The Story of My Kitchen Renovation | Renovating water areas is nothing but satisfying, right?

The ventilation fan in the house I bought used was broken, so I hadn't used the gas stove for a year. This is Usausami.

When you're living alone, it's cheaper to eat deli food that's 30% or 40% off than to cook for yourself.

That in itself is a truth, but once everything else is pretty much done, you end up wanting to change the kitchen too. That said, I couldn't even think about a kitchen renovation until the living room was tidied up. Also, I had told the people who did my bathroom and toilet renovation a while back that I'd ask them again, but while it felt like the material shortage had been resolved more than last year, there was a labor shortage, so I think I waited about two months.

That said, I had the bathroom and toilet done immediately because they were unbearable, but I left the kitchen as it was for a year. So, I felt like, well, waiting a little bit is fine.

How did you place the order?

At first, I thought Takara would be cheap, but it turned out that I'd also have to call in Takara's own craftsmen, so the labor costs would be more than the unit price... so I went with Lixil instead.

There's a service where you can do color simulations on the web, so I just picked things here and there and passed that on to the renovation contractor,

"I don't know which are standard and which are options, so please let me know if anything is ridiculously expensive. But I want this color for the panels."

That's how I placed the order. As a result, the faucet and stove are standard.
If you compare them, cheap things are just cheap, and expensive things are nice, but I think the ones that were originally installed were generally cheap ones too (as usual, I didn't take any 'before' photos lol),

Old and normal <<<< An impassable wall <<<<< New even if cheap

No matter how you look at it. I mean, new water fixtures are just the absolute best; it's been a year since I did the rental-grade bathroom, and I'm nothing but satisfied.
After all, I'm not in the bath that much (lol).

What were the renovation period and cost?

There was a mistake in ordering the hanging cabinets, so they actually aren't installed yet, and they seem to be smaller than what I ordered, so the price might change slightly, but it was 1.2 million yen.
I feel like it's about 200,000 yen more expensive than when I did it with the bathroom and toilet last year, but well, it can't be helped. (Though I don't know the price for the specific things I chose, that's just my feeling.)

The renovation period was probably two or three days.
(Though in my case, the hanging cabinets were done later, so it was three days.)
It felt like one day for removal and one day for installation.

Since the hanging cabinet part that isn't installed is exposed, I don't really want to cook there like that, so it looks like I won't be using the stove for a while, but I hadn't used it for a year anyway (lol), so I'm just thinking that it's fine as long as it's properly installed in the near future lol.

If I had a family and was cooking properly, this might be a big deal, but I'm just a single person living on deli food.

Like this, after peeling things off, they filled in the unnecessary holes with wood before re-attaching the panels.

Looking at it roughly, what caught my attention was that while there are tiles for fireproofing, the area behind the tiles is carbonized and scorched.
I feel like I'd want to use the back burner when simmering for a long time, but isn't there a theory that for long-term use, you should use the front one, or in this layout, the left burner facing forward?

It might be different from when I use it, but it's really great to be able to discover things like this when renovating a used house.

How is the finish?

Although I had to make some compromises from what I initially chose, I'm pretty satisfied.
The hanging cupboard part is peeling, so I didn't include it in the photo lol
Also, one thing worth mentioning is that I used to be bothered by odors enough that I'd open the windows first thing when I woke up, but now when I wake up and go to the living room,

zero odor.

I almost feel like I should have done it sooner. I used to keep deodorizing beads on the counter, but now it's like, do I even need them? Well, I might end up putting them back if I keep using it, though.

Well, how should I put it, the bathroom and toilet before the renovation were so intense that the kitchen felt cute as long as I used Pipe Unish.

In terms of price, I had to compromise on a lot of things from what I first chose, but

NEW IS ABSOLUTELY RIGHT

It was just that. Maybe I appreciate it more because I only renovated after I started living here, but I thought that if you buy a used house, even if it costs around 3 million yen, it's probably best to replace the three main water-related areas before moving in if you can.

But you appreciate it even more if you do it after moving in (lol)

As for other parts, if they were okay enough during the viewing, I'd want to say they're trivial. Though, this house didn't have curtain rails and I had a really hard time installing them myself.

So, although there are still some parts where the painting isn't finished, the big stuff is finally done.

Bonus: I also had a mailbox installed

I'll refrain from posting photos of the outside of the house, but I had them install the mailbox I was thinking of asking them to put up while they were at it.

I installed the smallest one on the far left of this.

The V2 can be opened from the back, but at the time I moved, only the old version was sold in Japan. Now that the V2 is out, it's finally here! I was thinking of getting the middle size since I'd been using a 100-yen shop trash can as a mailbox for a year, but I decided the small one was fine (lol)

Until now, the lid of the trash can wouldn't close after about a month, so it was actually left open, which meant I could tell if there was mail in it just by looking.
Since I have to go out of my way to open it to see if there's anything inside, I'm debating whether or not to attach an opening/closing sensor (the ramblings of a shut-in).

Even if the plastic ones on the back like at my parents' house aren't great for security, you can tell if there's mail in them just by looking, you know.

Well, anyway, I think it's better now that I can receive Amazon packages without them ringing the doorbell.
Even for Letter Packs (the type that goes in the mailbox), they used to ring the doorbell lololol

Ah, I bought snacks to give to the foreman who came to check, but I forgot.
I'll eat them.