1. This is one of the few things YouTube is still good for. The channel This Old House is usually a good resource for a lot of projects, but you can find tons of other channels that have good info. Some creators are contractors, so their focus will be on doing things efficiently at scale and might not be as relevant to you, but there’s still good information to be found.

2. One of the lessons I learned getting an Accounting degree is that everything around you is constantly degrading. Every object has a limited number of uses, and we can only take guesses at what that number will be. Every time you open or close a door, you are putting wear on the wood of the door and frame, the hinges, and the latching mechanism. Every time you open or close a tap you are putting wear on a valve. Every rain drop that hits the roof is trying to erode your shingles, work it’s way into the sealant around fasteners, damage your gutters and downspouts, and erode your land and foundation. So try to be gentle on what you can and keep up on preventative maintenance when you can.

To start off with, you take care of emergencies. Things that will cascade into more damage to your property or health if not addressed. Sewer line backing up and flooding your basement? Emergency. Water leaks in the roof? Emergency. Hot Water tank leaking? Well, the leak is an emergency, but a lack of hot water probably isn’t. If you’re strapped for cash, you should be able to turn some valves to disconnect it and live with cold water until you can afford to fix it properly. But if you’re somewhere cold in winter, that could put those pipes in danger of freezing. (In case you couldn’t tell, water causes trouble everywhere it goes)

Without knowing the details of your financial situation, I’m going to assume you’re like most new homeowners. Young, probably just starting to get financially established enough to break the rent cycle. Maybe some other car or student loan debt you’re trying to pay off. Expecting to advance your career and make more money in the coming years. Assuming your income keeps up with inflation and your interest rate on your mortgage is fixed, from now on your housing costs as a percentage of your income will most likely go down.

So you’ll probably have to put things off for the first few years. You’ll need a couple of years with mild and extreme summers and winters to get a feel for how much your utilities cost. Try to keep an emergency fund (credit cards can work in a pinch, but they cost you long-term). Some problems might need temporary, cheap solutions. The general financial wisdom most old people gave me was “buy cheap, but twice”, but sometimes you just need to “waste” $50 on something janky to last a couple years until you can afford the $5,000 proper renovation. You’ll slowly transition from being reactive to proactive over time. First set aside money for an emergency fund. Once you have a couple grand, start setting aside some for cosmetic stuff like flooring and paint (it’s less important objectively, but living in a house with peeling paint and stained carpet can be bad for your mental health). You probably want ~$10k in an emergency fund eventually (in today’s dollars), but don’t feel too much pressure to get there immediately. And don’t be afraid to use that money for emergencies either: that’s what it’s for.

Identify any big, expensive, non-urgent projects: how much will the cost and when will they become urgent? You’ll need a roof every 25-50 years depending on the kind of roof and where you live. In today’s dollars in the US you’re looking at the ballpark of $10-$20k. You will probably be able to finance part of it if you need to.

3. You can’t control what the previous owner did or did not do, the corners that a builder cut, or the flaws in the architect’s designs. If there’s something serious that was legally required to be disclosed to you and was not, you could consult a lawyer to see if you have any recourse against the seller.

You are going to be making a lot of your own repairs and decisions restricted by your budget, equipment, and skills. 10 years from now you might find you’re cursing your past self just as much as you’re cursing the previous owner now. Either way, there isn’t much to be gained from getting upset over what ‘the last guy’ did. All you can do is try to be nicer to ‘the next guy’, who may or may not be you.

4. Just some general advice. You’ll probably hear other advice recommending that you do not buy cheap tools, but to wait and buy nice, expensive tools as you find you need them. I strongly disagree. If you don’t already have screwdrivers, wrenches, sockets, a measuring tape, hammer, etc those cheap kits can be great. Sometimes it’s nice to have tools you don’t care about for dirty jobs or loaning to a neighbor. I don’t want to use the same screwdriver I would use on my guitar or computer on a sewage pipe or my car, for example.

Also keep records. Put together a binder with receipts, warranty cards, etc. If something has a 30 year warranty you need a good resource for how to claim that 25 years from now. And it’s a great thing to hand off to the next owner. What year was this roof installed? What was the hex code and brand of paint on the trim in the living room? Is there lead paint that is currently sealed behind newer paint? Did you upgrade the Ethernet to cat6? Does the basement flood once every 200 years, once every 20 years, or once every 2 years? Think of all the stuff you wish the previous owner would have told you and start writing it down for the next person. A house shoukd last a few hundred years, and I would argue that the quality of records should be a factor in buying/selling.

it’s obvious their pets handled the moving process poorly and have urinated in every room with carpet

Cleaning up pet urine can be really expensive depending on how bad it is. If it’s not just a few spots here and there, seriously consider ripping out all of the carpet and padding and living on the floor boards until you can get new flooring.

You should buy a black light. Nothing expensive, $20 or so. And shine it on everything with the lights off, urine glows. As a side note, anyone looking to buy a house, or even get a new rental should get a black light.

how do you prioritize your home projects when under budget constraints and they are of equal importance or unimportance?

I’m a fan of lists for this type of thing. Include how many hours of work and cost today and the costs and time if you skip it for a couple years. As in peeling exterior paint is cheap today, but if not addressed, you’re replacing boards for much more time and cost.

how do you deal with the overwhelm/frustrations of previous owner issues or poor workmanship?

They were trying their best to keep it in decent shape. Just as you will do the same.

their pets urinated in every room with carpet

There is a product called “Nature’s Miracle”. It has an enzyme that removes urine smell from carpet. It’s sold at pet stores or online. Get the gallon size to start.

Did you get a home inspection? Start with the things on that. If you didn’t, then start by reading up on home inspections, and start taking care of those things.

I’d start with spending my time cleaning.

Then I’d work on whatever bothered me the most day to day. If you notice the issue often, that’s the one to fix.

Also good stuff!

For #2, one piece I forgot to bring up is the urgency. One of the reasons I advocate for having a small collection of basic, cheap tools is that there’s some cases where you don’t have time to get to the hardware store or wait for a delivery. Sometimes you need a wrench NOW to fix a leak. Or there’s a foot of snow on the ground, the roads aren’t allowed, and something goes wrong with your heat or the pipes are in danger of freezing. Or there was the time I had scheduled my new over to be installed and the old one disposed of: I was responsible for disconnecting the gas from the old oven, but didn’t realize until about an hour before that I would need not one but two adjustable wrenches to disconnect it and had to make a mad dash to get another one. I’ve also had enough issues with toilets that I keep at least one flush/fill valve set and a sealing ring on hand (maybe I need to get a water filtering/conditioning system to go easier on my hardware?). Having a way to move water (either a cheap hand pump or the ability to use a shop vac) can also be critical.

A couple other things I keep in mind with tools are:

How often am I going to use it? A lot of experts giving advice, advocating for expensive tools, are craftspeople who use those tools every day. If I only need that adjustable wrench once a year, the $2 one from Harbor Freight is fine.

And specialized tools are different. It’s hard to even try to buy them in advance because you don’t know they exist until something comes up. When I looked into converting my home’s landline phone network into Internet, I had to get a crimping tool. I noticed the old window AC units has a bunch of bent fins, and research led me to special combs for straightening them.

One advice I haven’t seen mentioned: there are tool libraries in many cities where home owners can borrow tools for a low membership cost. This can save you from spending a lot on tools, especially for ones you won’t need often.