Saving Money On DIY: What You Need To Know
DIY projects can be highly rewarding in more than one way: in addition to helping you take proper care of your home, improving your handyman skills and boosting your self-confidence, DIY tasks around the house can also save you a fair amount of repair money. Still, not all of us know which simple DIY projects a layman can complete on their own and thus save some much-needed green – which is why we bring you a few useful tips and tricks on how to remedy some common home emergencies and other minor house-bound woes with minimum hassle, time and funds invested.
Your house as your personal coloring book: Cut the painting bill
One convenient way to reduce your refurbishment costs is to paint your walls on your own. While helping you learn some home maintenance basics, this simple DIY project will also save you some money you would otherwise waste on surplus wall paint quantities. To minimize project costs, pick one or two tones like white and silky peach to paint your home instead of buying gallons of several different colors for each room. In this way, you can save up to $50 on the materials alone, to say nothing for the workforce fees.
Keep your bills in check and your chimney clean: Off-season chimney sweeping
To minimize your home maintenance costs and keep your house optimally heated in winter, try sweeping your chimney in summer months. By this clever move, you can both get a decent chimney sweeping number when it suits your schedule best as chimney sweepers are usually more available during summer than in autumn and early winter, and the price of their services is also lower outside the peak flue cleaning season.
Alchemist at work: Concoct your own cleaning solutions
With some inexpensive kitchen supplies and a bottle of essential oil, you can make any cleaning product your home needs. For instance, a dash of white vinegar, several spoons of baking soda and a drop or two of lavender oil can do miracles for your windows, tiles and home appliances. You can find dozens of simple yet highly efficient recipes online, and the DIY project will cost you no extra money as most of the ingredients used in home-made cleaning solutions are already stacked in your pantry. Plus, home-made cleaners are far less detrimental to human health than their commercial counterparts as the former contain no hazardous chemicals and toxic ingredients.
Nothing like some clean air: Replace central air-conditioning filters
Another useful trick that can lower your repair bills by as many as $40 is a DIY HVAC filter replacement project. For this simple task, you’ll need a spare filter and some basic tools. If your toolbox is on the slim side, you can get some online and save money. Companies like Gasweld offer a good variety. By changing your central air-conditioning filters once a month during summer, you will allow the air to flow freely through the ducts and thus reduce the blower motor strain. On top of the lower cooling costs, fresh filters will help you keep dust and mold at bay that may otherwise gather on the condenser coils and potentially harm the cooler.
Air-conditioning done pro: Cut heating bills during winter months
We all love ceiling fans during summer when temperatures start soaring, but did you know that these cool gizmos can also save you some electricity and cut the heating bill in wintertime? Running your ceiling fan in the clockwise direction at a low speed will allow the warm air to re-circulate through the room, so you can turn your thermostat down a notch or two as the heated air will be continuously pushed downwards and away from the ceiling toward the floor.
Are you ready to pull up your sleeves and cut your home maintenance costs? With these DIY projects, you will both achieve highly efficient results and learn new house repair and upkeep tricks, too.
Written by John Stone
Exclusively for Homes Re-Imagined, LLC