Live in a gloomy, cramped bungalow built in the late 1940s?
Why not remove a few divider walls to open those tiny rooms to let in the light and accommodate a growing number of family members, including grandchildren?
That is what Rick and Victoria Preston did recently to their 1,200 square-foot bungalow on Brock Street in River Heights.
"Our traditional L-shaped home was divided by hallway walls that served no purpose other than to separate one room from another," said Victoria Preston of Royal LePage Real Estate.
Victoria and her husband decided they either needed a bigger house or a major renovation of their existing home.
"We love the area of the city in which we live and were reluctant to leave it for a larger and, possibly more expensive, home in the suburbs," said Victoria.
They decided to renovate their existing home by calling on the services of All Canadian Renovations, a company that Victoria had read about in a Winnipeg Free Press Homes article about two years ago.
"I'd kept the article because I was impressed by the company's attention to detail and to their eclectic design options," said Victoria, adding that she and her husband wanted to blend traditional and contemporary styles.
When Tony Teunis of All Canadian visited the home, he felt the re-construction would be straightforward, with as few glitches as possible considering the capricious nature of the renovations business.
"However, when we opened the ceiling there was an unwelcome surprise. The roof had been stick-built which meant the hallway walls we wanted to remove were load bearing ones," he said.
As a result, the walls had to be held up with temporary 2-by-6-inch walls that shouldered the weight of the original ones.
Two LVL beams with an engineer's stamp eventually replaced the load-bearing walls, one of which spanned the length of the house, and another that was about half the length was tied into a remaining original wall.
"This glitch almost doubled the first estimate because we were also required to add a concrete pad in the basement and a heavy-duty telepost in the basement to ensure the weight of the roof was properly supported," said Teunis.
Despite the extra expense and a five-week wait (normally three weeks) for a permit from the City of Winnipeg, Victoria and her husband were not upset.
"We'd gone to Phoenix for a couple of weeks to live while the reno was underway and only spent a few night living in the basement of our house because of the delay," she said.
"Tony suggested we keep the original fir baseboards because to replace them would have been very costly," she said.
The walls were painted taupe so that they would match existing colours in the house and the lighting was updated by adding pot lights in the living room, dining room and a few in the bathroom ceiling.
Victoria said the renovation allowed light to flow from one end of the house to the other, as well as giving the impression that the 1,200-sq.-ft. bungalow was twice its former size.
She said the next step will be to renovate the basement, adding an extra room and bathroom for her growing family and a rumpus room for the kids.
Will she hire All Canadian to do the job?
"Absolutely, I was most impressed with Tony and his team."
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