Home Remodeling
Home remodeling shouldn’t scare you! Careful planning and some smart choices along the way can keep costs down. First of all, you should decide if you have the time to DIY.
Savings Through DIY
If you do have time and basic skills available to do the projects then you can reduce the labor cost this way. There’re also various sources online that will teach you basic to advance home remodeling skills. Stores like Home Depot and Lowes even offer free classes on basic DIY skills like painting.
Before starting a home remodeling project, you should be cautious of anything related to gas lines, electricity, plumbing, and knocking down walls. It is highly advised to have a professional over for the removal of anything toxic. As you can see some projects just aren’t a good fit for DIY.
You should always keep in mind these 3 things –
- Safety
- Inconvenience
- Skill level required
- DIY savings can be pretty substantial
Savings Through Project Research
- Figure out what your project involves
- How much will it cost
- Safety hazards
Some sources to research your home remodeling project:
- YouTube
- Home Advisor
- Social media like Facebook.
You can usually post a quick shout-out on remodeling groups asking for help. You will almost always get a response from someone who can point you in the right direction or give you some quick guidance. Then you need to determine the potential savings of DIY when you do research.
Some good examples of DIY projects
- Painting
- Window Replacement
- Kitchen/Bathroom Remodel
For example, if you were to hire a professional painter for a $6,000 project for a 3,700 sq ft house, you could probably do the work yourself based on an intermediate level of skill for about $3500-$4500. Another good DIY example is window replacement. The costs of replacing windows are cut up to half percent when you do it yourself.
But when you get into larger projects, like kitchen and bathroom remodeling, you can be talking about saving many thousands of dollars. Doing a DIY kitchen remodel may sound like a daunting task, but when we’re talking of savings of up to $10,000 and more it may be very well worth it.
Savings through parts and material sourcing
Before you go off asking for quotes try to see if a contractor will do the actual labor for you, but you supply the material and parts. The key here is to source the material at discounts. Through this method, you’re looking at savings of up to about 20%.
