Bathroom Demo Day

My husband and I love a DIY project. It’s like therapy, but more expensive. It’s a partnership where one of us acts as the project manager and the other one follows the directions of the project manager. My husband learned how to keep a fraternity house standing and under budget when he was treasurer of his fraternity. Pizza boxes made for reliable and cheap solutions for broken windows.

Even then, he loved a budget.

If that fraternity house could talk…

A similar thought crossed my mind when I assessed the amount of work to remove the tub, shower, wall shower, tile, toilet, vanity, baseboards and sinks. If these bathroom walls could talk…

I dreaded the demo bathroom remodel phase.

It took us five months a year ago to update our daughter’s bathroom. I have yet to post that project I did, however, share the only thing we didn’t create ourselves here. It has been fourteen months and the only project I shared was this vanity purchase. (which I have yet to post the full remodel). As we updated our almost 20-year-old brownstone in the suburbs we learned a few things. We also aged 20 years which is a very, scary sentence and realization. OMG!

After finishing our daughter’s bathroom remodel here’s what we learned: the task to remove tile cost my husband a few days away from the slopes because of a pulled back muscle. And, the demo part of the project was above my pay grade.

I shared our bathroom update project here after our middle returned to college. We planned on updating the boys’ bathroom before he returned for Thanksgiving. We should have clarified what year.

This month I tossed out the question in my head, “What if we could pay someone to demo the bathroom?” Just asking the question made me feel like I was cheating on my house. To settle my guilty conscience, I ran the question by my husband. But, not before I had already called a realtor friend who gave me her demo guy’s name.

We decided, while I was texting this guy, there was no harm in getting a quote.

If the sequence of events sounds confusing; I am protecting my sources and timeline of events.

A demo crew member was in the boys’ bathroom two hours later measuring the space.

He texted me the quote which was $100.00 more than I planned to pay. I almost countered (I am a Realtor) but he sent a 2nd text that the only day he was free was the upcoming Saturday.

Is there a patron saint for DIY?

I grabbed these pics to capture a few before the demo bathroom pics and the memories.

Yes, I am peeking around the corner by the tub/shower. And, yes I cleaned the bathroom. Scroll down to see what the boys’ bathroom looked like over the summer. And, when I say boys I mean highschool/college age young men. But they will always be “my boys.”

And, here was the boys’ bathroom seven hours after Kenny arrived on Saturday morning. To answer the timeless DIY question, “Yes, there is some one we could pay to demo the bathroom.

Stay tuned! Now it’s our time to put this space back together!