Have I given up a frugal lifestyle?  Have I thrown in the towel because of housing expenses?  Well not exactly.  I’m new to the whole owning a house thing.  First and foremost I was excited that my monthly mortgage payment was almost half of my rent payment at my previous apartment.  I also bought a house that I thought I could fix up a bit and add some value.  Turns out that fixing up a bit and “adding value” translates to increased costs.  While this is fine and really should be removed from the expense column and into the investment column when I look at my monthly expenditures its hard to get into that frame of mind.

Some of my improvements.

1. I’m a big believer in efficiency.  In order to make my house more energy efficient I have resealed all of my windows (which are energy efficient themselves) as well as added some additional insulation to my attic.  Now lest one think that Frugal1 has lost his mind and started blowing money.  I recently have had success buying bailed insulation and then breaking it apart by hand and installing it in my attic, this adds insulation, its cheaper insulation to buy, and it saves me the additional expense of renting the machine that breaks it apart.  All it cost me was a few additional trips up the ladder, but I needed the exercise anyway.  Ultimately this move will save me money in utility bills, but right now I see it as 50-100 dollar trips to Lowes buying insulation.  50 to 100 bucks is still a lot of money in my budget, short term pain for long term gain I’m hoping.  I’ll continue to buy small amounts of insulation and periodically install it as my budget allows.  For bonus points: there are occasionally some good insulation buys on Craigslist.
2. I bought a three bedroom house but there were several problems with this purchase.  Technically my 3rd bedroom was considered a home office because someone had removed the closet and added a 2nd door to the other bathroom.  So for a short time I literally had a bedroom with 3 doors and 2 of them went to bathrooms.  The master bedroom just has a toilet but I am getting ready to remove a wall and install a standing shower making my home 3 bedroom and 2 bathroom.  This should add some decent value to the house and most of the project is well within my skill set minus some of the plumbing.
3. One of my favorite things about living in Oklahoma are the abundance of fireplaces in homes.  My house came equipped with a fireplace that was in need of a bit of refurbishment. I have attached some before and after photos but long story short I saved myself $300 dollars by simply scuffing the surface and respraying my fireplace insert, now it matches the rest of the room and the house and looks new to boot!
4. I’ll keep you all updated as I continue working on the house.  Back porch, chicken coop, new shed, and other improvements to come. (Remember while these cost money now, if you do a good job and don’t overbuild for your neighborhood its really an investment when you go to sell the house in the future).