How to Decorate Your First Home

If you have just moved into your first home, you may be left wondering how to decorate it. The chances are that your budget is pretty limited, after all the different fees that you have to pay, so you might have to get a little bit creative in order to make your house a home.

Make Lists for Everything

Decorating your first home is going to be a time-consuming process. You can make it more efficient by making lists for everything; write down everything that you own, everything you need for your first home and a wish list of items that you want (but don’t necessarily need). You could break this down further by separating the lists by each room.

Set a Budget (and Stick to It!)

After you’ve spent so much money securing the home and paying the various fees, your decorating budget is probably pretty tight. Shopping for new items is always exciting and it can be easy to get swept up in it, but you should always remember your budget, and don’t let a salesperson convince you to go over it.

Know Your Room Dimensions

This is crucial before you go shopping. You can’t just buy any sofa – you’ll need to make sure that it fits within your room’s dimensions. Measure your room, and remember that in the open space of a showroom, items will look smaller than they actually are. Bonus tip: always measure doors and hallways to make sure you can get the items into the room easily.

Go Neutral

Sticking to a neutral palette is ideal for your first home. Stick to white, black and timber tones initially, and introduce elements of color afterward. Neutral items allow you time to get used to the space, without overwhelming it using patterns and colors, which may look good before you move in and have to look at them every day.

Invest in a Bed

Your bedroom is one of the rooms that you will spend the most time in, so it makes sense to invest in it. If you’ve never bought a bed before or you haven’t felt the need to replace it   – make this a priority, as a comfortable well-made bed will last for years. You should also splash out on high-quality bedding that looks great and improves your sleep.

Focus on One Room

Decorating your first home should be broken down into parts, so focus on one room at a time. Otherwise, you’ll be so conscious of getting it all done that you won’t focus on making each room look the way you want it to. This method also helps with your budgeting.

Paint

Paint is one of the most affordable ways to bring a new home to life. New build properties are always covered in magnolia, so use this as a starting point to introduce color into the room. Don’t be afraid to experiment with accent walls, and decorative moldings to separate the paint colors.

Don’t Buy Everything for Your First Home At Once

Much like the theory of one room at a time, not buying everything at once will allow you to catch your thoughts and think about how you’re going to live in the space. Living in the house for about two months before you make any significant purchases will help you decide what a priority is – is it a new bathroom, or a new kitchen?

Solve Problems Affordably

If you can’t afford to replace your kitchen cabinets straightaway, giving them a fresh coat of paint can really perk them up. If your lighting is too harsh, swap the incandescent bulbs for LED bulbs with a dimmer switch, so you can use mood lighting according to the time of day.

Embrace the hand-me-downs

It’s most likely that when you move into a new home, suddenly everyone that you know has a piece of furniture that they can pass on to you. Although you may be inclined to reject these hand-me-downs straightaway, you should think about how you could up-cycle them. You could re-upholster a chair, paint a frame or just add accessories.

Leila Jones is a content writer from the UK. She is a Public Relations graduate from Sheffield Hallam University, and she enjoys social media, fashion, interior design and blogging. You can read more of her work on Chesire Mouldings