It can easily cost $500 a year to repair and maintain a home.  Give me a good do-it-yourself (DIY) book and a set of tools and I can do almost any repair that a home or apartment requires.  The DIY industry in the United States is multi-billion dollar per year business.  My thought is that if they can do it, so can I.  It seems like in the US there is a Lowes or Home Depot home improvement store popping up in every town of any size.  If you do-it-yourself, you can either have things you otherwise could not afford to buy or you can stretch your budget to make ends meet.  These are strong incentives to do the work yourself.  How much can you save?

Call a plumber, painter, tile setter or other home repair expert and it will cost you $75 or more just to have them walk in the front door.  You can buy the entire working parts for a toilet for $15 and a faucet will cost $1 to $20 for the repair parts.  Save $55 to $64 on one simple project.  If you want to change the color in a bedroom, you can hire it done for a couple hundred dollars or you can buy a gallon or two of paint and some brushes for less than fifty dollars.  Oh, and take care of the brushes and rollers because you can use them on the next job.

I’m lucky because when I was a kid I watched my Dad fixing things around the house all the time.  I never gave it much thought but I learned later that the biggest reason he did all that work was because we didn’t have the money to hire others to do it.  It’s never too late to learn how to do things. Take an adult education course and/or have a friend teach you the basics of any project.  I learned how to do trim carpentry on a weekend job when I was just out of school and trying to make ends meet on an income that otherwise would not stretch far enough.

Buy yourself a good basic tool kit and a DIY book like the “Reader’s Digest New Complete Do-it-yourself Manual” and give a project a try.  The book is a bit dated but it is a good inexpensive beginning for a home improvement DIY library.  I don’t recommend that you start with home wiring because of the danger there.  Electrical work is definitely a job for experts.  But there is so much you can do.  If the tools seem too expensive consider renting them.  If you think you are going to need the tools more than once or for more than a few days it often pays to buy an inexpensive version of the tool that you can keep.  I’ve built quite a tool chest using this method.  I consider all the tools to have been free because they were more than paid for by the money I saved by not renting.

Here is a short question checklist for helping you decide whether or not to take on a particular project:

1. Can I do the work safely and within building code?  If not, don’t.
2. If the project doesn’t go well, can I live with the delay, extra costs or other problems?
3. Can I do the project well enough to be satisfied with the results?
4. Will I save enough money to make it worth my time and effort?
5. Do I have to do it because I need it faster than hiring it out?
6. Can I do it anyway because I will enjoy the process?

The answers to these questions will guide you in making your choice to go DIY or professional.  It is vital that you don’t do anything that can endanger your safety and health.

Question 4 is a good one.  Will I save enough money to make it worth my time and effort?  Here’s how to figure it out.  Get some bids or estimates on how much it will cost for professionals to do the work.  Figure out how much the materials will cost.  Add in the cost of tool rental and/or purchase will be.  Estimate the time the project will take (add a bit for contingency).  Now do the math.  Add up the costs if you do the work and subtract if from the professional estimates.  Divide the potential savings by the number of hours it will take you to do the work.  The result is the equivalent wage you will be paying yourself if you do the work.  Obviously, some jobs just won’t be worth the money.  Others will pay you more than you make in your day job.  I’ve paid myself the equivalent of over $100 per hour on many projects.

On the matter of money, I have not kept track of how much I have saved in the past 20 years but just in the last 2 years we painted the inside of our house for $210 versus $1,500, repaired two toilets for $30 versus $150, fixed the shower valve for $8 versus $100, repaired several light switches for $5 versus $100, poured a 2 foot by 6 foot sidewalk repair for $150 versus $700.  The net savings on just these projects was $2,147.

In addition to books and all the DIY shows on television (Hometime, This Old House, etc.) there is a huge amount of information here on the internet.  Do a search for the product or project that you have in mind and you are likely to find all the information that you need to do the job well.  Manufactures often have the product manuals available on the web so you can find the parts numbers and information you need.  Many manufacturers will also have an 800 help line.  You can always take the parts to the store and get help picking out the right replacement parts. 

Do it yourself home repairs and improvement can save you money while improving your home.