If you have only a little money to invest in your home remodeling project (or perhaps next to no money at all), the decorating experts often recommend that you take up decorating themes, one at a time.
One theme would be to go with changing the lighting all around the house.
Another theme could have to do with changing the upholstery, the carpets, the bedsheets, for a fresher effect.
Let us discuss here another approach altogether to home remodeling on the cheap though - one using paint all around.
Certainly, painting your home can be an expensive project to undertake.
But not if you do it selectively, for the best effect.
Your first stop with your can of paint and paint brush should probably be the first stick of furniture in your home that you come across.
Do you see a chair, a center table, a stool or anything that could stand out better with help from a bright coat of paint? This should probably appear to great effect if the walls in the room happen to be a muted light color.
Remember that you need to sand furniture down with a sanding sponge before you actually apply any paint.
That's what makes the paint stick.
Don't use sandpaper though.
A sanding sponge is made of flexible foam and gets around all the grooves and curves admirably.
If your furniture has a wax finishing, you'll need to use denatured alcohol to strip it off first.
Not every kind of paint works for furniture.
If you have a beautifully finished piece of furniture with no flaws at all, using high gloss paint can work out great.
If you furniture doesn't look all that great, using semigloss will get it looking new without making the flaws stand out.
You could also achieve some pretty stunning effects painting the mirror frames around the house.
It's surprising how quickly a plain old mirror can begin to look kind of custom-made and expensive when you paint the frame a shade that complements the color of the walls in the room in some way.
Make sure that you use a glossy paint and coats of clear varnish over it for a super pretty effect.
You'll probably want to use a small brush to make sure you don't drip any paint or let stray brush bristles get paint on the mirror.
There is something about a beautifully and glossily painted door that can bring class and taste any room just about instantly.
Not every color will make a door look tastefully attractive though.
The color of the door needs to be reasonably close to the color of the walls around it.
Too much contrast will often turn out to be a bit jarring.
Unless you have a door that is as smooth as glass, you would probably be best off choosing ordinary semigloss paint.
Make sure that you get the door frame too.
Nothing looks more unfinished than a painted door in an unpainted frame.
And finally, make sure that your crown molding sees a little bit of paint too.
Well-painted crown moldings take on a color that's slightly different from the color of the ceiling or the walls and gives your whole house a beautiful, tailored look.
Make sure that you don't try a shade on the moldings that's too dark.
It would be too distracting.
The ceiling is never supposed to attract too much attention - it is just supposed to lend atmosphere.
And glossy paint won't really reveal too many flaws on something that's so high up.
You can easily use this kind of paint on crown molding.
A touch of home remodeling done with a lick of paint won't take you more than a couple of weekends.
But the results certainly won't look like anything you did in a short period of time.