Save Money With DIY Repairs

I’ve known all along that you can save some serious money by doing repairs yourself. I’m not all that handy myself though, so I tend to either delay making repairs or I call out a serviceman. My wife and I are first time homeowners, and our house is only ten years old, so we haven’t had to deal with too many problems yet thankfully.

Here’s what we’ve learned so far.

Problem 1: master bedroom shower drains very very slowly. I took the grating off myself and tried the usual Liquid Plumber/Drano bit several times, but no luck. I finally broke down and called a plumber, and ten seconds (and $50) after he was here the problem was fixed. Apparently he has this one of a kind tool for just such a problem. It’s called a “plunger.” One plunge and the drain works fine! Fortunately I took advantage of having him here to ask a bunch of plumbing related questions, so I consider it $50 in DIY tuition.

Problem 2: bugs. I don’t like bugs. Ants, spiders, etc. Ick. My wife is the same way, and although we didn’t have a bug problem inside the house, my wife didn’t even like the number of spiders she spotted OUTSIDE the house. We called a local exterminator to see if they could come out and spray. The guy we met with was the general manager of the company and seemed to be well informed and trustworthy. They offered a few different yearly plans that ranged from $300 to $700 a year, which included monthly treatments and the ability to call them if we ever have any issues in between calls.

Although it seemed reasonable, we decided that it wasn’t worth the money. I should say “I” decided. My wife was on the fence. I was (and still am) a little peeved that everything is an on-going commitment these days. I like one time, discrete, expenses. I don’t want to sign up for a one year plan for bug treatments or a three year plan for my security monitoring service. I don’t want to pay ten dollars a month so my Tivo can get the data it needs or who knows how much each month for satellite radio (I don’t have satellite radio, but if I did I could listen to more dave ramsey on my drive home). I want to pay a fixed fee, even if it’s a higher initial charge, and know that I don’t need to pay anything else unless it breaks!. BTW, I did this with my Tivo Series 1 about five years ago, paying $500 instead of $300 + $12/month for the data subscriptions. My little Tivo still works like a charm!

We gave up on the bug thing for a while (translation: I procrastinate), and I finally broke down and did some web research. I read up on Demon WP, which is a powder you mix in a pesticide or fertilizer sprayer that you can spray around the base of your house. Apparently the stuff is supposed to kill almost everything that can crawl over it. I shopped around the internet for the best price (~15-$20 for 4 treatment packets), and then shopped locally so I didn’t have to pay shipping. Knowing the price before looking locally was quite helpful, as the closest pest store wanted to charge me $40 for the 4-packet container. I walked out, drove an extra ten miles to another store, and bought it for the ~$15-$20.

I’m not trying to diminish the value of using a professional service. If we had bug problems inside I would have definitely used a professional. I don’t like the idea of having chemicals inside my house, even if someone says they’re safe. I also heard that a lot of (men) tend to over-spray for such things inside, believing that more is better.

Problem #3: one of my sprinkler heads blew up at some point. I returned from a 10k run one day and found some sprinkler parts in front of my house. I picked them up, told the wife, turned off the sprinkler system, and did nothing for a few weeks. Once it finally started to bug me I called around to see if I could get someone out to fix it. Apparently most companies around here have a $95 service call and send out a two man team to fix these types of problems. Parts are not included in the $95.

When we bought our home the inspection discovered a problem with a different sprinkler head, and the repair cost ~$150. Yikes. It wasn’t looking good for the budget.

Enter the genius of the family: my wife. My wife did a little web research, found a video that explained how easy it was to repair sprinkler heads, and watched it. I listened from a different part of the room, and although I wasn’t really paying attention it even sounded easy to me! She bought a $2 part at Home Depot over lunch yesterday, and after about ten minutes of digging and 5 minutes of figuring out how the parts fit together, we had the thing fixed!

Morale of the story: the only way you become “handy” is by learning how to fix things yourself. And even if you fail you can still call a serviceman! Someone has solved the problem you have already. You just need to find them and learn how to do it too. Get a book, ask a friend, or search the web. The end result will be more knowledge, increased personal confidence, and probably some financial savings too!

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