Beginner’s Guide to a Bedroom Remodel
Is your bedroom cluttered, depressing, and lacking warmth and coziness? If so, perhaps it’s time for a bedroom remodel, an awakening of a room that can range from paint to structural changes.
If you’re a homeowner looking to spice up or calm down your bedroom, know that bedroom remodels can have a return on investment of 20% to 45%, according to Angi, the home improvement site, as of mid-2025.
The steps you can take to renovate rooms aren’t too onerous and can often be done without the help of a contractor or other professional. Let’s take a look at the cost to remodel a bedroom, bedroom remodel ideas, and how to pay for a bedroom remodel.
Key Points
• Bedroom remodels can increase home value by 20% to 45%.
• The average cost for a bedroom remodel is around $20,000, depending on the project.
• Painting and decluttering are simple, cost-effective ways to refresh the bedroom.
• Simple bedroom makeovers, involving paint, new bedding, and accessories, can be DIYed.
• Larger projects, involving structural changes or plumbing, often need professional help.
How Much Does It Cost to Remodel a Bedroom?
The typical bedroom costs $20,000 as of mid-2025, according to Angi. However, the amount of money you put into a bedroom remodel depends on what you’re trying to achieve. Do you simply want to change up your décor, including your bed, bedside tables, and desk? Or do you want to paint the room a different color and add some window treatments?
You may also be looking at more extensive changes, such as ripping up carpeting and putting in new flooring, installing new windows, or building custom cabinetry in your closet.
The good news is that most bedroom remodels are less costly than renovations that entail taking down walls, rewiring electrical systems, and installing pipes, though some bedroom remodels may call for these types of tasks.
With a bedroom remodel, you’re less likely to be doing major construction that requires hiring licensed professionals like a carpenter, plumber, or general contractor. And even if you have to rely on the services of a vendor, there are likely other aspects of the project you can tackle yourself.
Recommended: The Top Home Improvements to Increase Your Home’s Value
Simple Bedroom Remodel Ideas
Decluttering is a tried-and-true way to visually open up a room. That means organizing books and magazines, laundry or piles of clothes, and furniture. Here are some other ways.
Painting
What color will turn your current space into your dream bedroom? Some of the major brands and independent companies offer online color consultations. And then, if you feel up to the task, you can avoid hiring a painter by painting your walls yourself.
You’ll want to take stock of the current trim and match a color to it. You’ll also want to consider how the room changes color depending on the time of day. Sometimes a room that looks white in the evening can take on a yellowish tint during the light of day.
You’ll want to make sure you have all the equipment you need to get the work done efficiently and well. This includes paintbrushes, a paint roller and pan, rags, sandpaper, and drop cloths.
The great thing about paint is, if you feel you’ve done a poor job in spots, you can always paint over it.
Flooring
What you do with your floors is going to depend largely on personal taste. Your choices include wall-to-wall carpeting, wood or wood-engineered flooring with or without area rugs, and tile or ceramic flooring, which works best in humid climates.
You’ll want to think about how your flooring will complement the rest of the room, including furniture. You’ll also want to take your comfort into consideration. Carpeting, for example, muffles sound, while wood flooring does not.
Some people don’t like walking barefoot on anything besides carpet, for example, while others prefer the look of bare floors.
Cost may also come into play here as wood flooring is generally more expensive than carpeting, $6 to $25 per square foot. Carpeting typically runs $3.50 to $11 a square foot, HomeAdvisor notes.
Furnishings
While some homeowners may want to keep the bedroom furniture they’re currently using, others choose to sell or donate what they have and start over.
If you’re in the latter group, you’ll want to consider the paint and flooring you’ve chosen when looking for a new bed and headboard, bedside tables, desk, and dresser.
Looking online for bedroom remodel ideas can be a low-cost way to design your bedroom décor, with many blogs and websites linking to online retailers for easy purchase.
Social media sites like Houzz and Pinterest have scores of photos and boards delineated by room, color, and style to help you brainstorm.
If your budget allows, this might be an area to bring in the help of an interior designer. An interior designer may be able to see things you don’t, such as whether you need a large desk for working from home, a bench at the end of the bed for sitting, or a changing table if you plan to grow your family in the near future.
On a tight budget? Many people find cheap furniture online, at flea markets, and from freecycle resources. Refinishing it, painting it, or otherwise freshening it up can be a fun, affordable, hands-on way to update a bedroom.
More Extensive, and Expensive, Bedroom Remodels
While bedroom remodels are typically less wide-ranging than those of a kitchen or bathroom remodel, you may opt for larger changes that can drive up your cost.
These include altering the function and structural design of a room, which may require the use of a professional.
Structural Changes
If you own a home or are looking to buy a property, the lack of an ensuite bathroom might be a big deal. Maybe you’d like to be able to pad into the bathroom in the middle of the night without tiptoeing through the hallway.
Depending on the layout of the bedroom and the rooms near it, this may necessitate turning a closet into a bathroom or building a door through a wall that conjoins your bedroom with that hallway bathroom.
Either way, you’re probably looking at hiring a plumber, carpenter, electrician, and contractor. While this type of remodeling affords you more options than sticking with your current footprint, it comes with added costs to be aware of.
Lighting and Fans
Adding recessed lights requires the work of a licensed electrician, who may have to work around obstacles like heating ducts, and will charge for both installing and wiring each light.
Ceiling fans, while pretty and useful, will likely also require hiring a professional installer to burrow through your ceiling, connect to electricity, and complete the necessary patchwork afterward.
Recommended: Guide to Buying, Selling, and Updating Your Home
Paying for It
Creating a budget and payment plan is key, no matter the size of your bedroom remodel. Some changes are so small that homeowners can pay upfront.
Those with more extensive remodels might use a home equity loan or home improvement loan. These allow you to tap into the value of your home and use the funds to finance your bedroom remodel. They typically have comparatively low interest rates, since they are secured loans with your property as collateral, but obtaining them can take a little while.
Another option would be a home improvement loan. These are a kind of personal loan, which allows you to obtain a lump sum of cash and then pay it back over time with interest. This is usually a fixed-rate personal loan, and the term extends from one to seven years in most cases.
Recommended: Personal Loan Calculator
The Takeaway
A bedroom remodel currently costs $20,000 on average. This price reflects more than just a coat of paint and a new lighting fixture, so it is possible to do the job on a tighter budget and transform your space into a dream bedroom. It could also improve the value of your home. To pay for a bedroom renovation, you might use savings, consider tapping your home equity, or take out a personal loan.
Think twice before turning to high-interest credit cards. Consider a SoFi personal loan instead. SoFi offers competitive fixed rates and same-day funding. See your rate in minutes.
FAQ
How much is the typical bedroom remodel?
The average bedroom remodel costs about $20,000 as of 2025, but it’s possible to spend much less or more, depending on the scope of your project.
How long does it take to renovate a bedroom?
Depending on the extent of the work you are doing, it could take a weekend, several weeks, or even months, if structural changes are part of the plan. It’s a highly individual process.
How can you finance a bedroom remodel?
To finance a bedroom remodel, you might dip into your savings, tap home equity, or take out a personal loan. Credit cards should typically be your last resort due to their high interest rates.
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