On “Fixer to Fabulous,” Dave and Jenny Marrs have renovated some magnificent homes, but on the latest episode, they must work their magic on an extremely small house.
In the episode “Cottage Gets a Modern Upgrade,” the Marrses meet Nick and Johanna, who have just purchased a 1940s cottage within walking distance of downtown Bentonville, AR, for $385,000. Although this cottage is only 696 square feet, they want this cramped space to accommodate three bedrooms, two baths, four family members, and two large dogs—all without expanding the original footprint of the house!
They’ve budgeted $225,000 for the renovation, so Dave and Jenny have a lot of money to work with—but not a lot of wiggle room, so to speak. Nonetheless, they come up with some brilliant ways to squeeze in all the essentials, and they also might show you a thing or two about maximizing space in your own home. Here’s what Dave and Jenny taught us this week.
Before you do anything, check for lead
Measuring the amount of lead in paint
HGTV
“I hope I’m wrong, but I have a feeling we might find lead in this house,” says Dave as he ushers the inspectors into the cottage. “So we’re going to check this house inside and outside, because if my hunch is right, it’s going to affect the way we approach demo.”
Sure enough, the inspectors find lead almost everywhere, especially in the one-car garage, where Dave and Jenny are planning on building a primary bedroom, bath, closet, and mudroom.
“As much as I love these old homes, they can come with their own set of issues,” says Dave. “Lead abatement is common with historic houses. It adds dollars to our budget, and it adds time. But we have to be safe and do it the right way.”
It will take two to three weeks to get all the lead issues taken care of, and it will take a $7,000 bite out of the budget. But it must be done.
Expand the house outdoors
Since Nick and Johanna don’t want to expand the original footprint of their cottage interior, Dave and Jenny decide to extend the living space outdoors—with a massive porch that almost spans the back of the house to form an outdoor dining room/lounge.
“Inside, we wanted to give you seating at the island, but it was impossible to fit a dining table in there, too,” explains Jenny. “So we have this big dining space out here, and 10 months of the year you can eat outside here in Arkansas, which is so wonderful.”
Limited space? Use peg board storage
Pegboard storage in the kitchen
HGTV
The kitchen they’re working with is extremely small, and there’s not a lot of room for storage space—cabinets and drawers are bulky and can take up a lot of room and light.
So Jenny devises a pegboard where pots, pans, utensils, and even herbs and flowers can hang, which opens the kitchen space up considerably.
The pegs are so effective that she also uses them in the mudroom and in the newly renovated bike shed.
Add a stackable washer/dryer to the mudroom
Mudroom/laundry room
HGTV
Speaking of the mudroom, Jenny cleverly devises a way for it to do double duty: It not only serves as a space for shoes, coats, and hats, but she manages to fit a stackable washer and dryer in there.
And she still finds space to give it some style.
“In the mudroom, we did a simple, fun tile on the floor just to make the space feel special,” Jenny says.
Try multipurpose furniture for storage
Bedroom with storage in the window seat
HGTV
Since storage is such an issue in this small home, Jenny finds ways to multipurpose some of the furniture so it can also accommodate belongings.
“In the main bedroom, we’re building a built-in window seat cabinet that will give them bonus storage space in there as well,” she says.
Voila! It’s seating and it’s a dresser at the same time.
Do Dave and Jenny Marrs take this home from ‘Fixer to Fabulous’?
“We maximized every square foot of space in this house,” declares Jenny, crossing her fingers that Nick and Johanna will like it.
Mission accomplished, according to Nick.
“It feels actually pretty grand for a little house,” he says. “Although it’s small, it just doesn’t feel small, and you don’t feel like you’re crowded or on top of each other.”
Johanna agrees.
“It’s really just awesome,” she says. “They figured out how to make it work so that the house is small, but those spaces aren’t.”
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