Do you periodically change how your home is decorated, or has it been mostly the same for decades?
I haven’t moved a thing myself in years. The freight trains passing by do that for me. I like where the floor lamp is now.
Not what I expected, but I love it
In our first house, things changed regularly because it was old and we were remodeling. Eventually, we remodeled every room. Even after everything was remodeled, I think we repainted the bedroom and the living room. My wife would change out decor at random times. She would just randomly get sick of a picture or a piece of furniture and replace it, while that stuff was never even on my radar.
We built a new house about three years ago and we've changed the kitchen and dining room light fixtures three times and the living room set once (all of which were brand new when we moved in). We have rearranged the room we call her "glam room" (we used one spare bedroom to install a make up counter, hollywood mirror, shelf a wall for shoes, etc). Sometimes I find it irritating, but it seems important to my wife to change these things out from time to time. I give zero fucks about it. I know if she wanders into the living room at 8:30 pm after being on her iPad for a few hours and starts a conversation with, "So....hey..." it means that my weekend is going to be fucked and there will be a project that is her idea but requires my work.
And while I may be griping a little here, I want to be clear that I love my wife and she is patient with me when I do stuff that she thinks is unimportant or dumb. Like getting drunk and buying a Corvette on eBay. Or rearranging the garage to fit more tools. Or buying another Corvette randomly and having it shipped up from Texas, site unseen. You get the idea.
I’m falling out of my chair laughing. Getting drunk then buying a Corvette online shopping makes my drunk shopping completely insignificant by comparison!
It is definitely not a normal thing. Ha ha
It all worked out. Got to load my dad up in my truck with a trailer and cannonball to PA for the car. I told my wife that someday my dad will be gone and I’d spend 2x that amount of money to spend the time with him again. It kind of became a thing for us. He came with me to get another Vette at a different time. The last one was the Z06 I shipped up, so he didn’t come along that time.
Good god I think I used to be married to you, or your drunken Ebay Corvette-buying clone. We had an an amicable divorce during which I asked "Hey can I have the red Corvette?" and was told "NO" so I cried a bit and got a radial arm saw as a consolation prize.
Only been married once and we are still together. Pretty crazy that there are more people like me out there though.
I love this! Marriage goals.
Holy crap! We've had a lot of stuff delivered after a couple 4,5 drinks. The rule in our house is: Never drink and Prime. But a corvette? Wowzer!!
As long as it doesn’t jeopardize family finances, it’s all good. You only live once. Life isn’t a dress rehearsal
I'm the OP who asked, because I just realized I've had mostly the same set of art prints on my wall for decades. I've bought a few new ones over the years but mostly it's the same old prints and I will, maybe once a decade, move them around to a new room.
Knickknacks too, they are mostly the same old items for years and years and years. And furniture as well. I'll hire someone to repaint the interior every now and then and though I do change the colors, nothing too wild.
I'm just wondering if this is normal.
I've changed things like furniture because I no longer like the pattern or that it just looks shabby due to kids/pets.
Pictures and knickknacks I tend to keep. I did some culling of old books but really didn't get rid of many due to sentimental value. Thanks to an abundance of online resources, I really don't need or use books from the 1980s, yet there they are on the shelf.
You reminded me that after 15 years, I did get tired of my (fairly cheap, but I like the table and set) kitchen chairs and had them reupholstered.
I change my decorative things out periodically and give my old stuff to my children. It's fun to be video chatting with one of them and seeing a print from my 1995 collection hanging over their shoulder.
Refreshed paint, some wall hangings, area rugs, and some furniture. Fairly easy to do stuff. Changing the prints is a great idea and easy.
For me it would be totally normal!
Both. Get rid of things I stop enjoying. Keep what I love. Change the easy/inexpensive things fairly often — stuff like duvet cover, throw pillows. Repaint every five years or so. I really like and use a lot of color and sometimes my vibe changes a bit.
Saw a picture of our dogs from fifteen years ago recently. Our living room looked totally different because we’ve painted twice, gotten new windows and window treatments, replaced sectional, have more plants, and made art we’ve collected into gallery wall. Added items I love I received when my gran passed a few years ago. (I’m mid fifties now— she was almost 100 when she died.) Have art from all grandparents up now.
I have way too much art that I love and not enough wall space for all of it.
No, the walls haven't been painted since we moved in 22 years ago. There has been one new couch and 2 new chairs in that time because the old ones which used to belong to my parents wore out.
Oh! yes I bought a new couch and lazy boy rockers after using the old ones for 15 years with all my grandchildren.
They were pretty beat up but still.....I rocked every baby in Grandma's comfy green chair.
The wall decor stays prett consistent but I do like to rearrange. Or as my husband calls it "hide things from him."
I am a man, I do what my wife wants in regard to decoration.
Wisdom.
I rearrange the furniture and switch out accessories now and then (maybe 1-3 times a year, but I don't do it on a schedule). I paint a room when I get tired of the color, maybe every 5 years or so. New furniture when the old wears out.
I’m a creature of habit. I find the right spot for my furniture and it stays there for decades. I update the trinkets and do dads once in a while.
Because we have two big dogs, we need to get a secondhand couch every few years.
When things wear out or we can upgrade, we’ll do that too.
We’ll also switch the art around from time to time.
Because we had 4 feral kids, we needed to get a new secondhand couch every few years.
Edit to add: feral at home, well behaved in public or left home with a parent. There are rules for behavior at home that are quite different from public, and my kids are climbers.
What happens to the things that rotate out?
I've lived in this house for 23 years. After getting divorced ~5 years ago I did a huge purge and repainted and rearranged pretty much every room; I replaced some fixtures and totally redid a bathroom. I got rid of some furniture, but I didn't buy any new furniture, just rearranged it. I found pictures from an appraisal that was done about ~20 years previously, and my main floor still looked exactly the same, so I guess it was about time to change it up!
Our house is not "decorated." That, to me, sounds like the sort of hollow, meaningless room-dressing I would expect to find in a hotel or a doctor's office—by somebody who has gone to some soulless "home decor" store and bought a bunch of fashionable, mass-produced trinkets and whatnot.
Rather, our house is where we display the art that we find, whether from our travels, from antique stores, from estate sales, or wherever. It is constantly changing. When we find a new piece and we need to determine where it goes, we usually end up moving a bunch of other things to establish a new balance. Pieces migrate, and everything has a story.
Sometimes we buy a new piece of furniture, or replace an old one. That prompts a similar re-visioning. A major change was buying a baby grand piano, which required a significant rearrangement of a big room. My constant accumulation of books creates some issues, because they need to go somewhere, so there are more bookshelves than there used to be.
So the whole thing evolves. But we're probably weird. People come over and they say, "Your house is like a museum!" Which we enjoy. There is always something to talk about. Or, if you're not particularly engaged in the conversation, there is something else to look at.
I have changed it up a lot. For the first adult decade we were poor and had little. When we finally both got through school we bought inexpensive stuff. It needed replacing soon. The slightly better stuff we bought in the 80s didn't last 30 years.
When we were finally in a position to really redecorate and buy what we wanted, we'd barely started when my husband died.
And there I was after the grieving, left to start thinking about what I wanted instead of what would work for everyone. I'd married so young and worked so hard to be a good compromiser and I had no idea how to just please myself.
It's been over a decade now and my late husband would hate this place, though I think he'd be happy I grew and changed.
Sorry your husband passed young, that's rough.
I remember how I really thought I was an adult in my mid 30s when most of my furniture was made of real wood: dressers, bed stands, side tables, bookshelves. I think I only have one pressed wood self-assemble furniture now, a little table in the office.
Too expensive to redecorate.
And decorate what home? Like this is so hard to read as a younger generation lol
I don't but my partner is really into the stuff. We gutted the house and remodeled it. Now she is going to paint my son's room after he moved out.
If it were all up to me, I'd just leave it alone but she gets into decorating and all that. Before we met, I had a "guy house". There's nothing wrong with a set of Ludwig rockers (drum kit) in the living room, ya know. :-)
No I change periodically. I get tired of one color, then change things. It’s blue right now and I’ll leave it like this for a while.
My wife changes things consistently.
We have redecorated every 5 years approximately with fresh paint and replacing furniture as required or desired. We collect art so that has always been updated and currently have more than 80 canvases/paintings on our walls and numerous statues. We are now starting to divest our home to simplify our lifestyle. Never liked chukka so we don’t have china figurines or dust collectors.
What do you do with the art that's not on display? Do you still keep it, or some of it, to maybe display later? Or donate it?
We have given away to family members and a few close friends. We do have a group we plan on donating in the future. We don’t own priceless art but we do our best to support the artist community and have always collected since our dating days, many, many years ago (married over 35 years now).
This is the last piece of art I bought to display, late last year.
It is at the end of the upstairs hallway, between two bedrooms, and above the cats' eating area.
If you can believe it, my friends advised me not to get it. It is obviously a masterpiece of art, though!
Now that made me smile! Glad you got it.
It should only bring you joy.
Totally the same, lived in my place for 18 years, have 1 picture on a wall in my office, ha
I've only lived in this house for 10 years, and it's largely the same, furniture-wise. But the art on the walls, the throw rugs, the throw pillows and comforters change over time. I'm actually getting ready to paint my kitchen and bathroom. Way overdue on that one.
I move my artwork around, update my pillows and occasionally look on Facebook marketplace to change my furniture. I just bought 8 black dining room wooden chairs for $130! I also paint 1-2 rooms a year.
I try to make sure my paint and furniture are pretty neutral. I can change out the curtains, throw pillows, rug, etc. rearrange the furniture and it seems like a whole new place on the cheap.
We used to re-arrange/update periodically but that's slowed down because:
- It's harder to move things around as you age/gain disabilities.
- Don't really need new stuff. Kids are long enough into adulthood and have been on their own a good number of years. So stuff lasts longer and with less people in the house on a daily basis, there's a surplus of furniture.
It's more the ship of Theseus approach at this point. Things do change, but rarely a major reshuffle.
- New grandkid pics as they age.
- Wife is an artist, so the artwork does change out as she produces more.
- This decor is wearing out/looks dated. We'll swap it out.
Things change slowly rather than all at once. We're also in a 100+ yr old house, so vintage works.
I would like to change but can’t because it’s expensive and takes energy to do so and I am broke and tired.
I find comfort in a print being in the same place for decades, honestly. It hasn't happened to me yet but I look forward to that. I like to observe how sometimes the mood changes with lighting or season.
I also like the idea of being able to close my eyes and imagine my home down to every detail.
Yes, I bring in new things from time to time but I don't like the idea of changing everything.
My wife redecorates and paints constantly. I told her she could have never married a blind man because he would be walking into furniture all the time. As soon as you learn the layout, it changes.
We’re always tweaking it! Plus my husband loves to rearrange the furniture on the regular, to “change the energy” as he puts it. Always reminds me of this Far Side cartoon XD
Same for decades.
Been the same for years. It’s comfortable and I really don’t care if a visitor thinks my furnishings are dated or worn. If someone has those thoughts, when they leave, that’s their problem.
We don't change anything unless it's actually necessary. We're not as much into a style as we are being comfortable.
There’s no furnace in my house. Main heat is a wood stove. LR furniture gets moved back for winter, away from the intense heat, and to make room for firewood and accessories. When it warms up I put the winter things away, clean and rearrange for spring/summer and install the window a/c units. One day I’ll be too old for all of this but I enjoy the seasonal rituals.
Sold it to downsize. Totally new.
It depends.
I have my furniture and table from 1999. The table still looks good and is my living room table. My furniture is fully made of wood and serves now my 2.5 year old as clothing,toy shelf .
I had until 4 years ago the bedroom of my 2001 passed grandma. It was ok.
Currently I had everything else renewed from the stuff I did not mention above. Just because I wanted or the opportunity was there to get a cheap buy from stuff I wanted (it was a walnut living room shelf which was cool 2019 but 7500 euros. And then they sold the showcase in 2022 for 3500...still expensive but I thought ok Will last for 20 years now)
I don't think I'm going to replace any furniture except the couch if it wears out until I move. I'm in a two-story townhouse now, in my early 50s. By the time I reach my 70s I want to move in a single-story place as stairs already scare me. I've personally known someone who died falling down the stairs when she was otherwise healthy and in her early 70s.
So when I move to the new place, I am planning to somehow get rid of much of my furniture that I don't love, and start fresh in the new place. That way I don't have to pay to move it, and will have new (or 'new' but used) things.
I am not very much in to decorating. I have thought about but not actually repainted any of the walls from the vague ecru the developer left us. The closest I've come to that is hanging up curtains, and the choice in those was made based off the cheapest Amazon had among the colors I liked. Add in the mostly young children still at home and my general disinclination to spend money replacing the couch they tore up with another for them to do the same anew, my style at this point is best described as thrift store chic. I might care when I'm an empty-nester, but I doubt it. There's always something more interesting to work with. Maybe if I worked with paint instead of yarn I'd have done something about these walls.
I rearrange the furniture every now and then, buy new pieces and discard old ones. Same for paintings and decorative items.
I'm currently planning, in my mind because I'm not at home for several days, how to rearrange my living room after I discarded one of my two sofas. It will entail moving all the remaining furniture and rugs around, as well as the pictures on the walls. I might even decide to paint an accent wall.
We don’t really change it much for redecoration. We make changes as needed, to add art or keepsakes, and replace used up furniture. We got a new very active dog in December, that forced us to pick up and declutter and organize. I wish I had the decorator touch, I love good design and layout and bright colors, I have a folding file full of ideas clipped from magazines. But to make it happen in reality is screamingly tedious, my partner dislikes the process, and it usually looks worse after I finish or my ideas don’t quite work. This last rearrangement of the living room for Mr Dog actually works really well, I have hope for future projects. Let’s not talk about the books I had to box up and stash all through the house, my recipe folder is still missing.
We’re older and it has dawned on us that the look we’ve arrived at over a number of years is rather “Grandma’s house”. Lots of antiques, original art in gold or dark wood frames. Gingham wing chairs! We’re thinking of making changes.
We bought a second home to live in temporarily while away for medical treatment and it required complete furnishing. We tackled it on the cheap, hitting up garage sales and such. It’s an entirely different look for us and we like it enough to consider moving in that direction when we’re back in our forever home. But we can’t see tossing inherited family antiques or favorite art, so it may come down to new fabric, new paint and a fresher, cleaner, brighter, more contemporary, less cluttered look.
Yes, I actually just redid most of the house.
Oh, it's almost entirely the same as when I bought the place 23 years ago.
OTOH, it's an urban lofty-style townhouse with a floorplan that would only allow a couple of configurations, and we know what we like. We've swapped furniture in a few places, though.
We have had the same general manner of decorating all our lives. Yes, occasionally a painting is changed out or we buy a new couch or chair. Neither one of us is really big on decorating so it’s nice but basic. We have friends and relatives who regularly change things up and have seasonal decorations that come out as the seasons change. That’s just not important to us. Different strokes, I guess.
I rearrange my furniture at least four times a year. I have a small living room with three doors and a fireplace, and I am never happy with it. I will get a new idea in my head and move everything. Or I get a new piece of furniture and have to rearrange to make it fit.
Omg glad you asked. I change everything CONSTANTLY. My house gets redecorated all the time because I think I like something then one day… I don’t. I look around at other peoples houses and I wonder how the heck they can stand the same old decor year after year.
I'll ask what I ask others: what do you do with decor that you swap out?
I donate everything to thrift stores. I know. It’s dumb. I’m wasting a lot of money. But it’s a compulsion and I’m trying to do better!
When I do a major declutter every five or so years, I donate tons of stuff to charity thrift stores. Sometimes it's new, expensive stuff that hasn't been opened, like if I get Christmas presents from my Dad of things I don't need. Or clothes with labels still on them as I don't know how, but I can buy clothes and then by the time it's at home decide I don't really want to wear it.
For a while I held off, saying that I would sell it on ebay or Facebook marketplace or at a yard sale or something. It took about five years of me telling myself this to finally admit that I wasn't going to sell it, and then just donating it.
It brings comfort.
The grandkids know it's Grandmas house.🤗
I (63F) have moved every 2-3 years since 2016, so I change things up fairly often.
:) Not quite. We lowball Greek villa rentals on VRBO and AirBnB. Pay cash and stay for 2 year stints.
My wife does. Spring, Fall, Xmas. She has even taken pictures so she knows where to put things so they match up with previous years.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
We will be remodeling and replacing the furniture soon. It will be the last time that I do it.
I plan to give the house and contents to my kid. He will have a lot on input on the changes. It's a 100 year old house so there's a lot to learn, and he might as well start now.
I'm a single guy and no, AFAIK none of my furniture has moved in the last 15 years.
Well, except I did bring 2 chairs in to the dining room table from the porch table last Christmas, I guess they should go back out now that the weaher's warming. ( ͡ᵔ ͜ʖ ͡ᵔ)
I don't change it that much. Constantly redecorating is expensive. A lot of us don't have money to spend on things like that though it would be nice. I just tried to buy classic pieces that don't really go out of style that much and though I do get bored with them? I can't really spend on decor that much.
I've just renovated my kitchen. My dining set doesn't go well - it's the wrong colour. But its a really good set, if out of style (everything was oak then - ugh). The finish is still perfect but I think I'll have to paint it or refinish. Painting would be easier and faster I think but I know it'll look awful in 5 years if I do it.
I redid the rec room about 5 years ago. But I have had the same taupe in my main rooms for probably 20 years. I like the colour so I'm keeping it, but I'll do some walls the same as my new kitchen colour for fun. I plan to paint my bathroom soon. I could do with a full reno there but it's not desperate yet and there are other things to prioritze. We replaced the plumbing about 15 years ago I think.
And our bedroom needs fresh paint. But I can't move the furniture. This modern crap is so big and heavy being all mdf with a thin veneer. ugh. I will need a lot of help and I think I'd get a new floor in there while I'm at it.
And all the doors and trim need to be repainted. I started about 11 years ago. My granddaughter got dropped off to be watched for an emergency and I put my stuff away halfway through a door and that was that. Time flies when you're old and tired.
I luckily managed to refresh my dining room set a few years back with just reupholstering the chairs. Well, having someone else do it. That helped a lot.
I changed until I was able to get stuff I love, and since I love it, I keep it.
Great subject! We used to laugh about a TV commercial with the wife complaining to the husband that "Our living room is so Y2K!" Heck, our living room still is, and that commercial was on years ago!
It evolves and changes to my whim. I'm not really trendy, it's more of what is easy, practical and beautiful. I don't want to spend my days dusting, and there is so much art in this world, that life is too short to look at the same work, in the same place, in the same lighting. Sometimes I find a small or simple touch of decor that I really like, and that requires re-arranging the entire room. But then I'll keep the other rooms the same for a while.
Mostly the same for decades I however, switch furniture around from time to time.
Sometimes, after I move, I shuffle things here and there until I figure out where I really want them. After that, they stay where they are for literal decades.
I've come to realize over the years that I am not someone who requires novelty for enjoyment in most areas of my life. Food and entertainment being two notable exceptions.
We replace furniture on occasion. We've been in our current place for 13 years; that's the longest we've lived anywhere in 35 years of marriage.
We're currently deciding on moving.
I change my decor: spring (March-May), fall/Halloween (October/November) and Christmas (December/mid-January). I don’t change pictures or furniture. Just the stuff on my mantel and sideboard, dining room table, coffee table, entertainment center.
My mantle still has Christmas decorations up.
I don’t change my decor..! My taste has changed about every 10 years or so for 50 years. Eventually it’s just blended together. We just reno’d the kitchen, got new flooring and carpeting, but just basically put all of our stuff right back where it was. Who can afford to toss everything and buy new? I have been asked what my style is and the best answer I can come up with is 21st century clutter lmao. It’s comfortable, it’s my stuff.
21st century clutter
This is definitely a style and the name should become more in use, as it describes a lot of homes I've seen, ha!
I knew a couple who redecorated their living room every December
We've been in our place for 7 years, only the bedrooms and kitchen are decorated
I don't do major things like flooring, though a flood forced me to do that and more. However, I do switch things out like furniture and bedding often. I'm always on the lookout for pieces that fit a space better, are more efficient, or are of much better quality.
When I moved into my current house, I sold just about everything to make the move easier and cheaper. I picked cheap stuff that I needed until I could find the things that fit my style, space, and budget. For example, I used a hand-me-down dining table as my desk until I could find the "perfect" desk.
I plan on moving to a single-story house or condo or something when I'm nearly 70, to get away from stairs. And I've thought it would probably be easier to downsize and get rid of all but my favorite furniture pieces, which would be pretty old by then, and just buy new.
This is exactly what I did, kept only my favs.
Antiques have always been my thing so I’ve taken my time since moving in 9 years ago and waited for the perfect pieces to fill it up. It gave me the time to live in the space and figure out how I’d really use the place.
I’m horrible with stairs and bought with that in mind too. Condo living is nice because there’s no outside maintenance and the HOA is reasonable. The whole development is 2story building spread out, 1 up 1 down, not a high rise. I love it. I did want to murder the guy upstairs for flooding my place, but got over it quickly and it allowed me to update nearly everything.
My friend lives on like the 19th floor of his condo, and also got flooded. Seems kinda crazy to get flooded up that high, but some vandals got in and busted pipes or something.
It was not fun, my sympathies to your friend.
My neighbor had a problem with his toilet at about midnight, didn’t want to wake anyone up and also didn’t know where his water shut-off was. I woke up around eight AM to water pouring from the hall and bathroom ceilings and ran outside in a T-shirt to shut his water off. Eight hours of water coming down and he offered to lend me some towels. I told him the damage was a bit too much for towels, no idea how I kept my cool.
Whether vandals or idiot neighbors, it sucks.
I moved a lot in my earlier years. Typically, a new residence meant new decor. We bought our current house 15 years ago. Other than buying new living room furniture 10 years ago, nothing much has changed since we moved in. I’m too old and tired to care anymore. It looks fine.
When I was younger I used to change things out seasonally and repaint every couple of years. I don't do that anymore except for Christmas time. DH and I realized the other day, we haven't painted the living since 2007
While I don’t change things as often as I did when I was younger, I still update things. We built houses in 2009 and 2018, so there were lots of changes and new purchases. I don’t plan on any furniture purchases until the sofa and chairs start to look shabby. I might refinish the dining table. Might!
When my last kid moved out, I went to town and finally did my house in the style of me. It's still a work in progress and the youngest is back home, but every single person that enters our house comments on how cool it looks.
Our layout stays the same, but we've gotten new pieces of furniture off and on over the years. We ditched our old blinds/lace curtains and got vertical blinds and that brightened things up a lot. We don't move the layout around because of my deafness so I can hear the TV and his limping that needs a wide enough walk-through so he doesn't bump into things.
As an Independent adult, I have owned 3 primary residences for 12 years, 7 years and now 9 years respectively.
In each instance, every few years, it is my wife who gets a bee in her bonnet to make ascetic changes in either the furniture, the flooring, the decor, paint, light fixtures, kitchen cabinets, appliances, etc, etc.
Like clockwork, every 3 years or so, I must do my best to maintain the status quo in the face of the winds of change.
I change mine all the time and my 85 year old mom redecorates hers even more.
I make periodic changes to decor and things like interior paint color. I do have some classic pieces that I love and will never get rid of, but everything else is up for grabs. I love decorating and considered being an interior designer at one point in my life.
I have known people whose homes are stuck in a particular decade. We had neighbors whose home interior looked like a 1970s museum. It's always interesting to see that.
I'm not really big on decoration overall I have to admit. I don't entertain really and the rest of my place is designed for my convenience.
We've had the same living room furniture for 25 years. It's good furniture that has been refinished once and reupholstered 3 times, the last in a different fabric.
We downsized 10 years ago and we kept some stuff, got rid of some stuff and then purchased stuff that fit better in our new space.
We do have the same art (we have a LOT of art) but some of it's in different rooms or groupings because of things like how much sun a wall gets and how much we like it in the new space.
And, of course, linens change as they wear out so several iterations of new bedspreads/comforters and kitchen linens.
I'm always rearranging furniture or changing something. Usually, it's when I'm feeling down or need a change. It doesn't cost anything, and it makes me feel better. I crank up Boston or Led Zepplin or The Doors, and I'm happy again. Sounds corny, I know.
I prefer comfort over decor. Probably nothing in my home would ever change, except my husband likes to stir things up occasionally
Our furniture, drapes, paint etc are all neutral. Then I add color with throw pillows, plants, decor etc. I like having a neutral backdrop for Holiday decor too.
I add new stuff every couple of years as I travel and get new art. I've completely rearranged my living room three times in the last 15 years and I'm in the process of doing it again cause I got a new bigger tv. I've rearranged my bedroom 2.5 times. The one time I just moved half the furniture. However I basically refuse to paint cause I cant stand painting.
I got involved with a gal who I thought was going to be “it”, but turned out to be wrong. In the meantime after she moved in she ruined my home with the most atrocious sense of style I’ve ever seen. What a waste of time redoing all the damage.
Bought house 40 years ago. Did a complete remodel with what I could afford. Pretty much stayed the same. Except upgrading electrical as needed. Have retired now have time to do it again with major upgrades. Am now doing a complete again. I do all my own work.
I have a wife who makes those decisions. I just live here
I can't believe you've been downvoted for this post. What on earth is the matter with Redditors?
Some of it is not real people, some kind of random bot, I've heard the kids say.
I'm constantly changing things around but it's mostly just for practicality's sake like right now my house looks like a combo daycare and music studio since I'm watching my grandsons and an album is being worked on. I've never really "decorated" so even the knick knacks and wall hangings change out often depending on interests and what's going on that month or year.
I am living in SE Asia now, and the house I bought was badly in need of updating & needed some "westernising" to suit me, at 70yo. That was over 6 years ago, and at first, I had earth floors levelled & tiled, walls rendered and squat toilet replaced with western pedestal style & shower put in once water was connected rather than use hand pump in back yard.
Later I had most of the yards roofed over, which cools the house & a raised patio built to sit on or customers to sit to eat & drink at my small convenience store I had built onto the front of the house. The last work I had done was the whole inside & outside of the house painted, which my plans to do myself, were changed after a couple of mild strokes that left my balance thrown off, especially on a ladder. It only cost me USD2,300 for 3 guys over 5 days, including the cost of paint & brushes.
The house is comfortable for m, maybe not the most modern but look good, especially from outdoors and suits me & my 4 cats and a grand nephew IL who stayed here each night while his step-father is rebuilding the family home. He also spent a year here when I arrived to help with language, getting services connected, showing me around nearest town, 20 minutes drive away & helping with setting up house when my container of effects & books arrived. There are still a few things I want to have done (some roofing needs replacing), there are no ceilings, which I want done for a bit more insulation from the heat and front yard I want to put a bamboo "house" in, as an eating/dining area for customers, with tropical plants around for landscaping. Before that I need to have a front fence erected to stop kids running across the front yard & use the driveway.
What made you decide to live in SE Asia? Did you already live there? Have family there? Just interested in the area? Cheaper retirement?
I always thought Vietnam wouldn't be a bad place to retire.
I had been coming to the Philippines since 1973, after falling in love with the place & people from my first visit. Later I married a girl from here & watched he family expand from around 20 to over 100, & despite now being divorced, I am considered more a family member than she is, but that may change in about 3 years when she get the pension & moved back here, & if I am still alive!
I am in a rural village & only paid around USD13,500 for my house & spend about $450 a month to live on average. Like my 4 cats, I live like locals, a lot of rice & vegetables & small amount of meat/fish. I don't have AC but use fans instead, except I have AC in car & the breeze when on motorcycle which at 76 I use less often now.
I enjoy the quiet life and regularity of life and now I try and avoid going to Manila or other big cities & socially there are enough gathering locally to enjoy drink with heaps of food provided & I can sit back, listen to the karaoke singers or discus farm prices or basketball results or just it quietly & listen to all the laughter as people relax & enjoy the simple pleasures of life. Here, language generally isn't a problem as English is widely spoken.
Very cool! Thanks for answering. I sometimes wonder what draws people to different areas in retirement, as I near it myeslf.
Love seeing all these old people with homes lol
Most people have a home.
It's houses that people are more likely not to have, so that they end up renting. Though the older you are, the more likely you are to own a house.
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