaker 2:And um, yeah, very grateful that everybody liked the video. And, uh, I waited for it to hit about 150,000. I told the homeowner. I said you have no idea that everybody in the world loves your video, so that really made her feel good. And, uh, we weren't even finished with the. Uh, we weren't finished with the bathroom completely, we were 98%. The only thing I hadn't done in that video, if you'll notice that I didn't add the crown to the top of the tower between the two sinks. And so my fiance that was the first thing she said well, where's the crown on the tower and I was like sweetheart. The video is great and you know, of course that's what she picks up with her critical eye, but, um yeah, everybody loved it. I was so thankful for the interaction and, you know, maybe now we figured out the recipe, so I'll try to do a lot more of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it was funny because some of the comments were exactly what the your fiance said Well, it would look better if it had crown. Well, it's not finished, Come on, just settle down everybody. But yeah, if you want to go check out the video, just search for the Carolina Contractor Show on Instagram Now, today. What we're going to talk about we'll see how far in the deets we can get with it is about renovating your house, and a little bit. Maybe renovating isn't the thing you need to do. You might have to do a whole new build and things you got to consider, but you do renovations, Donnie, right All the time, oh all the time.
Speaker 2:We love renovations. A lot of people are scared of those because oftentimes the homeowner lives there simultaneous when the work is being done. But you know, if you take the right approach and set the right expectations, renovations can go beautifully and and really you know, the transformation that you get at the end. Uh makes everything worthwhile. I think the major part of that recipe is having a good fit between the contractor and homeowner, but we've been fortunate enough to work with some really good people. Uh turned into be lifelong customers and friends, so that's good.
Speaker 1:And I guess there's a few things you have to consider before you're going to do a renovation or, if it's a new construction, is you've got to consider why are you doing it? I mean, obviously you want to make your place more comfortable to live. Maybe it's not functional. You need to take out a wall. Or you want to be able to see into the living room from your kitchen Aesthetics. You might just think that trim or that stairwell is plain old ugly and you want to change it. Or, as I like to say, do you want a new vanity because of your vanity? But it's pretty normal to look at your house and go man, it's not that this is a mistake, but I would like to change this or update it or fix some things and that's where the whole thing of renovation comes from and getting multiple estimates I guess this is obviously your wheelhouse. Donnie is finding a contractor who can not only do the work but handle the permits and the little things that a homeowner wouldn't know what to do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the threshold in North Carolina is still $30,000. So if the renovation is going to exceed $30,000, you're going to need somebody with a legit contractor license. I want to say the levels of the license are a half million for that. The lowest is now $750,000. They moved the intermediate to $1 million and then the unlimited is just that. So I think finding the right contractor not that you would need an unlimited for a renovation, but I guess in some cases that might work be the thing.
Speaker 1:But yeah, finding the right contractor with the right license limitation, getting an idea for your budget, I guess would be the starting point for that, and again for those of you watching on video uh, daisy, the, uh, the mascot of the show, once again, every time she hears your voice it seems like a joke by baby Um, she has to come and make a visit, so you, your voice, uh attracts the bees of the canine world.
Speaker 2:I've been a dog person all my life. I don't know what it is. We're going to build a house for an awesome couple. They listen to the show, shout out to Mitzi and Ron. I met with them yesterday and their dogs all approved of me, so I think that was a big part of the homeowner contractor acceptance process I had one of my dogs almost attack an ex-girlfriend and then when my wife met my dog, the dog loved all over.
Speaker 1:So I agree, Dogs can tell good people. So you talked about when you have a renovation. You need to have a good relationship with your contractor because you're going to become best buddies very quickly because they're going to be in your house all the time, depending on the scope of the renovation. And, Donnie, you own SureTop Roofing and getting a new roof for the most part is not very intrusive on a homeowner. When the process is going on there would be hammering and nailing and things like that. Maybe you hear a nail gun firing off, but for the most part it's all outside on top of your house. But if you're going to get your kitchen redone, your life is going to be greatly impacted and if you're going to get the master bathroom done, your personal life is going to be greatly impacted because those are longer processes and very intrusive. Is that something you prepare a client?
Speaker 2:for Absolutely A lot of times you're not able to do the work while they live in the house. If it's a kitchen or a master bath, it depends on their situation with their children. A lot of times you'll have a three bedroom house at a minimum, and they'll have another bedroom or another bedroom bathroom combo that they can use while you're doing the work. If it's a bathroom renovation similar to the one we just finished on the viral video that you mentioned earlier, but in a kitchen situation, they have to really be prepared. So we have a renovation going right now and it's a split level, so we're doing the downstairs, which is where their primary kitchen is. They do have an alternative upstairs to be able to have running water and everything, but what we did in that circumstance is they had a pipe burst, so downstairs on the slab flooded minor flood but still ruined the cabinets and everything.
Speaker 2:We set up a temporary sink and a coffee bar and some things like that. So you know, very bougie for a renovation, but uh, I would love to take credit for that. But Hannah and Matt actually thought of that and they said, hey, is there any way we can get running water down here, because they have three children and you know it's just not. It's not reasonable to to to have three kids in the house without some sort of uh, makeshift kitchen in place. So we did that and we actually had to. We just said the cabinet. So we had to pull that temporary sink, but we bought a utility sink, uh, from the plumbing supply house for about $150, you know, utility sink, faucet combo, and it was a very cheap thing to get them down the road so they could live in the house while we were doing the work.
Speaker 1:We're going to kind of focus on North Carolina, hence the name of the show, but some of these renovations are very popular nationwide. But I did a little research of what was popular in our beautiful North state. You're just talking kitchens. What are the common upgrades for renovations there?
Speaker 2:Really just cabinets and countertops. And if you're okay with the cabinet layout that you have, you could just do cabinet doors you know everything shaker style doors or what's in right now, but raised panel is what people did right up until that. So I still am a fan of both. I think it depends on the basically the style of the house. So a cheaper way to just do a minor makeover is just to do the drawer and cabinet door hardware but to get away from the cabinets. You know you, you get to the countertops and the backsplash.
Speaker 2:I think that's what makes a big change to the appearance of the kitchen. And really, you know, overall you could paint the cabinets if you wanted to keep existing and just do countertops and a backsplash, and just that changes the color scheme of the whole kitchen. So you know, there's so many ways to skin that cat. But I think one big thing that I like with the countertop folks that I use uh and they're local as well Um, they give you a sink with the countertops because they usually want to mount those undermount sinks to the countertops. They don't want a plumber coming in and giving it a whirl and doing it wrong. So, uh, with with mine, I'm going to change my countertops out eventually, but I really liked the fact that I can change my sink. I would have done it differently if I had put those on today, but, um, just a little added bonus there. But I think cabinets, countertops and backsplash are the big ones.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my wife and I have talked about doing a cabinet painting, which we would sand them and repaint them a different color and I looked at changing the hardware which we might. But I like the soft close hinges and that you mentioned about changing out your hardware is an easy little fix. You got to be prepared going in to buy even hardware, hinges and new handles and stuff, because they can get really expensive. The soft close hinges can be anywhere from three to five times more than your standard hinge for a cabinet and if you go into your kitchen and count how many cabinet doors you have and usually you have to multiply two hinges all of a sudden it adds up quick.
Speaker 2:I'll tell you a solution to that, and it's not always a solution, but we have bought more cabinet hardware on Amazon this year than ever before, and it's just like they. Every year they add more and more options and we've got hardware stores in Greensboro and in Raleigh that we can send homeowners to. But you know, everybody seems to be busy. And when you can get just about the same thing on Amazon and I'm not a supporter of buying things that are made in China, but once in a while, when it's your quality of life and if you have extra time versus ordering it right now and it'll be here before you wake up tomorrow sometime that's the easiest route.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I will never argue the expediency of something like that, but if you have old hinges you're trying to match, you gotta be careful. You gotta know your measurements to the 16th of an inch, cause if you even buy new hinges, if you don't know what you're doing, you can look at something oh, this is going to be the hinge that will match my other, and then you'll find out they don't match, they don't fit into the existing route. All sorts of things can happen. So it is good to have a contractor where you're doing that and that sounds like a small renovation, but the kitchen is the most popular one where you really get into it. Next would be the bathroom and your experience of a bathroom renovation. Is it a downstairs or an upstairs that's done the most?
Speaker 2:I'm talking a half bath versus a full oh full bath for sure. You know half bath basically just swap out the fixtures and a lot of times those half baths have, you know, a pedestal sink. So you really can't go back with much else besides a pedestal, because the plumbing is is coming out of the wall a different way behind a pedestal than it would if you had a vanity cabin. So you know you're kind of bound to that pedestal if that's what you had to start with. But uh, definitely, but definitely. Master bathroom remodels seem to be the most popular and I agree with that. If you're paying the house payment, then you should renovate the space that you use every day and maybe, if there's anything left over, give that to the visitors or the kids. And but yeah, the bathroom remodels seem to be the most popular out of the three.
Speaker 2:The main thing that everybody wants to do now is sort of like I know we'll get to the dining rooms later, but people are abandoning soaker tubs and dining rooms these days, so nobody wants to take a bath.
Speaker 2:I mean, you have a handful of people that want to take a bath and what I'm seeing the people that actually put a bathtub in a master bath renovation. They're usually like a clawfoot fancy tub. So it's something that's cast iron, you know, very heavy, and A lot of people still take baths the majority of the folks that reach out to us do not. So what we're doing now is taking those big soaker tubs that usually sit on a big tile base. We're pulling those out of there and we're putting a walk-in shower in place of that, and usually, where they had a three-by-three or even smaller walk-in shower in the master, we're turning that into just a bigger closet for the bathroom so they can put their linens in there. And that seems to be the swap the bathroom that went viral on Instagram. That's exactly what we did there, and I'll try to put another video up showing where we started and what we finished with. But that shower that you see in the video used to be where the soaker tub was.
Speaker 1:Well, let's jump to the dining room, because you make a good point. We have a dining room that can comfortably sit six, but with one kid in college and two older ones and a funky life schedule, it tends to hold things more than hold dinners. So there's a couple options people don't think about if you're going to renovate a dining room, what you can turn it into. Give them examples.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a big thing. When we did the TV show a couple years back, we basically renovated several smaller houses. I'd say seven out of the 10 episodes we had houses under 1,200, 1,300 square feet and a house that size is not very friendly to bedrooms and if you do have two or three bedrooms, they're usually small. One particular one that comes to mind is a house that it was two bedrooms, one bath and it had a big dining room and there was no point for the big dining room. And the dining room actually had a little inset which we turned into a closet. But all we did is basically frame the walls in and close the dining room in. We turned that inset into a full-blown closet with a door and cool thing was it turned that two bedroom into a three-blown closet with a door. And cool thing was it turned that two-bedroom into a three-bedroom. So it upped the value of the house by about $60,000 for about I don't know less than $2,000 or $3,000 worth of work. And you were going to put a floor in there. Anyway, it was just the walls, the drywall and the interior doors and trim. So there was that Another thing with a dining room, if it's uh, with sort of like the great room approach where it combines with the kitchen.
Speaker 2:There's no walls in between, you know. That gives you the possibility to expand your cabinets in there and do what they call an eat-in kitchen. Uh, that seems to be a popular thing these days because everybody congregates around an Island, so the big island with the wraparound countertop and barstool space. That's a popular thing. And I would say the only thing that I've done other than that is close that dining room in to make a massive pantry. So people seem to not want things on their countertops these days, meaning toaster ovens, coffee makers and you turn a dining room into a pantry and it basically gets all the clutter off of your counter, which I kind of like. That I wish we did sit down and have more dinners where everybody sat across the table and did that sort of thing, but with busy lives and separate schedules, that's just not realistic.
Speaker 1:No, but I think it's a fantastic idea to. If you have a multi-level house and you don't want to sell it as you get older, you can add that bedroom into a lower room in the house. It's not utilized. We have a dining room. We have an even larger what we call playroom that could easily be a master bedroom. It's so big through a conversion and maybe people are hesitant right now to go. I don't know if I want to make it turn my dining room, maybe someday. What about holiday? No, go ahead and do it. Trust me, it's a. It's a great idea to take advantage of all that floor space.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree 100%.
Speaker 1:All right, uh, not everybody has a basement. Uh, some people do. And converting a basement into a livable space, instead of just leaving it block, wall or something, you could make it a great room, a cool room, a man cave, you could make it a recording studio even, but you definitely would add value to the overall square footage of the house and you've done that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely you. You totally get credit for any kind of heated and cooled square footage, whether it be basement, uh, or you know, if you finished out, turned a garage even, or an old carport into a living space, you know you still get credit for that on a sale by the square foot. And, um, what I did is, uh, I built my house in 2011, I believe, and then, right around 2015, um, decided to uh go ahead and start the renovation, so did this massive clean out, and it was pretty cool because my kids were tiny and we just kind of shove them in the basement, let them just bump into walls and do whatever they wanted to do. And about 2015, they got old enough where they could take care of something a little nicer. So, um, I sat on a bucket in a corner of my basement and thought, what can I make where? And, uh, basically had a little 10 by 10 that I turned into a, a secondary office, and then I left the main area open like a sort of like a great room concept. And, um, of course, I went to App State, so I made a mountain theme and I did all wood walls with pine walls, uh, tongue and groove walls, and I dressed it out with cedar around the doorways and the casings.
Speaker 2:But cool thing we did is designated the back room, which is about maybe 13 by 15, into a movie room. So I don't have one of those fancy theater, movie theater rooms with the staggered seating and the stepped up everything. But you know there's a bathroom off that room, so it's all one level and we just basically have a sectional couch and a recliner in there and a great big TV. But I went all dark and so dark carpet, dark walls, and then I had my brick mason come in and he basically built a stone archway. So we continued the stone archway around the back wall of the kitchen and the backsplash and man, I'll put some pictures up.
Speaker 2:I try not to put the personal stuff out there, but it is really cool and it definitely has a mountain feel. But we have a small kitchenette with a sink and a refrigerator and ping pong pool tables. And I guess my favorite and not always, but I'm trying to do better is that we had one room that was about 30 feet by about 12 feet wide and it was just long, awkward and narrow and we turned that into a gymnasium. So I have this App State-themed weight room and traded out a lot of things in the weight room a lot of equipment, dumbbells and that sort of thing with someone for some roof work a while back, so kind of got lucky there. But we've got this black and yellow room with all the App state memorabilia. We've got commercial grade carpet in there, so you can't really hurt that and, um, you know, the stereo and the TV, so it's a good place to go jam out. And only thing about that is when you get home, last thing you want to do is more work. So you gotta be motivated.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that definitely is the case. Now that's a lot of the inside parts of a house. We're going to talk exteriors and things you can renovate on the outside of a house. This is the Carolina Contractor Show. I'm going to quick go over the curb appeal stuff which I guess can qualify as a renovation depending on how deep it goes. But we talked about in past shows that people can go listen to, about return on investment the ROI. Stone veneers give you a good ROI, change the front of your house instantly. So does siding and paint. We've talked about that a lot. Garage door replacement has always been a super high ROI, but the more I thought about it and consciously looked at houses that had nice garage doors and nice framing, it really can make a house look a lot more regal than it is or than it was looking before. But a big thing would be to me, whether it's wood or composite, is wood deck or composite deck additions to a house. You come across those a lot.
Speaker 2:Donnie, yeah for sure, and I think the reason is they wear out, and not so much the composite as the wood, but 80% of the decks out there, or more, are treated lumber and you know, heaven forbid it be on the North side of the house, which was my scenario at the personal house, and of course, five years, six years, in that treated would look terrible, and so you either have to really try hard to maintain the treated, uh, and babysit that thing year to year, or just go composite and forget about it.
Speaker 2:And of course there's different grades of composite. We could get into that, but I won't, and that's that we. We hear that oftentimes we put a video up on the Instagram, and I hate to circle back to that with all this, but did you see the one about? It was a lady and she took her time and went basically took up all the screws and flipped the deck boards. Yep, brilliant, I thought so too, and that's about the cheapest, smartest way to do a deck renovation. If you can't afford to go composite and you want to get another four to five years out of your existing deck, just flip the deck boards and put the screws in there and stain that baby and call it a day.
Speaker 1:I agree, and it might not be quite as simple because you might have some curved boards, but still the overall idea is the majority of them will flip. You'll be able to screw them right back into the joist, sand it, stain it, seal it and maybe even get more than five years. But yeah, kudos to her, I thought that was good. Um, also like a grilling stations I know are big and and fire pits and stuff. You get those occasionally too, I'm sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, yes, I do. And I just finished a house insanely awesome house and I can't wait when they, when they get moved in, we're going to clean her up and take some professional pictures, but it's about 7,000 square feet just under that. And, um, the, the homeowner and I forged a heck of a friendship and he, he's awesome, just a go getter, I mean, one of the hardest working guys I know, but just a good family man. On top of that. I have encouraged him to take up grilling and I said, dude, you know you're not going to be in the city limits anymore. You're going to spend a ton of money eating out and it's going to take you a lot of time to do it. I encourage you to get a grill.
Speaker 2:So he goes out and buys this badass grill Excuse my grill, excuse my language, but buys a nice one. He works hard, he deserves it. And the one thing I said is we have stamped concrete on the back patio there. I said, please invest in a grill mat. It's 30 bucks on Amazon. A grill mat goes under there. And he says I got a grease trap. I said, dude, don't trust the grease trap because it'll overflow. You're either going to babysit or just get some cheap insurance. So if you do the grill station on the deck, you know, grab one of those grill mats for 30, 20 or 30 bucks off of Amazon and you won't regret it.
Speaker 1:So another thing with renovations comes design trends. We're not going to spend a lot of time on it because that's a personal preference, but I'm sure as a contractor it's fun to talk with people. We one time put up the video from the notebook where he's going what do you want? She's like I don't know and I'm sure you've lived that movie scene many times, so you weren't actually telling her or yelling at the client. But we've done shows on energy efficient systems and we've done several shows on smart tech. That's a big thing.
Speaker 1:When you're renovating you have a chance to upgrade, changing window sizes that's really popular when people come into our store and they want new windows, or talking with a contractor about opening it up. More Painting I'll get into that later this year, some changes and stuff that I'll be doing. But painting new colors, broad colors Talk about a cheap renovation is painting a room or, as I said, changing your kitchen cabinet, sanding them, painting them, sealing them. There's paints by, like Benjamin Moore that are specifically designed for cabinets and and wood design that looks really, really good if you want to do it. Uh, we talked again about kitchen stuff you can do. But when I mentioned renovation at the beginning of the show Donnie I also talked about. You could come across situations that are going to be more than renovation, and are there a few examples you can give or something for people to remember whether they should be renovating or maybe just starting almost over from scratch?
Speaker 2:Yes, several Um. One of the things that come to mind that I've experienced before is that if you know you, you love your house, but it's outdated. That's renovation all day long, because you can upgrade the house even though the layout may be dated as well. You can blow walls out. A lot of those older homes. The bones are so strong that you have to find the load bearing walls and get an engineer involved and that may cost you $700 to $1,000, but it's well worth it because it completely changes the look of the house. A lot of times a contractor will be able to tell you that without an engineer, but that's a good starting point if you have an older house.
Speaker 2:There's one other circumstance where you have a good location but you don't love the house. I definitely think that's renovation as well, and in that circumstance, if it doesn't fit your family, you could always do an addition. What I find when we do additions a lot of times is they'll want to, we'll get into the addition and they love the addition so much. They say we want this theme throughout the house. So we go in, take out all the old doors. We, you know, match all the doors in the casing and we basically repeat that, that theme throughout.
Speaker 2:If you don't love the house or the location, that's a scenario where that's a new build all the way and not going to get in your way. If you want to do that, bring it on, but a lot of times there's an older house that a remodel is going to require major, major surgery and structural changes. I think that's a scenario where that's a new build all the way as well. So stay where you are if you can and if you like the location. You know I love my house but I'm pretty far from civilization and so if I had to change one thing, I'd like to pick this house up and put it, you know, maybe five miles outside the city limits, but that's not always a luxury. So if you got a nice house, you got a nice lot and it fits your family, school district and that sort of thing, then I think remodel will will do the trick.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm definitely in that camp of. I'm very content with the location I live in, the neighborhood I'm in, and I don't have any big issues with the house. But you do want to sit there and make changes and improve the house and so I'd I'd be a renovation target and, uh, nothing major, like I don't want to add a third floor or, you know, add on a new room. I mean maybe a glass in the screen porch so you can sit out there in cold or rainy weather and drink coffee and enjoy it year round. But I mean so many options and people get scared when they think renovation. They think, oh, this is going to cost me $150,000.
Speaker 1:And there's so many things. When you hire a general contractor, like Donnie Blanchard, for example, that can come in and say, no, we can make some incredible renovations for a lot less than you think and all it's going to do regardless is increase the value of your home. So of course, you make the renovation because you like it. But there's a win-win situation right there with a renovation. You think you're ready to be your own contractor, yet E, no, I don't have the, uh, I haven't had the liquid courage yet to uh, take that next step?
Speaker 2:Oh, come on. You know, last month was our seven year anniversary doing the show, or it's a seven year anniversary, I know? And you didn't even give me a car. Well, it was that we started the show, or I started the show in August of 2018. So you and I got together in January of 2019. So we still have our anniversary I'll. I'll remember the card, don't worry. All right, I like flowers too.
Speaker 1:Just just just saying. But we thank everybody, by the way, as the show is is grown and leveled out and then all of a sudden, it's taken off again. We've got hundreds and hundreds of new followers. We really appreciate that, especially you down under in Australia and South Africa, who knew 1% of the audience is South Africa. We're worldwide I guess I should say that and I'm the and what's my IG name? World's famous, world's most famous DJ. And now I can say that's true, I'm in different continents for this show. So check out the IG page, the YouTube channel where we put these shows up. Also download them podcast for me and find all the details at the website that Mr Blanchard has assembled, thecarolinacontractorcom.
Speaker 1:And again, we just thank everybody for tuning in and helping the show expand. It's not because we really deserve it. You guys just like what we do and we appreciate that. You tell us things you'd like us to talk about, and that's what we try to do every week. Absolutely Appreciate it, guys. All right, and we will see you next week on the Carolina Contractor Show. Have a great day everybody. Thanks for listening to the Carolina Contractor Show. Visit thecarolinacontract.