DH and I have always been DIY-ers. Our bedroom walls had evident of mold growing inside since we live in a fog dense area. For the sake of our health, we decided that it was time to replace the two damaged walls.
Here's a comparison of how much we saved by getting our hands dirty.
Contractor's estimated cost
Labor-$700
Materials-$300
Garbage Disposal-$40
TOTAL: $1,040
DIY cost
Labor - $0
Materials(dry wall, foam insulation, mudding sheet rocks, and paint) - $250
Garbage Disposal - $0 from our weekly service
TOTAL: $250
By tackling the project, this translates into a HUGE saving of $790. That's $790 we can allocate back into our home expense fund in case something else needs repair down the road. Now this is what I call "sweat equity."
6 comments:
DIY $10 solution = 1 gallon industrial strength non-diluted Clorox.
LOL. Thanks. We tried wiping down with industrial chemicals but the mold kept creeping up back onto the wall months later. It was also eating up the paint.
Good for you! But also remember that there is a time-value consideration as well. If it took more than 3 hours to do, it's worth more for me to hire someone to do it, since I charge $250/hour. When deciding whether to hire out for things like that, I always consider what other things I could be doing with that time, and normally it costs me less to hire someone else. (This is to say nothing of the severe allergies and asthma which prevent this from even being considered :D).
Nice work! I've done small diy projects but nothing as big as your project yet!
Thanks. We try our best to save money and do home improvement projects that is approachable. And believe me, I was holed up in our 2nd bedroom for almost two weeks (more than the 3 hour timeframe). We still have about 8 bags of garbage we're slowly throwing away. Today is garbage day so I'll try to donate 2 more bags for collection.
Aaren, do you do construction work for a living and is $250/hr a reasonable rate.
I'd guess Aaren is a professional/consultant/attorney of some sort billing out at $250/hour. Just indicating the time/money tradeoff as it would apply to most people. At some point, even if it's less expensive to DIY, when you consider the cost of what your time is worth and how long it would take, it just makes more sense to hire the professional to do it for you and be certain it's done right.
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