The Home Improvement Thread

[Heylel Teomim]

Since the home buying thread in finance was pretty successful, I'm closing on my new place in a couple of weeks, and there seemed to be some people interested, I thought now would be a good time to start a home improvement thread.

This is especially of interest to me, and I suspect other new home owners might find some value in it. The concept of maintaining property, much less improving it, is a bit foreign. I'd really like to hear some of the common pitfalls and horror stories folks have experienced with home improvement projects of their own, along with ways to avoid the same traps. Also, if there 's any major successes or tips for saving money, time and energy, here's a great place for that too.

In the interest of getting the ball rolling, I've started developing a list of tasks I'm setting for myself this summer as I get settled in. The place I bought is a rock, but it's got a lot of cosmetic work to do.

Now, I'm assuming that the way to tackle any room is to work from the ground up: flooring, walls, shelving/cabinetry, ceiling, then paint. I can skip parts of that in every room, but I'll have to tackle them all throughout the house eventually. So, where to begin? I'm inclined to try and lay down new carpet before my actual move in date, so there's no furniture to move. On the other hand, any other modifications I make could end up damaging fresh carpet. Should that be my first major expense or are there other things I really should tackle first?

Discuss!

[chaos]

I am trying my best to learn how to do all kinds of home improvement tasks, but I end up paying people to do the harder/more annoying stuff like roofing and carpetting.

My current goal for this year is to get new carpet upstairs and fix the subflooring and get some hardwood laminate flooring in the living room and fix the subflooring down there. Also want to get the guest bathroom recaulked/grouted, get new fixtures in the master bath, and recaulk the kitchen sink (have tile countertops and some black mildew/mold has gathered especially around the backside of the sink) and repaint a few of the rooms.

For me, I hit up the necessities first. The house needed a new roof so I got that done. I'm getting the trim done and new gutters/downspouts put on because the old trim was in bad shape and I want to be sure the roof stays in good condition. We had a leak in the toilet in the basement bathroom so I had to rip up the baseboards and carpet down there and mitigate that, then put in new carpet. I am thinking that my next big project will be the windows and sliding glass doors and getting them replaced, they are 20 years old and I am hoping that I can get some real improvements in energy conservation. Getting the floor in the living room done is a priority also, the subflooring creaks when you walk on it which is annoying, but also with the new baby I want a smooth surface for her to be able to learn to walk/crawl on.

So far I have been gaining knowledge and tools and just doing basic maintenance stuff. I just got a 10" Hitachi miter saw , after getting a table saw I will be ready to hit up the living room floor. Everything I have read says that it should be a fairly easy task to get my feet wet on, but I want to hit up the Home Depot class to actually see it done.

[aychamo_aycono]

Hey man, I'm really glad you made this thread, I was going to make one similar to this.

I'm obviously no contracter, but I've helped a couple of friends remodel their houses now. (Bad story: My friend spent 3 months doing his own house, and the weekend before the floors were going to be done being refinished, the house floods from a hurricane! Now 6 months later he just moved in. This time insurance paid for everything.)

First, work from the ceilings down. You're going to be moving so much junk in and out of the house, so do your floors last. Do your demolition first, then get your ceiling and walls fixed, then cabinets, get everything caulked, paint, and do your floors last. Workers are messy. They will get caulk, grout, and paint on everything.

You need to make a list of everything you want done in the house. Make a little book, and have each room broken down with the exact materials you want, colors, etc. Don't design on the fly - you'll make rushed decisions and end up hating it. Do research too. You can find all kinds of awesome shit on the internet.

Are you going to be doing the labor yourself? Set your DVR to record every home improvement show, and load up YouTube. You can learn so much home improvement shit on YouTube. Get some books and look some stuff up. And don't be afraid to try it. And don't be afraid to hire help if you need it. You're going to need professional help if you're hanging cabinets for the first time, you just don't want to spend all that money and have it look like shit. And stuff like sheetrock, you can hang it very easily, and then have someone come tape and float it, it will save you some money.

Also be sure to always use the right tools. Remember you can rent most tools (saws, etc) from home improvement places. I never understood how they could cut dovetail joints into cabinets, then I saw it's just a router jig and it takes zero talent to do it. With the right tools and equipment you can do almost anything.

And consider the nature of your improvements. Are you just doing new walls, etc? Or are you going to be completely redoing bathrooms and kitchens? Everyone says kitchens and bathrooms get you the most bang for your buck when you sell the house. Is your house on a slab or on piers? If it's on piers it's very easy to re-plumb and do bathroom and kitchens in any way you want.

If you need cheap help, this will sound shady, but if you get a contractor to send some help out, you can befriend the help and then you can hire them directly later on down the road.

My other buddy is a contractor, and he tells me how they do quotes for jobs. They have a vague idea of how much it would cost to get the work done, and then they add on a big percent (he said 25%, but I think he may be a horrible contractor, so take this with a grain of salt) which allows for fuckups and re-do's (sp?) and they still take home a large profit. If you look at a contractors quote for a job it's such bullshit that every single job item is a multiple of $1000. You gotta be sure to get a breakdown of the quote. And if you do use a contractor do all the demolition yourself. You'll save a ton.

--

I've been on the fence about buying a house for a while now, and the one I really like is an older house in the oldest neighborhood in my city. It's a super gorgeous tiny house, but it needs a lot of updating. The thing is they are asking $200,000 for the house, and it's honestly worth about $120,000. All the real estate agents, etc, balk at their asking price. For the neighborhood I could see paying an extra $20,000 or so. And it would need about $30,000-$40,000 in updating.

Every day after work I get on the internet and look up shit for possible remodel of the house. I found this website which has gotten great reviews for kitchen cabinets: https://www.pinnaclehomeproducts.com/ Kitchen cabinets are a huge expense, and this place is ultra cheap and everything I've read about them says the work is fantastic. I want shit like green concrete countertops, subway style tiling in my kitchen and bathroom, light wood floors, etc.

[Heylel Teomim]

I'm lucky in that a lot of what I'm planning is optional. There are no pressing matters in the home, the inspection came back totally clean. The hardwood in the living room is in great shape, the roof is less than 5 years old, everything runs right and there's no leaks.

The biggest problem is that it's just plain dated inside. For instance, here's what the living room looks like. Sorry for the quality, it was taken by the current owner and until I close I'm not able to get in and take better ones:




It's in great shape, it's just sorta tired looking. I actually don't even mind how dark the room is, I just feel like something needs to happen to those walls to modernize the room a bit. I'm just not sure where to start though. Hell, I don't even know what I *can* do with walls like that. They've got a ton of character, and I'm worried anything I do besides tearing it down completely and putting up sheetrock will end up looking bad.

[Sharmai]

Something me and the fiancee want to do are building our own backyard fence (neither of us having an ounce of experience in that area) and making a backyard garden. We are wondering what the costs are of putting up our own fence would be including materials and tools(rented?).

Also wondering about making our own concrete backyard patio. Don't know what that would take either if anyone knows.

[Ravvenn]

I'm going to post my recent project once I get another pot of coffee in my system. But I'd like to share some information.


I found my contractors on Craiglist (licensed, insured, bonded). They most importantly speak English, came with two pairs of shoes (one for outside, one for inside), work hourly which was AWESOME, give free work for referrals, and more. I referred them to my agent and had him use them as Star Real Estate's Handyman "Dude" (New homeowners typically ask their agent - if they liked them - for a handyman referral....Star only had 2 whom were both in the LA area and busy). So I ended up with 11 free hours of work so far thanks to SoCal referrals.

I had 4 quotes for our fence for 2-4k. These guys quoted 900 bucks and while they were out paint matching, they sent the workers in my house to do anything I asked. I got my dishwasher fixed, pool cleaned, door and window crease-thingies cleaned, Christmas boxes packed neatly in garage, all empty boxes broke down AND hauled away, and lots more.

George, the contractor, is basically my new BFF. He lets me borrow his tools and shows me how to fix things on my own. If anyone is in SoCal and wants an affordable handyman (anything from new driveways to changing smoke detectors in homes with retarded high ceilings like ours), let me know and I'll get you his info. Everyone needs a George like mine!

Anyway, check your local CL for cheap work. You may get lucky like I did!

I've been working on my sons room, so I'll post that and the pictures within the hour or so (need to clean the house first).

Something me and the fiancee want to do are building our own backyard fence (neither of us having an ounce of experience in that area) and making a backyard garden. We are wondering what the costs are of putting up our own fence would be including materials and tools(rented?).

Also wondering about making our own concrete backyard patio. Don't know what that would take either if anyone knows.

If our HOA weren't such dicks, I'd have gotten the cedar look vinyl fence and never looked back (lifetime warranty).

[Heylel Teomim]

Originally Posted by Sharmai

Something me and the fiancee want to do are building our own backyard fence (neither of us having an ounce of experience in that area) and making a backyard garden. We are wondering what the costs are of putting up our own fence would be including materials and tools(rented?).

Also wondering about making our own concrete backyard patio. Don't know what that would take either if anyone knows.

I'm no expert, but I've looked into it since I'll be needing to put up a fence as well. My father told me it would probably run between $6 and $11 per foot, depending on materials. Your cost will heavily depend on the size of your property.

As far as doing it yourself, in theory it isn't a difficult job, it's just hot sweaty labor and a little measurement. Make sure to mark and measure your yard twice. Get some stakes and make a plumb line with some string around the whole thing. You might also want to mark the area around the stake with paint so you don't lose it to rain or anything else. Getting your posts secure and straight is the real trick, after that it's supposed to fall into place pretty easily from what I'm told.

[Sharmai]

Only $900? Licensed, bonded, insured and referral-ed? And you only paid them hourly? How much did you end up paying total?

That's like a wet dream of a handyman.

Did you pay for all the supplies ?

We took out the tape measure once and I think we measured it at around 200 ft maybe. It was along time ago but that sounds about right. 13x200 is $2600 dollars.

[Ravvenn]

I paid $900 total including paint, supplies, etc. Well, add on $60.00 because they were still working at 8:00pm from 8:00am so I bought them all some food.

They calculated the time it would take (which it took longer but I wasn't charged more) + materials. I basically was set to pay $75.00 an hour but they worked for 3 days, ~10 hours a day. They gave me a checklist of shit I needed done around the house. When they would be paint matching, or one guy cutting, doing concrete, etc. They'd take it and send the guys NOT working on the fence to do shit on my checklist. I got every penny's worth. It's rare to have workers that work (around here).

[Sharmai]

Can you take a picture of the fence they built for you? You mean 900 to put in a new fence right now just paint one?

Do these guys like flying? I'd be seriously surprised to find a deal remotely close to anything like that here.

[Ravvenn]

Haha, yeah. I'm going to get the other side of my house done soon as soon as I find out if my neighbors will do a halfsie. I'm charging batteries for camera now, then I'll take a picture. That included removal of old fence (which included a 200 pound "space rock" the retards had in the middle of my old fence holding it all together), materials, paint, labor, etc. My fence is perfectly level, too. Literally, I checked. They even patched up grass my sprinklers destroyed (leak) and put mulch down, and also added pretty black meshy fence at the bottom to keep my dogs in. Oh, that included the door, too. Which had to meet some code due to our swimming pool.

[TheCutlery]

Originally Posted by Sharmai

Something me and the fiancee want to do are building our own backyard fence (neither of us having an ounce of experience in that area) and making a backyard garden. We are wondering what the costs are of putting up our own fence would be including materials and tools(rented?).

You definitely need a post hole digger. Can probably rent that. Need a wheelbarrow + shovel, good chance you'll have to buy those since they're gonna be covered in concrete. and then other than that, just a plumb line, a level, and something to cut the wood and drive the fasteners.

Pretty simple gig. Doing a concrete patio is a bit outta my realm of expertise, but it can't be too terribly hard if you've got a book or something. Mexicans do all this stuff without much training at all

[Heylel Teomim]

Pouring a concrete slab is easy, actually getting it to set where it's smooth and won't crack is a good deal harder. I helped my dad do it a time or two growing up, and it's always a challenge. You really need to do some leveling of the area you plan to pour, don't rely too much on the concrete to even itself out.

[Ravvenn]

During my time looking for homes, we saw a house I referred to as "Gucci Shitter". Two interior designers owned the home (for the time being, it was a short sale). The bathroom had Gucci wallpaper. The boys room was very bold and my son wanted us to get the house based off of the room, obviously that didn't happen. This is the bedroom.



We ended up where we are now, and sadly his room is a very awkward shade of doo-doo brown. As shown here:



I decided to try and design a room for him that's as bold as the other, but more tolerable. I whipped my concept up in ms paint.



I sadly got ballsy sale camping the furniture and it sold out, so I had to go with another style which is a metal mesh.



Covering the doo-doo seemed rough, so I went with Valspar tinted primer which is about $6.00 more than Kilz.


+


I had two friends/guildmates (thanks Maori and Cel!!) assist me with taping. I bought a B&D laser level + stud finder combo to help, $50.00 at Lowes.



First series of tape:


+


First layer of paint on top plus bottom blue stripe (Valspar, Boy Blue)



First layer of paint on bottom plus top grey stripe (Valspar, forgot color but it's dark grey)


Second layer of grey


Tape removed, first half done!



Today I'm going to retape to do the white and orange stripes. I still need to paint the trim and doors, and put up moulding on the ceilings. For the closets, I'm taking a class to do built-ins which I plan to do. I'm going to take the doors down and put up curtains of sorts instead.

[Heylel Teomim]

Speaking of classes, are those home depot classes pretty helpful? I've never looked into them before. I'd like to try putting down some kitchen tile, but I don't want to make a mess of it.

Looks good so far Ravvenn!