Price Breakdown

Bear with me, this next project was a big one for me and one that was a bit of an adventure so there will be a couple posts about it.

If you're anything like me you read a bunch of blogs where people refinish furniture.  On these sites they often list their supplies and they end up needing to buy three things since they had everything else on hand.  Not the case with this project.  All these blogs have made me feel like it's no big deal to do what I wanted to do, I was not prepared for the huge amounts of supplies we needed to gather.  We don't re-finish furniture, we had zero supplies and needed to buy or borrow absolutely everything.  I feel I was completely unprepared for the actual cost of this project so I thought I would give you a true to the penny breakdown of what it costs to do a project like this (minus the few items we borrowed, sorry).

First of all a bit about the project.  For my birthday I was given a solid wood door.  Thinking I was sneaky I teased and showed the door only to have everyone guess correctly that I was making a headboard.  We also have these really ugly bedside tables that I decided to re-finish at the same time so we'd have a matching set.  There will be more about those two projects but this post is just a cost breakdown.

I made a list of everything we needed, sure I got everything (yeah right!), this was what we picked up (this picture makes me smile now because I thought we were buying so much but now when I look at it this is such a small pile compared to the stuff we ended up with).

Here's a price rundown:

• Zinsser brand primer-sealer - $9.97
• 2 cans double cover RUST-OLEUM Heirloom White Spray paint - $6.99 each
• Behr brand Faux Glaze - $12.49
• RUST-OLEUM Espresso paint - $5.97
• Minwax Stain and Polyurethane in American Chestnut - $8.49
• Green Painters Tape - $3.19
• 2 Foam Brushes - $1.49, $1.24
• Polyurethane Spray - $9.99
• 4 new drawer pulls - $4.39 each

Total with tax and environmental fees, $83.17.  We were a little surprised at the cost and then Brad had the brilliant plan, sign up for a credit card and get $25 off.  We signed up, saved $25, paid for the card and canceled it.  Done.

Then we came home from my parents with this basket of goodies, no prices for these obviously.

• Sandpaper
• Finishing nails
• Wood glue
• Paint stripper (which I ended up not needing)
• Putty (to cover nail holes, which I also didn't use)
• Varsol (to clean up the stain, didn't use this either)
• Steel Wool (nope, this one didn't get used in the end, I prefer really light sand paper)
• A handy spray paint handle (which I'm never giving back, she has two)
• Rags
• A bucket to mix the glaze
• Paint stir stick (we forgot to grab one)
• Rubber gloves (for working with the glaze and stain)

Then there was the second trip to Home Depot for more brushes and a roller, $8.49 and the trip to 6 different stores looking for two more cans of paint, which turned into 3 because I was worried about having to find it again, $20.97.  In the end I needed all 3 so I was really grateful I'd bought the extra.

So the door was $45 but a birthday gift, so free for me
The first trip for supplies was $63.17 but $50 was a gift from my in-laws, that helped a lot.
The miscellaneous trips for supplies cost $29.46
Lastly we had the cost of the wood parts, $18

Total cost of new headboard and two refinished bedside tables $156.61 (just imagine if we'd had to buy all the supplies that we got from my Mom)

Cost for us $61.61

Not too shabby for something that's great quality and I love.  Stay tuned Monday, we'll start with the bedside tables and then move onto the headboard the following day, I hope you love them like I do.