10 Cheap Living Room Makeover Ideas On a Budget

Are you looking for living room makeovers on a budget?

Perhaps you just moved in to a new home and you’re looking for smart and easy living room design ideas to make the space truly your own.

If you have a small living room, an outdated living room or a poorly designed living room, it can often feel uncomfortable to be in the space so much so that you don’t even use the room!

That’s no good.

As the primary room in a house where family and friends gather, the living room is probably the most important space in your home to be designed properly to suit your needs.

After all, your friends and family members spend a lot of time bonding in the living room, as it is the primary room dedicated to socialization in your home. Thus, living room interior design is important.

But don’t worry, we’ve got you covered!

Whether you’re looking for small living room designs, living room makeover ideas on a budget or how to do living room makeovers, we’ve gathered some easy and simple tips that anyone can do to spruce up their space.

You don’t need to break the bank to have the living room of your dreams — just a few organizational and aesthetic changes will leave you happy and relaxed in your new, awesome living room.

List of The Top 10 Inexpensive Living Room Makeover Ideas On a Budget

1. Mix & Match Patterns & Textures in Living Room

When starting on your living room makeover, consider decorating with patterns and textures. When you contrast different textures, such as rough and smooth, bumpy and shiny, or thin and thick, you make a room come alive and prevent a static and conventional space.

A monochromatic room is dull, drab and boring.

When furnishing your living room, look for furniture with interesting details, rugs or tiled floors with cross-hatch patterns, drapes or curtains made of silk and soft-to-the-touch fabrics, pillows and fur throw blankets in complementary colors and designs.

When elements of diverse qualities are combined, the end result is something beautiful, eclectic and truly magical.

Often, living room design ideas that mix and match patterns and textures encourage us to use the items that are in the room (e.g. books, baskets, pillows, blankets), rather than storing them away for fear of messing up the place!

2. Feng Shui Your Space

Though you’ve heard the term before, maybe you’re not entirely sure how to feng shui your living room.

Utilizing feng shui in any living space is top priority since it can transform the flow of qi (i.e. energy) from either extremes — chaotic and fast or stagnant and stale — to a steady, calm flow that is rejuvenating and refreshing.

Living room makeovers that utilize feng shui techniques tend to be the best looking and feeling living room designs.

Feng shui interior design for living room includes location, layout, furniture and the overall vibe.

On the internet, you can find a lot of different tips and tricks to feng shui your space during living room makeovers on a budget, but the primary feng shui guidelines are as follows:

No Clutter.

A living room that is free from clutter is the foundation for good feng shui.

Lack of clutter cannot be emphasized enough: there can be no genuine feng shui in a space that is infected with clutter since the two of them are directly counter to one another.

Arrangement & Balance.

No matter what size, the feng shui living room will feel roomy and comfortable.

This is primarily due to the arrangement of furniture and objects, as well as the balance of colors, textures and patterns throughout the feng shui living room.

A living room decorated entirely in any one color is not good feng shui; instead, a balance of multiple colors, shapes and materials leads to a healthier and more harmonious environment.

Flow & Pathways.

Living room interior design that uses feng shui will have architectural designed and natural pathways, which is maintained by optimal furniture placement.

For instance, an item of furniture that juts out into an obvious pathway not only becomes a hazard of safety, but also blocks energy’s attempts to flow unobstructed throughout the living space.

Natural Light & Ventilation.

A feng shui living room must be located in a room that has two exterior walls.

The reason for this is that the proximity to the outdoors encourages and allows fresh, positive energy to enter and flow freely throughout the space.

Additionally, plenty of sunlight and ventilation is ensured by the windows on the exterior walls.

3. The Power of Color in Living Room Makeover

Any interior designer would agree: changing the color palette of a room is one of the best and easiest ways to transform the look of a room.

During your living room makeover, keep in mind that color acts in three basic ways: active, passive and neutral.

Lighter colors are expansive and airy, making small living rooms feel larger. Dark colors, on the other hand, are sophisticated and warm, adding drama to a design scheme and making a living room interior design feel more intimate.

• Turquoise and beige
• Purple and green
• Sage, pink and beige
• Blue and burnt orange
• Blue, green and cream
• Yellow and grey
• Yellow, pink and green
• Red and blue
• Pink and yellow
• Red and white
• Blue and yellow

Keep in mind that each color has a psychological value: they can influence how you feel and serve to help you achieve the mood you want.

In addition to painting your walls a new color, small living room designs also encourage utilizing colored fabrics, carpeting, furniture and tile to truly transform a room.

However, if you’re looking for cheap living room makeovers, just painting the walls is a fairly inexpensive way to entirely transform a room.

The most important thing to keep in mind when utilizing color in a living room makeover is balance.

4. Let There Be Light in Living Room

Though this tip has been touched on in feng shui techniques (tip #2), the importance of enough light cannot be overstated: lighting is an essential element of a room and can impact everything else in the space.

Living rooms should have four types of lighting:

1. Natural light in a room automatically makes a room feel bigger, breezier and more inviting.
2. Ambient light is in the background and gives the room a general illumination.
3. Task lighting focuses light onto certain areas, generally where work is done.
4. Accent lighting illuminates specific areas of the room or objects in the room.

If your living room is small, cramped and dark, there are (thankfully) many decorating tricks you can do to brighten up the space without undergoing a massive renovation!

A successful lighting design combines a number of light sources at different levels in the room: a mixture of table lamps, floor lamps, ceiling fixtures and accents, built-in accents and sculptural light fixtures will combine to create a layered and robust lighting scheme, free from shadows!

During your living room makeover, consider using these different types of lighting placed at different points in the room, in combination with large windows to let in natural light.

If adding windows or making your windows larger is outside of your control at the moment, consider these living room design ideas:

• Hang sheer, gauzy curtains on your windows to let in as much light as possible. Install tie-backs on the walls so you can pull the curtains back when desired.
• Paint the walls a glossy white: white reflects light, and the gloss augments that effect.
• Select light-colored furniture for the room: light upholstery reflects natural light and brightens the room.
• Cover a dark floor with a light-colored rug. Consider replacing dark floors with lighter-colored tile or wood floors. The floor has a large surface area that can help to reflect and maximize natural light.
• Decorate with mirrors, but be careful not to create a painful glare in the middle of your living room during certain times of the day.
• If it is within your budget, install a light tube. These devices collect sunlight from the rafters and channel it down to your living space. If you have extensive DIY experience, this can be a simple way to add light to your living room makeover; if not, hire a contractor!

5. Storage Is A Must in Living Room

No matter how large or small, your living room demands adequate storage.

Since the primary intention of your living room design and living room makeover is to create a space for socialization and relaxation, your living room makeover will require clever storage pieces to keep clutter to an absolute minimum.

You can do this with large built-ins and with unique dual-purpose living room furniture pieces.

Check out these living room design ideas for ample storage:

• Two-tiered coffee table or coffee table with drawers
• Invest in an entertainment center or built-ins
• Add storage with a stylish hutch
• Repurpose a dresser as a TV stand
• Incorporate a storage bench into the living room design, under a window
• Use cubby-like shelves
• Utilize all of your wall space: store things up to the ceiling
• Use storage ottomans as a coffee table or end table
• Use a console table behind the couch
• Hang shelves and cabinets on the walls

Living room is a gathering area for family members as well as guests, and it needs to be comfortable as well as inviting.

Also it must set the tone for the décor of the rest of your house.

Keeping all these factors in mind, decorating the living room is not an easy task and requires planning.

Here are the basic things to consider while doing a living room.

6. Painting in Living Room Makeover On a Budget

The first thing that should be carefully decided is the color of the living room. To get the living room of your choice-

You can use bold color for the wall which appears to be the point of focus of the room. Painting the other walls with contrasting color will make the room look vibrant.

While coloring small rooms, dark color should be avoided as this will make the room look much smaller.

Painting the walls with soft shades can create a peaceful atmosphere within the room.

Ceiling should always be painted in white to maximize the light.

7. Flooring in The Living Room Makeover

A good solid floor will generate an impressive image of the owner of the house. These days you can use different types of flooring available:

* Carpet Flooring – This type of flooring has been there since forever and is still preferred by many. Carpets are available in various designs and they can be machine-made or handmade.

* Hardwood Flooring – This type of flooring is preferred to carpet flooring as it can be easily cleaned of dust, liquid or other stuff. Moreover they can be polished which gives a classy look to the room.

* Laminate Flooring – Laminates are less expensive as compared to hardwood flooring. Hence, you can easily change them every six to seven years to give a new look to your room.

* Tile Flooring – This type of flooring is becoming popular these days due to the efficiency of the tiles to keep the room cool. Moreover they comes in various shapes and exquisite designs.

8. Contemporary Furnitures For Living Room Makeover

Though furniture comes last in the decoration category, it is essential to choose it wisely. An ill-fitting furniture can destroy the look of the room.

The recent trend is to use contemporary furniture which is not heavily ornamented like the vintage wooden furniture.

This is the reason contemporary furniture is finding prominence in most living rooms. Some of the other characteristics of this modern day furniture are:

• This type of furniture is made of metal which gives it a lustrous and glistening look which blends with any kind of décor.
• Modern furniture is sleek hence fits in any place.
• Contemporary living room furniture follows simple designs comprising plain geometric structures and soft colors.
• Materials used to build this furniture make it lighter, therefore portable.

Therefore, to make this room lively and to create the perfect ambiance, paint, flooring, lighting and furniture should be chosen carefully.

You can also hire an interior decorator, who with their expertise can make your living room look even better.

To locate these experts, you are advised to run a quick search online.

Have you ever walked into a living room and couldn’t tell kids lived in the home?

Does your neighbor’s living room always look trendy and up-to-date?

Their decorating secret may be that they’re using slipcovers.

Slipcovers are a quick and easy way to update your furniture and keep the living room looking fresh.

However, you can’t just get any slipcovers and expect them to work in your room.

The secret is to choose the right slipcover for your furniture.

9. Ready-made & Custom Slipcovers For Living Room On a Budget

There was a time when slipcovers were available only for sofas.

Now you can find ready-made slipcovers for sleep sofas, lounge chairs, recliners, sectional sofas, a futon, chaise or even kids’ furniture in the living room.

They come in almost any style, color, or pattern you can imagine.

For a custom look at a fraction of the cost, look for slipcovers that cover each of the chair cushions on your sofa.

This gives a better appearance than a slipcover with one piece that fits over all the cushions.

If you can’t find a ready-made slipcover to suit your style, you can always choose from thousands of fabrics and have slipcovers custom made for your furniture.

Lighter weight fabrics usually are better for slipcovers than heavy upholstery fabric that may be difficult to sew and harder to fit on the furniture.

10. Choose Right Living Room Decoration On a Budget

Seasonal Decorating

Slipcovers allow you to change the look and feel of your room as the seasons of the year change without buying new furniture.

Heavily textured fabrics in darker colors work well in the fall and winter.

They will not only feel warm and cozy but hide dirt that can get on the slipcover when you’re lounging on the sofa.

Smoother fabrics in lighter colors are great to use during the spring and summer months. Your living room will appear cool and comfortable on a warm day.

Decorating Moods

You can change the mood of your room in minutes by changing the slipcovers and adding or subtracting a few home accessories.

Your living room can look more formal with slipcovers fashioned from fabrics with traditional patterns such as paisley and jacquard.

Add brushed brass or crystal accessories and your living room looks more polished.

If you’re looking for a fun, casual look choose slipcovers made from fabrics in primary colors.

Red, green, and yellow colored fabrics and home accessories create a cheery and playful mood in a room.

Decorating Styles

Get a country look with slipcovers in fabrics with floral, check or plaid patterns. Accessorize the room with items found in nature such as branches, rock and branches.

Create a sleek modern look with slipcovers made from fabrics in solid, neutral colors such as white, beige or black.

Polished chrome and brushed nickel home decor items keep the room looking fresh and contemporary.

Another fun way to change the look of your living room is with slipcovers in retro colors like buttercream, chartreuse and turquoise.

Complete the look by decorating your living room with vintage items.

And there you have it!

10 simple living room makeover ideas you can do on a budget, without breaking the bank.

Living room makeovers on a budget can be fairly simple and fun to do — no need for a huge renovation that will take up all your time, energy and money with living room makeover ideas like these

Avoid these Mistakes to Save Money on Living Room Makeover

Most of us are enjoying while we decorating our living room with all the best ideas and plans in our mind, but sometimes we tend to make common mistakes over and over again.

So here in this section I will share some important tips on how to decorate a living room avoiding some of these common mistakes

Instead of quality, people go for quantity, this is a common mistake we often made.

Just because the accessories are very cheap doesn’t mean we have to buy a lot of them to accessorize our living room.

We will end up purchasing something needless and don’t add a contribution to our decoration, even made our room cluttered which in turns offer nothing but annoyance, in short, we are wasting our money for something don’t worth.

It doesn’t mean that we can purchase moderate to very expensive furniture because it looks beautiful, we still have to take theme matching into consideration when picking a nice furniture.

I won’t take the risk to purchase a piece of furniture that won’t match with my living room theme. It’s a waste of money.

Think wisely before you purchase anything.

Cluttered and messy furniture arrangement, this is another big common mistake we often made.

I remembered my first office room furniture arrangement consumed too much spaces and the whole room was very cluttered and messy, there is not much spaces for walkway.

After some rearrangement, my furniture were arranged in much more organized way, there is even a big spaces for walkway and the whole room looks bigger although it was just a 200 ft room.

Try to arrange your furniture in a more organized way as this not only make your living room clean and tidy, it also creates a harmony and comfortable environment.

Non-matching style or theme, either directly or indirectly, well planned or go without any plan, we often purchased a furniture we like much but it never matches with our theme.

Maybe the price is reasonable and the furniture style is one of the best, but keep in mind that, furniture that don’t match our theme from the beginning will always be not matching until we switch our theme or style that matches with it.

Once we decided to go for our style, stick to it and never get tempted to other furniture style especially the latest trend.

They will be the past very soon so never follow the trend as it is not practical at all.

Created two or more competing focal point, another common mistake.

Lets say We have a big beautiful canvas wall art on the wall, then we have another big plasma TV on the other side, and maybe there is a beautiful grand piano on the other side again, these 3 decor are actually competing with each other in terms of focal point because they are very attractive.

We only want to create one focal point in our living room, so choose either one to become our living room focal point, depends on situation, we may or may not combine either 2 or 3 together to become a very strong focal point.

These are some of the common mistakes that we should avoid when we want to decorate a living room.

By avoiding these common mistakes, it would ride us off the hassles when we are going to decorate a living room thus making the process much more simple.

How to decorate a living room without hassles is as simple as avoiding common mistakes.