Tips for Owning a Cabin Home

Hilde Leiaghat shares her tips as the homeowner of a vacation cabin in the mountains.

• We kept the kitchen as it was but changed the cabinet hardware and painted the walls, which had been a faux-wood color, immediately. We painted them a historic green color that we bought at the hardware store.

• Make sure your home is insulated really well. We replaced the aluminum windows with weatherproof windows to keep the cold out.

• We threw out the furniture and redecorated. It had ugly brown carpeting and ugly reclining chairs from the 1980s. We built a new deck around the cabin; due to the amount of snow, the old one gave way.

• A cabin could be a good moneymaker if you rent it out when you know you won’t be using it.