How to Create an Awesome Guest Room on a Budget

There are several reasons why someone would want a guest room. For example, they might want to have guests over. Alternatively, they might want to rent it out for extra income. On top of this, guest rooms are something of a status symbol because they are a visible statement that the owner can afford to have extra space in their home. Fortunately, if you are interested, you should know that you can create an awesome guest room on a budget.

How Can You Create an Awesome Guest Room On a Budget?

Here are some suggestions for decorating a guest room without breaking your budget in the process from My Domaine and other sources:

Make Your Guest Room Dual-Use

For starters, you should make your guest room dual-use. Essentially, if you aren’t using your guest room as a guest room, you should be using it as something else. The best candidate for that other use depends on your particular needs and preferences. One suggestion is a home office if you do remote work.

Another suggestion is a recreation room if you need a space for your hobbies. Creating an awesome guest room on a budget isn’t just about cutting costs. Instead, you want to make your guest room as useful as possible while keeping your costs low because that is how you can get the most value out of the space. Making your guest room dual-size can give you two rooms for the price of one, which is a huge improvement.

Look For Dual-Use Furniture

Design Like says dual-use furniture is extremely useful. After all, it enables you to get more usefulness out of a space without producing a corresponding increase in your costs. That is possible because of several things. First, dual-use furniture means you are buying one piece of furniture rather than two.

Second, dual-use furniture means you are still getting the usefulness of two pieces of furniture rather than one. Third, dual-use furniture uses less space, which is extra convenient when you work with something as small as a single room. These things are particularly beneficial when you are going ahead with the idea of making your guest room dual-use.

Give the Guest Room a Fresh Coat of Paint

A fresh coat of paint is one of the easiest ways to improve a room’s appearance. As a result, this should be high on your to-do list if you are looking for an inexpensive way to make your guest room seem more livable. Please note that Bob Vila and other sources say choosing the right color has a huge effect on the overall feel of a bedroom.

For example, you don’t want either red, orange, or yellow because those are stimulating colors. Thanks to that, if you paint a bedroom in one of those colors, its occupant will find it harder to fall asleep. Similarly, you don’t want a bedroom that is either black or white. Black makes it easier to fall asleep but harder to wake up.

Moreover, it makes a space seem cramped and closed-in, which is a huge issue when it is already on the smaller end of things. Meanwhile, white is too cold and sterile, thus making it a poor choice for a space that should be warm and welcoming.

Generally speaking, you should check out neutral colors that are lighter in tone without seeming cold. Common examples include beiges, creams, and tans. Neutral colors tend not to excite people. In exchange, they possess widespread appeal, thus making them safe choices for spaces that will see a regular succession of people pass through.

Of course, if you know there is a color better suited for your guest room, you should go with that instead. Individual preferences trump general trends in this regard unless you have plans for which general trends matter.

Get a Good Mattress

A good mattress can cover a multitude of sins. Simply put, a guest room is a bedroom. Due to that, the bed is either the most important or one of the most important components. You might think a good mattress is expensive. However, Slumber Yard says there are ways for interested individuals to get a better deal.

First, mattress stores have sales like other retailers. It is common for them to have sales on Black Friday, but it is also common for them to have sales on other major holidays. As a result, if someone wants to buy a mattress, it is a good idea to keep a watchful eye on mattress stores when the right times of the year come around.

Second, coupons and coupon codes are extremely useful. Some of these offers are worth $200 or so, which is a fair amount of money that can be better used elsewhere in the guest room. Third, you might be able to get a better deal by buying a product bundle. Yes, that means you will spend more than if you buy just a mattress.

Still, if you need more than just a mattress for your guest room, it makes sense to take advantage of a product bundle rather than buy the items separately. Fourth, pay attention to the mattress’s warranty. It is always possible for a product to have some kind of problem. Due to that, you need a decent warranty to protect your interests as a just-in-case measure. Fifth, you should get a feel for the mattress before you make a purchase. Visiting mattress stores is the best way to do so. Failing that, you can ask for samples, which aren’t as good as checking out the real thing but are still informative.

Visit Second-Hand Stores

You could buy nothing but new furniture for your guest room. That means higher prices. Furthermore, that isn’t necessarily the best choice for your guest room’s overall look. Generally speaking, people want a bedroom they can be comfortable in. New furniture doesn’t necessarily make people comfortable because it can be too perfect-looking, thus causing them to restrain themselves for fear of causing damage.

Instead, consider visiting second-hand stores for second-hand furniture that is worn enough for people to relax in. As a bonus, distressed-looking pieces are popular with sizable segments of the population, so much so that interested individuals can find tutorials on how to artificially distress new furniture. You could do that, but to be perfectly honest, you would be much better off buying authentically-distressed pieces at much lower prices.

As always, My Move and other sources offer helpful suggestions on buying second-hand furniture. For instance, you need to thoroughly inspect each piece before you decide whether you want to buy it or not. You want pieces worn enough to be cheap and comfortable but not worn enough to be unusable. Yes, if you have the right skills, you can get good use out of even damaged pieces by either re-varnishing, reupholstering, or otherwise giving them a makeover.

Still, some pieces are so damaged that the effort isn’t worthwhile. Besides this, you should know that you should never buy certain kinds of second-hand furniture. The most famous example would be second-hand mattresses. Essentially, they can harbor bacteria and other problematic things.

In particular, it is very common for bed bugs to spread through second-hand mattresses. They are ridiculously hardy creatures, so much so Orkin says the adults can last up to a year without feeding. Thanks to that, second-hand mattresses shouldn’t be risked.

Buy Plush Blankets and Pillows

Guest rooms should be warm and welcoming spaces. There are countless ways to create that kind of impression. One of the easiest is buying plush blankets and pillows before putting them in the right room. There isn’t much to be said about this because it is as straightforward as it sounds. Besides blankets and pillows, you might also want to get a good rug for your guest room if you don’t already have carpeting installed in it.

Put In Some Storage Solutions

If you want your guest room to serve as a guest room, you should give it some storage solutions. After all, people tend not to travel empty-handed, meaning they tend to find storage space in temporary accommodations very useful. For a lot of people, the first storage solution that comes to mind would be a closet or some other expensive piece of furniture.

Fortunately, you have better alternatives, particularly when your guest room is on the smaller end of things. One example would be an over-the-door rack, which you can either install or remove as needed. Another example would be wall-mounted racks and shelves, which are relatively easy ways to utilize vertical space. Dual-use furniture is also great for this purpose. Even something like a luggage rack can come with a built-in shelf for extra storage space.

Have Some Seating

Not everyone likes sitting on a bed. As a result, your guest room needs to have some additional seating. It doesn’t need to be particularly expensive. For example, if you have a work desk in your guest room, just pair it with a decently-comfortable chair. Alternatively, if you want to go as basic as possible, you can always put a bench at the end of the bed. Your guests may or may not use it as seating. If they don’t, they can always use it as an extra bit of storage space.

Have More Than One Light

Generally speaking, you want a bedroom to have warm light rather than cool light. The reasoning is simple. Warm light is good for creating a warm and welcoming atmosphere. In contrast, cool light is much better suited for places where you expect to do work. You want to minimize the things in your bedroom that can keep you from your sleep, which is why you shouldn’t install sources of cool light in them.

Guest rooms are an exception to this rule. The gist of it is that their occupants will be using them as not just places to sleep but also places to work. Due to that, you should provide them with extra options for lighting. At the very least, you should make sure there is a good reading light situated either close to a chair or over the bed. That way, the occupants will always have a clear view whenever they do something that requires it. Other popular places to put sources of light range from bedside tables to work desks.

Have a Set of Window Treatments

Having a set of window treatments is surprisingly important for a guest room. Windows are great for providing natural light and ventilation. Their downside is that they can do so at inconvenient times for the occupant of a room. Anyone who has ever woken up because of sunlight on their face will understand this on an intuitive level.

As such, window treatments are an easy way to provide your guests with control over the windows. If they want to wake up as soon as the sun starts shining, they can get that by keeping the window treatments open.

In contrast, if they want to sleep in, they can get that by closing the window treatments instead. Choice tends to make everything better for people, so having a good set of window treatments is an easy way to provide it to your guests. Meanwhile, you should know the cost of window treatments can differ a great deal depending on what you are buying. That means you can spend as much and as little as you want on this one.

Include Some Home Essentials

Some home essentials can make a guest room seem much more comfortable. Common examples range from a box of facial tissues to a pen and a paper pad. The ubiquitous use of smartphones and other mobile devices means that a charger can also do a great deal to make the space more pleasant for its occupant.

Best of all, none of these things are expensive. If you don’t want to buy them specifically for your guest room, you can always just borrow them from the rest of your home.

You can also read:

• 10 Pieces That Ruin the Energy in Your Bedroom
• 20 Guest Bedroom Ideas That’ll Knock Your Socks Off
• 20 Awesome Bedroom Ceiling Ideas