What do the current walls look like? I personally find these tub surrounds a negative because I associate them with cheap motels.

Thanks for responding so quickly.

The walls are white 4x4 tile; pretty plain and boring. The grout's darkened and black in several places (despite my cleaning efforts). The silicon (?) sealer between the tub and the tile walls is pretty gross (again, despite my cleaning and also replacing it about a year ago).

It's the only bathroom (yes, a very old house) and I think it needs to be jazzed up at least slightly.

Also, I should add that the tub is chipped in a couple of places, as well.

Suzieque

This post was edited by suzieque on Mon, Dec 2, 13 at 13:41

Well, I think if you can regrout, recaulk, and refinish the tub, and add a nice wall paint color and bath accessories, you can get a long way. How are the vanity, mirror, light fixture?
if you could post pictures and go to the bath or home decorating forum, you'd get a lot of good advice.

I agree to just do a general clean up/fix up to the existing tile. Is the tub cast iron? If so you have have it refinished if needed. A plastic tub surround even if brand new is something that needs to be gutted to some buyers.

Clean the grout and use an epoxy grout colorant to make it look spiffy. Recaulk, and then leave the rest alone. Any tub surround worth doing costs thousands that you will never recoup, and it will involve removing the tile that's there and that opens up a whole can of worms. Let the new owners dig those worms and spend that money. As long as it looks clean, it's fine.

Ok, great advice. Thank you! This is the kind of advice I was looking for.

The bathroom walls are fine and pretty, as is the vanity and the fixtures. I don't know if the tub is cast iron or not. Regrading the grout, I will look into having it recolored and see if I can replace the silicone.

You folks are great.

You can hire someone to regrout and someone to refinish the tub if needed.

I agree with the others. I think those enclosures are good for rentals. Professional cleaning of the tiles and refinish the bathtub plus paint the walls and change the toilet and fixtures will make a big difference and not too expensive.

We did the tub surround before we put our house on the market. It was quick, only one day and it was complete, and with only one shower in the house we needed quick!
We need to redo the bathroom in this house and I do not want to go that route with this house. Again, only one bath, so that will be quite the inconvenience.
But the surround was the way to go for the sale of the old house.

My house had 3 1/2 baths and we did a tub surround in one of the bathrooms before listing. We also had a tub (in another bath) resurfaced and it came out great. That bathroom was rarely used and we never updated it. It was green tile with a green tub, toilet. I scraped out all the grout around the tub myself. Messy but I got it done. Removed all the chalking and recalked and grouted. Had the green tub resurfaced (sprayed) white. Replaced the toilet and sinks and put in a new vanity. Left the green tile and it actually looked very cute. I also replaced the shower doors with a white shower curtain.

Bottom line, the house sold for almost list, had a bidding war and no one even mentioned the shower surround or the green bath.

If you make the bathroom look clean and bright, I don't think anyone will care. You can do it either way.

Jane