how much should I budget to renovate a beach house?

THE VIEW IS THE ONLY THING THAT DOESN’T NEED REPAINTING

Yeah, I hear you on the “maintenance surprises.” I thought I was being clever by using stainless hardware everywhere, but even that started showing rust after a couple seasons. It’s wild how fast things go downhill if you skip a year of upkeep. I’ve started treating my annual budget like it’s got a “mystery leak” line item—because something always pops up. Sometimes I wonder if it’d be cheaper to just rent and let someone else deal with the headaches... but then again, waking up to the ocean is hard to beat.