HeyJaredSunday Strategy(ish) by Grace Kaage
Stories and strategies to help you create your dream home, one long, slightly weird post at a time.
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- Sep 28, 2026
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- Aug 2, 2026
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I have made some very expensive mistakes. (opens the original)
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I once bought an antique door for $100.A HUNDRED DOLLARS.It was beautiful. Old wood, original hardware, the kind of patina you cannot fake no matter how many YouTube tutorials you watch.It had character.It was exactly the kind of thing I love, and I was extremely pleased with myself. When I carried it out of that salvage yard, I felt like I had personally outsmarted the entire home improvement industry.I believe I told several people about my incredible find.Possibly people who had not asked.(KC
He's built homes for famous people. I can't tell you who. (opens the original)
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I have a secret, and I am historically terrible at keeping secrets, so bear with me. Our new Director of Construction at Kaage Homes starts this week, and I am not telling you his name yet, which is already more self-control than I usually show. What I can tell you is that he has over 40 years of experience, which is longer than I have been reliably making decisions about anything, lunch included. He has built multi-million-dollar homes on the lake. His work has been featured in Architectural Di
The Farrow & Ball Colors I Actually Use (opens the original)
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Sunday Strategy usually opens with a long story before I get to the point. Not today. Something has happened.Want more of this? Subscribe to receive my weekly dose of design lessons, construction stories and household emergencies.<div class="
Why no one can answer “What will my renovation cost?” until you know what you’re actually building (opens the original)
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There is always a pause.I will be on the phone with someone lovely, someone who has thought carefully about her house for two years, and I will say a number out loud.Then there will be a silence long enough that I start wondering whether the call dropped.It has not dropped.She is just doing math.The question I get more than any other question, and I mean by a mile, is:How much does it cost?And I have been avoiding this one publicly because the real numbers are almost always higher than people ex
Straight to jail. (opens the original)
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“MA’AM. GET BACK IN YOUR CAR.”The officer flung open his door and stepped out, pointing at me.“GET BACK IN THE CAR,” he repeated. “...MA’AM.”I was in the Winnetka parking lot outside my office last Tuesday morning, and I was not doing anything alarming.I was holding an insurance card.A current, valid, entirely unremarkable insurance card that I had just excavated from my wallet while I sat there waiting for my tickets. And because I am a fundamentally helpful person, and because some corner of m
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