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What do you think of this bathroom remodel?

HT22330

I found this video on YouTube, and thought I'd share it with you all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMkZusZJQaA

Is it boring? Loud? Appropriate for the right type of client? Do you like it's classic style? Hate it? Is it faux-classic? Faux-lux? Would you use the same fittings, tile, materials, and fixtures if you had to design a bathroom of similar or equal quality? How would you improve it without increasing it's space? Could you improve it? Is there anything the design forgets or neglects?

Personally, I think the bathroom looks wonderful but think the cost for materials according to the poster of the video was a bit much if I read correctly. I think it was noted somewhere as about $25k or so for the remodel. I don't know if that's what the client was charged, or the designers/builders expense. I also don't know if it's worth having in a home, if it wouldn't increase the homes value by more than what went into it. The luxury aspect to it is nice, but doesn't override practicality on my part if it'd be financially unwise to have.

I love the idea of it having heated floors, the faux-wood porcelain floors that are durable and possibly easier to maintain than real wood -- but have a wood look for wood lovers-- the marble shower with multiple water sources, double vanity with pivoting mirrors, and bathtub with classic fixtures are all wonderful. I love it's size --it's noted as being 8.5x8.5 from what I can tell-- and think it'd be great as an en-suite master bathroom. 

The bathroom I have now is atrocious. I hate it's size of 35-40 square feet, adjoined bathtub and shower, pink and white floor and wall tiles with burgundy tile boarder, white chipped wall paint, mitch-match vanity --in comparison to the outdated 1950s bathroom it resides in. Its traditional style but a more up-to-date piece of hardware-- small wall mounted mirror above the vanity with equally as small medicine cabinet, pink toilet, and no ventilation via a window or vents.

I wish the shower had a niche for bathroom soaps and hygiene supplies, a very large wall mirror perhaps as a background to the two pivoting mirrors or it as a solo wall mirror-- if I had to choose between it's current set-up versus an alternative-- a water closet for the terlit, and possibly a bidet.

 
Bathroom remodel

Feb 14, 15 12:58 am
,,,,

Please hire an Architect. Go to the AIA website and not Craigslist. The difference between hiring an Architect and not hiring an Architect is that you are not only paying for their skill as a designer but they are also legally responsible for what they do. It is well worth the money. Your project will be done right and look infinitely better. 

Feb 14, 15 1:22 am  · 
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#thisiswhywecanthavenicethings

Feb 14, 15 1:46 am  · 
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We're here to serve you.

Here, try this.

Feb 14, 15 9:27 am  · 
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chigurh

The bathroom is fine if you a into that style.  The final product is way over built for the type of house it went into, assuming from the original photos, it is a dumpy ranch burger.

25k seems really high, especially if you are doing the work yourself.  You could do something like that for 5k if you are smart about it.  

General rule of thumb, if you are not adding square footage in your improvements, you will not get that money back in resale. That kind of work has to be for personal reasons if you are planning on staying in your house.  You can sink 200k in bath and kitchen remodels and your house is still the same area as when you bought it, that is what the buyer is going to look at.  If you get anything on those improvements it is a small fraction of what you put into them.  

Feb 14, 15 10:05 am  · 
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Respectfully, chigurh, there's no way someone could build that bathroom for $5k. $25k actually seems *very* reasonable assuming your contractor is someone who actually knows what they're doing.  Meaning, someone who can deal with the complexities of underfloor heating, finicky tiles, increased water supply size, sealing all those curbs properly, etc etc. There's $5k just in Carrera in that room!

In my 8 years of experience doing exactly this kind of project I'd estimate $50,000 for this - that's all inclusive, with a good contractor buying all the fixtures and providing a warranty for everything.  I only ever worked with very high quality contractors, because they are worth every penny. The one time I worked with a tile guy who did not know what he was doing we ended up tearing out the entire master shower five years later and retiling it all: he didn't use the proper underlayer and the tile all popped and water got under the subfloor. 

Feb 14, 15 12:25 pm  · 
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joseffischer

Wow... I thought both the $25k and $5k number seemed very realistic, both in the terms that I would charge a homeowner about $25k to build something like that... maybe closer to $30k as I don't know much about the costs of heated floors and I'd have to look that up, and with minor adjustments (a cheaper tile than Carrera but the same effect, Installing 2 shower fixtures instead of 5, a different countertop and light fixture option) I could easily do the bathroom in $5k materials myself and most homeowners wouldn't notice the differences. Yes, that does mean roughly $20k profit, which for a month of work seems about right to me. Maybe it's regional differences only, GA here.

Jun 21, 18 8:59 am  · 
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apscoradiales

Agree. bathrooms and kitchens are the most expensive things to renovate in a house. Double that if you want to do it right.

Oct 5, 20 9:48 am  · 
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chigurh

I'm saying your run of the mill 5'x8' bathroom, do the work yourself, 5k is totally reasonable. 

I only watched that video for about a min, but doing this full on marble/waterworks bath in a tract home is ridiculous.  Like I said, outbuilding your home.  Putting 50k into a bath in a house that you bought for 350k....dunno.

You could do something similar to that in the video waaay cheaper than 50k doing the work yourself and selecting more modest materials.

Feb 14, 15 12:41 pm  · 
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Yes, absolutely agree. We redid a bathroom in our own house for about $7k, doing everything but rough plumbing (including a level bed for the tub to sit on) and tile work ourselves. We used Home Depot tile, I called in a few favors from suppliers I know, I spent - not kidding - 30 hours online finding a good sink that was on sale. We spent money on a tile installer because most of the room is tiled and the guy I hired is impeccable - worth it. He gave us a discount because I've used him on so many jobs AND he did the work over the course of two month's worth of weekends.

For the average homeowner, spending almost a full work week looking for *one* sink, and going without a bathroom for five months because you're doing the work on a non-professional schedule, can be deal breakers. Many a marriage has been stressed to the limit during a home remodel project! IMO the best thing is to go ahead and spend money on making the process easier, by working with real professionals and by not trying to nickel and dime every little thing by doing it yourself. I had a client insist on buying all her own light fixtures from an online supplier. Half the stuff was shipped with improper mounting brackets, missing screws, etc. The contractor won't spend one minute resolving those problems without asking for payment, so you're better off in the long run paying the contractor his/her markup for them to be responsible for the whole thing.

Feb 14, 15 12:50 pm  · 
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JeromeS

It's a shame about the "impediments" above the doors and windows...

Feb 14, 15 1:22 pm  · 
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MyDream

Cool bathroom with some cool features.

Feb 14, 15 3:43 pm  · 
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gruen

It is faux-lux. Looks cheap to me. I mean, an expensive cheap. Nice, but not creative. 

Having done many baths myself or partly myself, I'd say $5k is a floor, complete DIY without having to move or redo any plumbing. I probably put $7K into my attic bath, which is super tiny and simple. Half the cost was running the plumbing from basement to 3rd floor attic. 

Our downstairs bathroom re-do (5x8 simple bath) was ~$10K but included redoing all the plumbing including all supply piping in the basement for the whole house (2 apartment units). We redid it because the 1920's vintage brass piping was working at half efficiency and leaking. I got a huge deal on the plumbing from a B+ grade plumber. 

It's really easy to spend $25++K on a bath. 

Feb 16, 15 3:54 pm  · 
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HT22330

Thanks for the feedback.

Mar 4, 15 5:02 pm  · 
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Wilma Buttfit

We've remodeled both baths in our house ourselves. Spent 2.6k for a pro to move a toilet and replace a waste line, but did everything else ourselves including replacing fixtures and some plumbing. Bath 1: 5'x5' demo'ed everything including the drywall and subfloor and replaced it all, spent about 3.4k plus the aforementioned 2.6k for the waste line so 6k total. Nothing over the top but we put in nice fixtures and decent porcelain tile, did everything ourselves with no experience and were picky so it took a long time (2 years? we were slow, had problems, but learned a lot.) Turned out really, really nice. Nicest bath I've been in for a long time. Bath 2: 5'x9' new vanity, faucet, toilet, mirror, electrical, refinished the clawfoot tub, peel and stick floor tile over new sub floor all diy, spent about $1250. Kept existing fan and light fixtures and used peel and stick tile because I ran out of money. Both of my baths are grey and white but much simpler than the one in the video, which has too much going on, too showy for me. I like em plain, simple, not easily dated, not collecting dirt.

Mar 4, 15 5:51 pm  · 
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On the fence

I disagree with donna and chigurh.

Could it be done for $5k.  no way.

Can you pay $50k for it.  Sure but the contractors just stole $25k from you.

I'm doing my master bathroom right now.  About 10'x14'.  Whirlpool bath, 5',3'-6" shower with bench seat, body spray, shower head and spray, two sink vanity, lots of travertine on floors shower walls and floor, granite countertop and tub deck, framless shower door system, can lighting, wall sconces, brushed nickel fixtures throughout, cased openings at door and to whirlpool area, accessories, paint, etc  $25k

Can I pay them more?  Sure can.  You can always overpay.

Mar 5, 15 9:55 am  · 
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HazYu

I have remodeled my bathroom to have a contemporary style. The people from whom I bought this house had no sense of style so I had to remodel the entire place. I had the house remodeled last year itself but the bathrooms were not done as I ran into financial crunch. It is always a good idea to look for blogs and videos about a remodel before you actually start on it. This will give us innovative ideas and will prevent us from making unnecessary mistakes.

Dec 16, 15 5:02 am  · 
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BulgarBlogger

Grohe is a cheap plumbing fixture brand

Jul 7, 16 7:35 am  · 
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gdub

I am not a fan of where they stopped the wainscoting on the walls. I would have stopped it at 42". I find that it looks weird due to the kind of mirrors used. Also, I am not a fan of how they chose to round the backsplash when everything else in the room is squares or rectangles. I get that they were trying to make the vanity look like a furniture piece but this just looks wrong.

$10,000-$15,000 seems like the reasonable number based off the changes to plumbing and adding in floor heating. I am guessing they probably paid too much for the marble and tiles.

Jul 16, 16 7:04 pm  · 
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Forget heated floors, I want a heated toilet seat.

Oct 26, 16 2:48 pm  · 
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senjohnblutarsky

It would be awesome to just delete this thread so the spammers would stop bringing it back.  Or lock it somehow? 

But now that I've looked at the previous poster's history... maybe not spammer. 

Nov 1, 16 8:01 am  · 
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archiwutm8

They are a spammer, they've learnt from their previous mistakes. They try and blend in with us then tout their rubbish.

Nov 1, 16 8:22 am  · 
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This post is like flypaper for spammers.

Jun 15, 18 8:37 am  · 
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sonnyjohan

Here are a few things you should consider before remodelling the bathroom -

1. Make sure you get the drain sizes right. The industry standard size is 1.5 inch; however, you can upgrade it to 2 inches. 
2. Make sure you have plenty of space in the under cabinets to store toiletries cosmetics, towel and other bathroom accessories. 
3. Lighting in the bathroom is essential too, so make sure you get it right. 

Jan 7, 19 9:57 pm  · 
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Non Sequitur

Is that all?

Jan 7, 19 10:02 pm  · 
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As Miles said above this post is a spammer magnet but...

I just told a friend they should expect to spend $40K on a bathroom gut job. Do you guys agree? What does the market look like where you are?  Some specifics for mine:

- old house with uneven floors - the bathroom will be stripped down to floors joists (above a crawl space) and sistered up to level

- this is an ADA upgrade for someone who will soon be using a wheelchair, so it would be knocking down an interior wall and moving it over into the adjacent bedroom 4' to gain clearance

-roll-in ADA shower

Jan 8, 19 10:46 am  · 
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JLC-1

sounds about right, complete redo of plumbing, heating, wiring, waterproofing, and nice tile and fixtures, you can be well into $600/s.f.

Jan 8, 19 10:55 am  · 
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Every single trade is involved in a bathroom, no way around it. The estimate sounds reasonable me, quite conservative compared to my astronomical market.

Jan 16, 19 10:43 am  · 
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Non Sequitur

how much if you source everything during Ikea's bathroom sale event?

Jan 16, 19 11:11 am  · 
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JLC-1

can't tell if you're being snarky or truly believe everybody doing a bathroom remodel should use toto, waterworks, restoration hardware, hansgrohe or whatever expensive crap gives you a hard on.

Jan 16, 19 11:20 am  · 
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I have an Ikea double sink vanity cabinet in my house. It's good, not great. Good enough. Sleek, but not exceptionally well-made. When I was researching to buy a double sink wall hing vanity cabinet including sinks, though, the cost options were either buy the $799 at Ikea or take a huge leap to like $2,300 for anyone else. So, Ikea it is.

Jan 16, 19 1:04 pm  · 
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Non Sequitur

I live within 10min walking distance from Ikea. Love that place and the toddler loves it too.

Jan 16, 19 1:19 pm  · 
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I "redid" my bathroom. I'm a renter, so, make of that what you will.

$20 for paint
$40 for tile decals to cover up the ugly pink & grey from the 50's (not cool vintage retro 50's... ugly bad taste cheap nasty colored tile 50's)
$30 for a nice bathrug from H&M home
$10 for a macrame plant hanger

If I had $5k or $10k or $25k hanging around waiting for something to do, I sure as hell wouldn't spend it on a stupid bathroom. Are people crazy? For real, you could spend a few months abroad or buy an abandoned villa in Italy for that. Jayzus.

Jan 16, 19 8:49 pm  · 
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JLC-1

do you watch househunters international? I find most americans are utterly unprepared to live in europe, they're always complaining about lack of space and storage. There was a girl that wanted to live the italian medieval town experience and didn't like stone walls......

Jan 17, 19 5:15 pm  · 
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JLC-1

on the other hand, the stupid bathroom upgrade can add 10-20% to your equity when you want to sell - I bought a "builder's finish" condo and re doing the bathroom for 10k added 25K to the sale price.

Jan 17, 19 5:17 pm  · 
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JLC-1

and last, I have the luck to live where rich people re-do their bathrooms every 3 years, so it's really easy to find cheap high quality fixtures in our Re-Store. (Habitat for humanity thrift store)

Jan 17, 19 5:19 pm  · 
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mightyaa

Late to this.. but... I'm in for about $30k on my 14x16' masterbath remodel starting next week. It sort of breaks out like $5k for a good freestanding tub, $2k per vanity, $3k for a quality shower, another grand for toilet and accessories. So you are $13k in just on fixtures. Then finishes are another grand. Ditto with good lighting (2 vanities, general, plus shower). My plumber/gc will run $15k to install everything and redo all the plumbing/electrical. Another couple disappear fast with blinds, new towels, and nick knacks and in my case, some mold remediation. So.. $30k happens fast.

Jan 17, 19 7:06 pm  · 
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mightyaa

Oh, and from the economics point of view… current loan on house is $420k. Valuation prior to remodel is $820k. Starting last year and going through next year we’re putting in $210k. So I’ll be into the house for $630k. Realistically, when complete and IF the market values hold, it will appraise for $1.2M. So I’ll walk with $570k in five years or so when I sell. If I didn’t do the remodel at all, it still needed about $60k in repairs (leaky roof, molds, failing plumbing and building shell) and would be stuck at the sub-million mark because it is outdated and shows. Part of that is why I bought it fairly cheap. So ya… I could travel the world and blow money, but instead chose to invest it in my own house to see a better return, plus the perk is I get to live in a really nice house with a lot of new stuff. So, to each their own….

Jan 17, 19 7:18 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Thank you for this honest response, mighty!! Your bathroom numbers are right in line with the typical high end residential I do.

Jan 18, 19 6:01 am  · 
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Wood Guy

The last bathroom I renovated as a design/build contractor, a little over two years ago, was small and moderately high-end but nothing over the top. New fixtures, only the vanity changed locations and that was only by a couple of feet. I charged $35K and didn't make a penny on it. I'm gearing up to redo my own bathroom this winter. Again, small, will be nice but nothing that I'd consider fancy, I'll do all the work myself and it will be $10-15K. ($10K now, and I'll swap out the tub for a shower in a few years which will be the other $5K+.)

Nov 1, 20 3:43 pm  · 
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empea
I’m doing the wildly overpriced Murican thing myself right now, while feeling exactly like doing (not doing) what Stephanie said.
Jan 16, 19 10:23 pm  · 
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Not even joking I saw a news article in the guardian this morning about buying homes in Sicily for 1€ provided you promise to invest 15000 in renos. Let that waft over you.

Jan 17, 19 5:28 pm  · 
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JLC-1

I know, have you browsed on any of the real estate websites in italy? it's crazy cheap, but again, not for the "biased american" that thinks everything has to be like it was in akron. look at this https://www.casa.it/immobile-v...

Jan 17, 19 5:34 pm  · 
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Stephanie

That house is larger than my North American 2 bedroom 1959 bungalow that I pay $3000/month for in Vancouver.

Jan 17, 19 6:01 pm  · 
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Stephanie

Additionally, most 1 bedroom condos are far, far smaller than that. The average in Vancouver is about 550 SQ feet and the minimum is something like 480. So I wouldn't say that North Americas are all that opposed to small living... Think of the tiny home/renovated airstream industry!

Jan 17, 19 6:03 pm  · 
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Non Sequitur

Are we just going to gloss over the fact that this Italian villa has a shower in the tool shed? Luxury!

Jan 17, 19 6:05 pm  · 
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JLC-1

you missed this part "Allo stato attuale l immobile in completo stato di abbandono e mostra evidenti segni di vandalizzazione.Sono presenti difformit catastali sanabili." At present the building is in complete state of neglect and shows evident signs of vandalization, there are conflicting land registration differences.

Jan 17, 19 6:51 pm  · 
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Stephanie

Who doesn't love a good before/after home reno though? Flip this villa! Prime candidate for a new reality TV show me thinks.

Jan 17, 19 6:57 pm  · 
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rachelgwog

Cabinets matters, if you have limited budget consider replace those old cheap cabinets with nice looking cabinets. That will definitely boost the whole taste of the bathrooms. 

Oct 17, 19 11:16 am  · 
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SneakyPete

Might I suggest Karen Longaric of Bolivia?

Dec 6, 19 12:08 pm  · 
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apscoradiales

It's been nearly six years since this was posted.

Time to renovate again.

Nov 1, 20 8:03 am  · 
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justinebermudez

Wow, this bathroom remodel looks amazing! I agree with you about the cost, though—it seems a bit steep. I love the idea of heated floors and the marble shower, but practicality is important too. Great job on the design! Also you can visit this site if you need bathroom remodeling services. https://wacoremodelingcontract...

Feb 28, 24 4:01 am  · 
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