Best way to spend £1000 cheering up bathroom?

amcluesent

OK, so have a budget of max £1000 to refresh smallish bathroom in otherwise unremarkable 2-bed terrace house. What's going to give me most value-for-money if I sell up?

Currently I have an oldish but white suite, new chrome radiator/towel rail, chrome/mirror cabinet, cheapish vinyl flooring in wood effect.

I'm thinking -

Replace power shower-over-bath (knob is wonky etc)
Install bathroom extractor fan/light over bath
Re-tile with mostly white to replace avocado green (yes!)
New shower rail
Maybe bath panel in a dark wood to tone down clinical look

It would be great to get more storage space too!

sarah_elton

Tiling the walls and floor would be my first priority - tiled floor is so much nicer than vinyl. I wouldn't necessarily go for white tiling. You mention the clinical look. Maybe introduce a colour. Blue or beige are popular for bathrooms. (Google image search "beige bathroom" and "blue bathroom" for ideas).

Are there painted wall areas as well as tiled areas? At a flat I rented that had a smallish bathroom the floor tiles were a mid-blue and the wall tiles were white with a few scattered navy blue ones. The areas of painted wall were a sky blue. It was cute.

Replace the shower if the current one is obviously old or just a run-off-the-taps job as viewers will be looking at it thinking it needs doing.

Is there currently an electric or power shower there? If not, you'll need cabling installed which will eat into your budget.

Bath panel shouldn't need replacing if you change the colour scheme with the tiling (unless it's particularly old looking?).

I wouldn't have thought shower rail is a priority, but they're so cheap that you might as well do it if you have time. New shower curtain is more important if the old one is water stained or mouldy.

fluffpot

For storage, we have something similar to this in our smaller bathroom.
http://dwell.co.uk/103366/Rotating-mirrored-floor-cabinet/
They also do a smaller one for about £80.

The benefit is that you can just turn it to hide all those toiletries to make the room seem less cluttered, plus you get a mirror into the bargain. It can fit in a really small corner space too.

I would second getting your floor re-tiled - much better than lino.

The fan option, may get quite pricey - it depends where it can vent to the outside - through the wall? or the roof - both are going to be a bit expensive if the bathroom is on the first floor.

Were you thinking of a fully electric shower? This will massively eat into your budget. Might be worth asking a plumber what your options are, and if you can have a pumped shower instead (not possible though if you have a combi boiler)