We had a colonial style stairs which had orangish hues and looked very dated. We recently refinished our hardwood floors to a more modern white oak finish, and the stairs, and the hand rails looked very out of place and had to be refinished as soon as possible. But refinishing stairs is a costly affair since it’s a very manual task. Sanding the stairs is a very manual and time consuming effort, there are tight, awkward places that are difficult to sand.
Let me share the before and after pictures first, and then tips on how to reduce the overall cost.
(Where we started)
Some renovations are expensive but we found ways to keep the overall costs low. Here are some tips that might be helpful to consider
- Do NOT try to match the hand rails with the stair color. That will involve lot of detailed sanding, and then staining.
- Stair treads (the part under the stair) are hard to sand and it’s better not to try and match them with the stairs.
- DO NOT try to match the spindles with the stairs. Leave them alone and paint them white or black (which is totally in these days)
The above three trips helped us manage the budget.
We chose to keep the raw look for the stairs just like the hardwood. We chose to use Bona Natural Seal followed by two coats of Bona Mega One Matte. This Bona system is simply amazing. It is a hard-wearing, commercial-grade, two-part water-based finish for floors and handrails. It’s low VOC, very durable, dries and cures quickly and does not cause the floors to turn amber over time, which allows the natural color and tones of the wood to shine. But the water based hardwood finishing can be tricky to work with because they dry quicker so do yourself a favor and find a certified Bona professional to do the work for you.
For the hand rail we chose to sand them lightly, and go with SW Iron ore. Love how modern they look. It saved us a lot of time and money.
Spindles were painted in SW Extra White in a satin finish. They complement the hand rails and look amazing.
We painted the stair treads, and the bottom flat part to be SW Extra white too. This is one tip I think will save you a lot of $$$
Cost Breakdown
Overall costs for the stairs – 1200$
Paint job for the hand rails, spindles, stair trim, and the bottom flat part – 350$
Let me know if you have any questions below, and I will do my best to answer!