You finally did it! You managed to get your first home, or maybe by now in your life the third or fourth home! You are living the dream, the American Dream!
Of course, that was until you realized that this dream comes with a lot of costly repairs over time.
So now on top of your mortgage and property taxes, there seems to be a never-ending requirement to call in the repair specialist for the upkeep.
What if you could without a huge learning curve, do some of this maintenance yourself? At least try to learn even the most basic home repairs and maintenance like painting and minor plumbing issues. As with any job, it is the labor charges that are the real bank account depletion costs.
No matter what your career is you could learn to take care of most of the more common basic home repairs yourself and maybe have some fun doing it.
In fact, entire retail stores such as Home Depot or Lowe’s have dedicated their business model to the do it yourself, homeowner.
I have a short list of projects that could save you thousands in labor costs over the years, These are simple to do if you took the time to simply learn how to do them. They are as follows.
- Under sink plumbing replacement
- Bathroom and Kitchen faucet replacement
- Less than 25 feet plumbing blockage
- Toilet tank valve replacement
- Simple wiring, switch and outlet repair or replacement
- Ceiling Fan Installation
- Drywall repairs
- Interior Wall Painting
- Water heater replacement
- Floating floor installation in living room, dining room or even bedroom
- Kitchen Floor replacement
- Interior door replacement
- Exterior Screen door replacement.
If you took the time to just master this short list, you would be in a position to take care of most of the annoying little problems that can go wrong in your house.
These all can be taken care of by professional, but that is where the costs are, even if you purchased the materials yourself.
The best way to learn how to do almost any repair is to go to YouTube. Do a search on the subject at hand, and watch the videos. Typically, they are less than 15 minutes long.
Let’s talk toilet tank repair as an example. Here is a YouTube video on how to replace a toilet fill valve. It takes about 4 minutes to watch it and after you do the same thing a few times, you are now a professional and probably saved yourself at least $100 on a service call.
Replacing the drainer, the under sink plastic plumbing and connecting to the metal pipe into the wall shouldn’t be that difficult to do. It requires only plumbers putty and hand tightening.
A simple YouTube video will explain it and go to your local Home Depot or Lowe’s for the parts is all you need to do. Here is the YouTube Video on repairing an under the sink leak. How to repair a leak under the sink.
Basically, for just about any home remodeling and repair, you could go to YouTube first and watch a how-to video.
You can even buy a book at Home Depot on basic home repairs and remodeling. Here is the other upside to this education.
Even if you decide to contract it out, your personal knowledge of it will help you determine if a contractor is trying to overcharge you on any repair.
So now you can simply go out with confidence knowing that you can keep your beautiful home beautiful without huge labor costs.
