Remodeling a section of your home can add great value to your entire property and render it more attractive to prospective buyers. In addition, remodeling is a magnificent way of putting to use rooms that were largely unoccupied such as the basement. For the majority of homeowners, refinishing means acquiring a home equity loan to afford the project. However, refinishing a basement does not necessarily have to be an expensive undertaking.
Ceilings and Floors
When remodeling a basement, the exposed ductwork, pipes and the cement floors along the basement’s ceiling can be a source of great problems. Painting the ductwork and pipes is an easy yet inexpensive option. In the case of a ceiling, a drop ceiling with fluorescent lights and foam panels is cheaper than a drywall ceiling. When it comes to the basement, press-on vinyl tiles are the cheapest option. To make the basement as comfortable as any other room in your house, you can add an area rug.
Walls
When refinishing your basement, it is important to treat the walls. In this case, hanging drywall can be an expensive option if you are working on a tight budget. Painting cinder block walls is a fast and easy way of doing the refinishing project alone. Porous cinder blocks may need several coats of paint and the process will offer no insulation to the basement. Despite that, it will give the basement a more finished look. Painting a decorative border or wall murals can make your basement space more colorful to the extent of serving as the children’s playroom.
Room Types
When refinishing your basement, it is important to take into consideration the type of room you are creating . Some rooms can be an expensive basement remodel compared to others. Rooms such as a living room or media room might require finished walls, new furniture and air conditioning systems to give the rooms a feeling of more comfort. Bedrooms in the basement may require that homeowners add egress windows to be in compliance with the local fire codes. To avoid such an expensive modification, homeowners can design their basement rooms for some simpler purposes such as a workshop or playroom.
Storage
Refinishing a basement for storage purposes can be cheaper than remodeling it into furnished rooms. Basement storage can help create more space in other parts of the house and save on money that could have been used to improve your home’s main rooms. Refinishing a basement for purposes of storage is all about installing free standing or wall shelf units.
Painting is one home improvement project that is very important when it comes to increasing the sale value of your home. On the other hand, the goal of each and every painter is to have the painting job done quickly and neatly. This can be very challenging especially for someone who has never done painting before. For instance, you might take a whole week trying to paint your bedroom then at the end of it all, your wife is displeased by the color. No one wants to spend most of his time at home working on the lawns because the painting inside the house is not pleasing. The good thing is that there are a handful of tricks and secrets that can help in your painting project. Here are some painting tips, gleaned from many years of painting by pros.
Tint the Primer
One important tip for painting your house is that you should first tint the primer. Irrespective of whether you will be painting the exterior siding or interior walls, a coat of primer is important in getting a professional looking result. This case goes for new drywall, raw wood and previously painted surfaces. Most painters miss out on the primer and end up with some poorly looking paint jobs. One reason why primer is important is because it offers a one coat coverage for the topcoat. In addition, it blocks resinous knots and stains from bleeding through. Most important of all is that the primer improves adhesion which greatly extends the topcoat life.
Use a Pole
When painting rooms in your home, avoid using a ladder but instead look for a telescoping extension pole for the paint roller you will be using. These extension poles are of different sizes but one which is 30 inches offers more reach. If you are painting a tall building such as a cathedral, you can go for poles telescoping up to 18 feet.
Invest In Canvas
One important aspect about painting your house is that you must protect other parts from paint splatters. Most painters use the cheap plastic drop cloths for protecting the floor only to find paint spots beneath the sheets. For the best painting experience, canvas drop cloths are recommended. They are puncture resistant and durable meaning that they will not allow paint splatters to penetrate. Unlike plastic drop cloths that get slippery when wet paint falls on them, canvas cloths absorb all paint drips.
We all know that attempting to remodel a bathroom usually ends with a huge dent in our bank accounts. This is because the equipment in a bathroom is often some of the most expensive in the house, second only to the kitchen. Next, if something goes wrong – and something always goes wrong – it’s a huge expense to repair things like plumbing.
So how can you ensure that you remodel your bathroom on a budget? We’ve got some tips and tricks below to save you some serious money.
1. Have Your Bathroom Inspected First
Having your bathroom inspected first will let you know if there are any issues before you start tearing down walls. You can get mold tests, plumbing tests, and anything else you may need. This way you can get the repairs done before dipping into your remodel budget. If this means having to put off your remodel project, so be it. At least you’ll know that when it’s time to actually start to remodel, you’ll be able to!
2. Find Cheaper Alternatives
We all want a jetted tub and marble countertops. However, few of us can actually afford those things. At least there are cheaper alternatives that we can access. Sure, maybe it’s not actual marble, but it sure does look like it. As for the tub? Spring for a deep but unjetted tub if you have to. You will still get a lot of comfort and the ability to soak until your heart’s content, but you won’t have to pay as much.
3. Get The Best Quality
Wait… how does this save you money? In the long-term, you will save more money by only getting the best quality. This is because the best is less likely to chip, crack, or break for many years. If you go cheap, you risk things breaking or shutting down in only a couple of years. Then you have to pay to repair it. And pay again. And again!
It’s not too difficult to remodel or repair your bathroom on a budget. In fact, if you plan ahead well, get things inspected ahead of time, and mind the materials you use, you may end up not paying much more than you did for other rooms in the house. Just take heart that you’re not remodeling the kitchen. Now that’s a budget eater if there ever were one in the modern home!
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Tips For Finding The Best Residential Plumbing Services
Every homeowner needs a plumber at least once in a lifetime. When you renovate your kitchen or your bathroom, you need someone to help you with the installation of new faucets or water heaters. Even if you don’t renovate, you may still need services such as drain cleaning, toilet repairs or garbage disposals. All these are plumbing-related jobs, therefore a good plumber could prove to be very useful. This article is going to give you a few tips for finding the best residential plumbing services.
1. Choose By Area Of Expertise
Not all plumbing services are alike. Some plumbers may be specialized in drain cleaning and garbage disposal, while others may be experts in water lines or various installation jobs. If you know what kind of plumbing services you need, it makes sense to seek for those professionals that are the best in that specific area of expertise rather than others.
2. Ask For Recommendations
The best way to check whether a plumber is really as good as he claims to be is to ask some of his former customers. Good professionals will always be happy to show you samples of their previous work or to put you in contact with their actual or former clients. Another way to see what others think about a certain plumbing company is to search the web. You are probably going to find reviews of lots of companies or skilled professionals, so you are going to see whether there are any problems with a certain plumber you may think to hire.
3. The Early Bird Catches The Worm
If you wait until the last moment to find a good plumber, you have good chances to fail. When you have an emergency, you may care less about the high quality of a job in favor of the speed of reaction. A broken pipe may result in flooding your entire house within minutes, thus making it hard to make an informed choice. It’s much better, if you own a home, to find a good plumber and maintain a good relationship. It’s wise to do regular checkups anyway, because minor issues are very easy and relatively inexpensive to fix. The problem with these small issues is that most of the time they may pass unnoticed. The eye of an experienced plumber doing a periodical checkup has way more chances to detect such problems and fix them from an early stage. Besides, your plumber is going to be there for you at any given time, should you land some emergency situation that needs to be dealt with immediately.
Speaking of emergency services, it’s best to find a good plumber in your neighborhood, because this would significantly shorten the intervention time in case of an emergency.
Last but not least, don’t make price your first criterion of selection. A not so good plumber may cost you more in the long run, especially if your floors, carpets or other assets get damaged because of water leaks that could have been detected and repaired more effectively by a good professional.
prospective buyers. In addition, remodeling is a magnificent way of putting to use rooms that were largely unoccupied such as the basement. For the majority of homeowners, refinishing means acquiring a home equity loan to afford the project. However, refinishing a basement does not necessarily have to be an expensive undertaking.
