Adding a basement apartment – Our DIY House Renovations

Cabinets, Plumbing and Appliances

This is a continuation of the series of our renovations to our basement; turning it into an apartment. Last article I wrote about doing the walls. You can read that here. This part I go over how we added the cabinets, plumbing and appliances.

Cabinets

Before we even bought our house, Tara and I made a trip to Ikea to look for things we would need and how much they would cost. While looking for cabinets, we found modular cabinets that were inexpensive and looked good too. Tara found some gold pulls online that would work perfect for these cabinets. Once we bought our house, we went back and bought the cabinets and set them up. Tara and her sister, Gabby, set these up almost entirely by themselves (thank you, thank you, thank you!) and we installed them shortly before everything was finished.

Plumbing

The plumbing was actually one of the first things we had done when we moved into our home. We were pretty lucky because our upstairs kitchen drain went right where we had wanted to put the downstairs kitchen. It could have been very pricey, but having the drain so close made it a lot easier.

Once the cabinets were installed, Doug and I added the plumbing fixtures. It took a good amount of planning and creativity. Because the sink was not aligned with the pipes, it made the drain pipes a little difficult.

The sink and faucet we also got from Ikea and cut into the countertop to install. We got a simple sink that had a metal part on the side for drying dishes.

Appliances

Luckily for us, our local classifieds typically have some cheap appliances in good shape. We bought our stove oven for only $20 from a family that had just remodeled and were “just wanting to get rid of it”. We also got our fridge from a family for $100 and we were given our microwave from some friends. So for 3 appliances in really good shape, we paid $120.

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