The Ever Intrusive Future Homeowner
How would you solve this situation?
You are decorating your entire house for someone you’ve never met. You have no idea if they are male or female, a family with 7 kids, or an elderly couple. You have nothing to go off of as far as likes or dislikes, you literally know NOTHING about them. You also have no idea when they will move in. But you think about them. You think about them every time you want to be brave enough to change a paint color. You think about them when you pick out your lighting. You think about their opinion with every single home decision that you make.
Sounds sort of insane right? THAT’S BECAUSE IT IS!!
Helloooooo its hard enough to make up our own minds when we know every single thing about ourselves.
One of the biggest things that come with homeownership is the resale value of your house right? I get it. But here’s the thing. Those people? They don’t live there. You do!
Whenever I think about this future homeowner I always picture a nerdy guy with a comb over and a sweater vest tapping me on the shoulder saying (in a nasally voice) “But I don’t liiiike brick.”
He kind of looks like this guy from our family Christmas pictures:
In order to not do anything to offend the maybe future homeowners we feel like we need to do things that are inoffensive.
Vanilla.
Heartbreaking.
The boob light.
WHYYYYY?? You know what is offensive? Boobs. On your ceiling!
How about beige?
(Source)
Southern Utah is full of beige builder grade houses. Trust me, I bought one.
So in a effort to keep our homes in the pristine beige world that they entered as, we just leave it? So that Joe Blow will maybe want to live there someday?
You guys.
Think about your favorite room that you have ever seen (in person or online). I am willing to bet that it’s not builder grade neutral with boob lights. I am also willing to bet that there are people that fiercely love it and people that hate it. That’s not bad!
There are so many things that you can do to inexpensively update your house and not decrease it’s value. Like paint. Its just paint, you (or the new homeowner) can always take it back to its beige-y beauty if it is so desired.
But more importantly, what can you do to make your home a place that you love? There is something that needs to be said for understanding that yeah, this might not be your dream home. But still doing your best to make it that way is ok!
Everything is going to offend someone, and guess what? You’re the only one that has the power to change what offends you in your own home.
I was talking to some friends this week, one of them is building a house and asked if it would be a horrible idea to paint the kitchen cabinets white because it is on trend and it will go out of style eventually. Here is what I think, if you love it DO IT! Everything will go out of style. Except Taylor Swift, she never goes out of style (now you have that song stuck in your head, sorry.) Everything you put in your house has a timestamp on it. It’s what makes the world go round. It’s what gives you nostalgia. Think about it, classic styles still evolve and that is not only ok, its AMAZING!
So lets make a pact, if you have beige walls and boob lights, and hate them lets change it!! Don’t be scared, come into the light! It’s way funner over here!
And tell that intrusive future maybe homeowner to shush it.
