Home Tour: The Canyon Kitchen
Looking at photos for this post took me on the best of walks down memory lane. Canyon was the first house we bought, and we bought it in April of 2012 while Colton was in the middle of a pretty hairy deployment in Afghanistan. We had been looking at homes for nearly six months, and had made a series of unsuccessful offers on a handful of places. This was the peak of the sight-unseen, all-cash-buyer madness, and we were somewhat disheartened with our fully financed, lower-end budget.
The Canyon home came on the market and we made a full price offer that day. Because of the time constraint and Colton’s lack of phone or Internet access, I had to make the offer (and eventually buy the house) without him ever seeing photos. Fortunately, we have the same list of must-haves in a home, so I felt relatively confident in my purchase.
The kitchen at Canyon was a series of small updates – refinishing the floors here, painting there, etc. – until January 2018 when we finally replaced the cabinets, countertops, and appliances.
Every time I stop by The Canyon Estate I’m reminded of just how much I love this house. There’s this classic, traditional warmth about it and the windows let the loveliest natural light in. I absolutely love living on the farm, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss living in Canyon sometimes.
A word on remodeling a rental property. It can be hard to weigh the pros and cons of spending money on a rental. Colton and I knew we never really wanted to sell Canyon, but instead would always have it as an investment property. For this reason, there are things I would love to do to this kitchen that just didn’t make sense financially (custom cabinetry to include a fridge, switching to gas appliances, opening up the window above the sink). If this was our primary residence, we may have considered doing more. But because it’s a short-term rental I couldn’t justify the expense with the lack of return - at least not for the time being. I’ve noticed that being intentional about what updates we’re making has made all the difference in net income on a property. It can be so hard to walk away from the potential I know a room has! But knowing I can better utilize that money elsewhere keeps me motivated to stick to a budget.
