Lots of work, but really nice job and outcome!
Thanks, for the most part, we just cleaned, repainted, and made lots of minor repairs. We reused anything we could. Mom already had several items she had purchased and never used (like the floor tiles we used in the bathroom), so that saved us some money too. We really didn't have any major expenses, just lots of little ones that added up.
Mom had smoked heavily in the house for many years, so nicotine stains were running down the walls and the popcorn ceilings were nearly black. There was no way to clean those, so we had to remove the popcorn ceiling. It was a messy job, but my wife enjoys projects like that.
The old furnace died many years ago, and there was no ductwork (just blew into the crawlspace). So I installed wall heaters throughout the house, using the old furnace wiring.
I replaced the 30 year old water heater and repaired or replaced all of the plumbing fixtures to stop leaks. I replaced all of the electrical outlets since they were worn out and installed new LED light fixtures.
I had the broken glass replaced in the front living room window. Only cost $400, much cheaper than replacing the windows and associated trim work.
I was able to salvage the old wood garage door with some wood epoxy filler, sanding, and repainting.
The floors were really out of level everywhere, but I used floor patch to smooth things out and installed vinyl plank flooring in the kitchen/dining/laundry. Only cost about $750. Had an inexpensive carpet installed throughout the rest of the house.
The kitchen cabinets were in rough shape and were mismatched. Rather than spend thousands on new cabinets and counters, we just sanded them down and painted. I added some cheap handles for a little "bling" and replaced the worn out drawer glides. Installed some vinyl floor tiles inside the kitchen base cabinets to dress those up, and vinyl contact paper on all the shelves and drawers. Probably spent less than $200 total on the kitchen cabinets. Didn't turn out too bad considering.
It would have gone a lot quicker if her house wasn't so far away. I put about 18,000 miles on my car that year making the four hour round trip 2-3 days a week. Once we got one of the bedrooms cleaned up and repainted, we would drive over some weekends and camp out in the house while we worked on it.
Mom paid $40K for the house 20 years ago. A realtor in the area estimated we might get $120K for it as-is if we cleaned out the garbage. We spent $6K fixing it up and sold it for $230K.