On “No Demo Reno,” design expert Jennifer Todryk is on a mission to help people perk up their homes without the chaos of major construction or tons of cash.

“You can stick to the original floor plan,” she insists. “You can save yourself the money and the stress that comes with a gut renovation.”

And in the latest episode, “Out of the Gray,” it’s clear that the homes she’s helping just need a bit more personality.

Her first project is for a family of five, Naz and Umer Ayub and their three children. They moved from California to Frisco, TX, to a lovely but generic home. They want to make it feel like their own, and Todryk tells them she’s up to the challenge—and can do it all on their budget of $85,000.

The second family she helps are the Camberes, a young couple who have $10,000 to $15,000 to spend on their back patio, hoping to turn it from a junk-filled storage area to a luxurious lounge area reminiscent of Tulum, Mexico.

As Todryk shows them how to make a big difference with minimal cash and effort, it might get your own renovation wheels turning. Take a look!

The Ayub house has an impressive living room with a lovely two-story corner fireplace and a soaring ceiling, but it’s gray, gray, gray with a few white “accents” here and there. As popular as the neutral gray-and-white palette is right now, Todryk believes it gets boring fast.

“Let’s play a game where we touch everything that’s gray,” she exclaims as she begins going around the room touching everything in sight.

Todryk suggests brightening the room with pops of both color and texture such as green plants, wood accents, and long, flowing drapes in vivid navy. With a multicolored rug on the floor that ties it all together, the room warms right up.

As Todryk hangs the curtains, which are not for privacy but to add color, flow, and texture, she notices something weird about the hems.

“See the bottom of that curtain there? How it kind of flares out and looks all wild and crazy?” she asks. “That’s how my hair looked when I cut it short.”

Luckily, there’s a solution for this.

“I’m going to get some curtain weights,” she continues. “They go behind the curtains, and they pull them down, so you get that beautiful, straight, magazine-worthy curtain.”

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While a white-on-white color scheme is still alive and well in many a kitchen, Todryk chalks up this look as a big fail because it’s so dull. So that’s definitely something she’ll have to address in the kitchen without overhauling too much of the space.

“To break up the monotony of a white-on-white kitchen, a dark floor is a great way to do that,” says Todryk as she holds up black hexagonal tiles. “It’s going to provide a lot of fun contrast, and this hexagon shape is going to give me a lot of grout lines, and it’s going to naturally draw your eye down to that floor.”

She also removes the microwave from above the stove (why would anyone put it there in the first place?) and has a craftsman construct a shapely range hood in its place, which she covers with plaster she applies herself for a more rustic, textured look.

Voila! The boring white-on-white kitchen now sparkles with personality.

There’s nothing wrong with the Ayubs’ kitchen cabinets. They just disappear into the rest of the all-white kitchen.

Since this is a no-demolition show, Todryk is not about to destroy perfectly good cabinets.

“These cabinets are great quality,” she says. “They just don’t want them anymore.”

So she photographs them in place, where they show much better, then she has the cabinets carefully removed. She posts them for sale online.

“Just because it’s not good for this client doesn’t mean someone else won’t want them. They’re worth something,” Todryk says.

Sure enough, she gets $1,300 for the cabinets, which she will use for a custom tile backsplash. It’s a win for all: the Ayubs, the buyers of the cabinets, and the environment!

The Camberes obviously can no longer have a fishnet with neon-colored plastic fish hanging on it. Todryk has something more sophisticated and tropical in mind: a living wall.

Living walls look gorgeous, but they require high maintenance. Keeping the right moisture level and all those sideways-growing plants alive can be quite the challenge.

So Todryk takes more of a horizontal approach to the living wall. She attaches open shelving, then selects leafy, draping plants that do well in the shade and “take up a lot of real estate” on the shelves.

She arranges the plants on the newly installed shelves and adds natural and organic accessories like driftwood and coral. Hey, they were plants once, too!

The result is a living wall that looks great but is much easier to care for. Todryk has transformed this tired, old patio, all for $12,000.

Lisa Johnson Mandell is an award-winning writer who covers lifestyle, entertainment, real estate, design, and travel. Find her on ReallyRather.com