Extreme Makeovers
Do-it-yourself condo owners transform kitchens and more

By Julia Beizer
Express
Tuesday, September 12, 2006 3:41 PM

Switch on HGTV or TLC, and it quickly becomes obvious: Between the earth-toned paint-mad decorators of "Trading Spaces" and the hammer-wielding handymen and women of "Fix It Up!," do-it-yourself home renovation couldn't be hotter.

And while many of these reality shows focus on bold face-lifts for mega-mansions, the urge to rehab and redo has also hit local condo owners. From folks rescuing older apartments to new condo owners who simply want to upgrade their kitchens, these creative and often brave souls are discovering that tweaking a small space also produces dramatic results.

Take Steve Klc, 46, a pastry chef and consultant who is on the creative team for Jose Andres, the chef behind Zaytinya, Oyamel and five other area restaurants. Klc (pronounced "Kelch") and his wife and fellow pastry chef, Colleen Apte, 47, renovated their one-bedroom condo in the Courthouse neighborhood of Arlington in 2004.

It's no surprise that they paid special attention to their kitchen. "Being pastry chefs, we were used to working professionally in very small quarters," said Klc. Through the rehab, he said, "We ended up turning [the condo kitchen] into a better pastry kitchen than either one of us has ever worked in."

A self-described "Ikea kitchen missionary," Klc frequented the mega-store's "as-is" room, where returned merchandise is sold for a fraction of the list price. "It's kind of like outlet shopping," said Klc. Limited by the sometimes strange merch that ends up there -- partially assembled cabinets, chairs with ripped upholstery -- Klc spent several months stalking the space to score deals like a $1,200 Corian countertop for $10. The chef couple used the money they saved to splurge on higher-end kitchen appliances.

One of those haute appliances, a GE Profile Dual Fuel oven range, turned out to be a big mistake. Klc and Apte found one of the high-end cookers advertised at Home Depot at a clearance price. They took that figure to Best Buy, and the retailer agreed to give them an even better bargain: $950 for a $2,300 stove. But after the stove was delivered, Klc realized that his new baby was built for a 220-volt outlet and his condo was on a 110-volt circuit.

"I knew Ikea cabinets; I didn't really know anything about electrical work," he confessed. Klc spent a week researching ways to make the stove work, but since the only solution involved getting approval from his condo board and calling in an electrician, he eventually decided it wasn't worth the trouble and returned the range, swallowing a 10 percent restocking fee.

Still, Klc and Apte couldn't be more pleased with their decision to do it themselves. "There's a pressure when you have a contractor engaged to do the work. Time is money," said Klc. "If we got some design inspiration, I was able to pursue it and not worry about a change-work-order charge with a contractor," he added. Like creating cakes and pastries, he said, the work was "entirely within your control."

Audra Miller, a 28-year-old medical student who just wrapped up a monthlong renovation of her Rosslyn one-bedroom condo, feels equally connected to her project. Through working on the condo, Miller said, "I've looked at every corner of the place and just have a much better appreciation for it."

Like Klc and Apte, Miller focused on updating her kitchen with new appliances and laminate countertops. She also spruced up the bathroom and living areas with fresh paint and new fixtures.

She picked up tips on doing these tasks from multiple sources: staffers at Home Depot, her building's engineer and her handy parents. A recently renovated condo in Miller's complex proved especially inspirational because its layout was identical to that of her own pad. "One of the advantages, being in a condo, is that you can see what other people have done," she said. "They've run across the same problems that you have. You can see how they solved them."

A big motivation for Miller, and many other condominium makeover masters: upping the resale value of her place. But she said she is also pleased with how much she has learned about construction through the process. "I never knew it was so simple to put in a dimmer switch," she said.

She also installed new kitchen cabinets -- a task that proved especially tricky due to the construction of her building. She couldn't find the vertical wooden beams that hold up the wall, known as studs, on which to hang the cabinets. "It seemed like a ghost wall," she said. It wasn't until the building's engineer told her that her terra-cotta walls were held up by horizontal slats that she was able to finish her kitchen.

Because she only had a month to work on the apartment before starting medical school, Miller opted not to knock down any walls. Such a drastic change would have required approval from her condo board, often the bane of do-it-your-self condo dwellers. Considering all of the neighbors who could be affected by one misplaced sledgehammer, restrictions on the kinds of work that can be done inside condo units and who can do it are not uncommon.

Sarah Kenny, a 36-year-old government employee who is vice president of the condo board in her Adams Morgan building, said that, in her building, owners must seek approval for renovations before beginning any work that "intrude[s] upon the existing walls." Laying new tile over existing tile is okay, but board approval is a must if the owner wants to rip out the existing tile first. Nearly all projects get the go-ahead, but owners in Kenny's building must hire contractors for plans that go beyond cosmetic changes, such as installing new light fixtures.

"We don't let people do this work by themselves," she said. Only contractors who are licensed in D.C. and can provide evidence of workers' compensation insurance can work in Kenny's building. Rules differ from condo to condo, but many other D.C. buildings have similar requirements.

Kenny recently completed her own condo renovation, a significant project that involved tearing down a wall to combine her one-bedroom condo with a neighboring studio she had purchased earlier. Kenny thinks that she and her husband, Michael Rabasco, may have been able to tackle some of the redo's smaller tasks, but thinks the contractor's work was superior to anything they could have achieved. "We don't have the skills," she said.

When the real estate market was particularly strong in 2003, Sterling Ashby faced little resistance from the board at his Adams Morgan condominium. "At the time, everyone was just so excited where the prices were headed," he said.

Ashby, an attorney in his 30s, wasn't looking to do anything drastic to his place, just fix it up to sell. He removed a disco-era mirrored closet door and, with the help of a handyman, painted the walls white and installed wood floors. He also took down some window treatments to let in more light and moved many of his belongings to storage to cut clutter. He had tried to sell his two-level, two-bedroom condo several months before he made these changes, but without any luck. These small tweaks -- which he estimated cost $6,000 -- translated into a $60,000 increase in his ultimate selling price.

But that was 2003. These days, a renovation securing a higher selling price is not such a sure thing. According to Dan Melman, a real estate agent with Melman and Molik, a division of W.C. & A.N. Miller Realtors, buyers certainly do look for wood floors, good lighting and updated kitchens and bathrooms, but price and location reign supreme in today's cooling market.

That news shouldn't discourage would-be do-it-yourselfers. Melman suggests making improvements to a condo that you'll appreciate as an owner, not just as a seller. "You're going to get most of your dollars back [when selling after a renovation]," he said. "Might not be all of them, but you'll get some enjoyment out of it, too."