Showing posts with label DIY beware. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DIY beware. Show all posts

Monday, January 20, 2014

Does DIY add to the value of your home?

Hi Everyone!  Welcome to today's blog post about DIY projects!  Did you know that I'm the author of not just one, but thirteen books?  For more information, please visit www.charlesirion.com, www.irionbooks.com and/or www.summitmurdermystery.com

Does DIY add to the value of your property?Wherever you look in the world, there are literally millions of people attempting do-it-yourself on their home properties and investment properties. If you know what you are doing, and you are confident in your own ability, there is the potential to add significant value to your property and make yourself some serious money. So, if DIY is so easy why do so many people fail to see the increase in the value of their property that they expected?

There are many reasons why DIY does not work for everybody, it is not as easy as it looks, there are potential pitfalls and the bottom line is that you need to know exactly what you are doing. We will now take a look at some of the issues surrounding DIY and why you should only attempt it if you are confident in your ability.


Simple DIY is easy
There are many different levels of do-it-yourself taking in anything from painting to roofing, from electrics to fitting a new bathroom and many more in between. When it comes to very simple tasks such as painting and “tidying up” a property to assist with a potential sale then this is something which is not out of the reach of the vast majority of homeowners. You would be surprised to learn how big an impact a simple “tidy up” and repainting job can have on the saleability of your home – making your property more “easy on the eye”

Medium level DIY
We then move on to the medium risk DIY projects which take in the likes of flooring, replacing tiles, wallpapering and other similar tasks. On the surface, again, this type of project seems fairly simple but have you ever tried to lay flooring? Are you confident climbing ladders and replacing tiles? Are your wallpapering skills as good as you think they are?

When we move towards medium level DIY this is an area which can have a detrimental impact upon the value of your property, its saleability and can actually impact upon your finances. If you make a hash of replacing flooring, replacing tiles, wallpapering, etc then the likelihood is that you will need to call in the experts at some point at further expense. Indeed, if you have made a mess of your medium level DIY then it can actually cost more to put it right than it would have to bring in the experts from day one. Nothing is ever as simple as it seems where DIY is involved!

High level DIY
DIY projects such as installing gas equipment, rewiring your home, fixing new lights and fitting a new roof to name but a few are high-level DIY projects which require professional skills. There are many tasks in the DIY arena which experts would think twice about tackling unless they have specific focused skills in the relevant areas. Just because you can wire plug does not mean you can rewire your home, just because you can fit a few tiles does not mean you can fit a new roof. You also need to take into account the safety aspect, the fact that tackling electrical, gas and other challenging DIY activities can not only place you in danger but also those around you.

If you are looking at any level of DIY on your property you need to make sure you have the experience, the expertise and perhaps just as importantly, the right tools. Many people will make a success of their DIY projects, they may well add a significant amount of money to the value of their property but there are more people who make a mess of their DIY projects and end up paying more to get their mistakes corrected!


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Tuesday, February 5, 2013

5 DIY Projects That Could Ruin Your Home

Thanks for reading today's blog post!  Did you know that I'm the author of not just one, but thirteen books?  For more information, please visit www.charlesirion.com, www.irionbooks.com and/or www.summitmurdermystery.com

Great advise in this article!

Before you take an unsupervised plunge into your next do it yourself project, you may want to keep in mind these four DIY disasters.

Here are a few easy ways you could ruin your home from Yahoo! Homes.

1. Flooring - When you deal with bathrooms, you're dealing with water. You should really hire someone who knows what they are doing. This is serious stuff! Educate yourself and go online, because you can't cheap-out on doing a bathroom floor.







2. Toilets - Homeowners have ended up paying thousands of dollars to repair ceilings and floors after the new toilet leaked through one floor to the next. An extra $2 wax ring to seal the toilet and floor drain is one solution, or just hire a contractor or plumber for about $135 in labor costs.


3. Cabinets - You can have a professional painter do the job or have a company reface them. Cabinet refacing has become a quick, affordable, and less messy renovation process. Contractors remove and replace doors and drawers for a couple thousand dollars, depending on the size of your kitchen, which is a bargain compared to the more than $10,000 is can cost for new cabinets.





4. Walls - A load-bearing wall is one that bears the weight and force of a structure and transfers that weight to the ground. That means everyone and everything is safe from falling through to the bottom floor. But before taking out one of these walls, you need to first put up a temporary wall. If you don't do this series of events in tearing down walls, everything drops.

5. Venting - The ventilation in your home is vital to keeping the temperature regulated, so when doing things yourself be aware of where the ventilation is in your home. It could cost up to $15,000 to move ventilation. So if you want to DIY but ventilation proves a problem, it may be best to leave that project and move on.



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