Thread: Least Favorite Home DIY projects

Concrete is one of my favorites. Last on the list is Painting. As a matter of fact painting is the last 10 things on my list. I used to paint Harley's and that was great. Booth sucks paint out of the air , drying room where all the smell stays. Laborer to clean everything. I am working on a patent for a paint bomb. Tape what you don't want white, pull the pin and run. Do the whole inside of the house in 2 hours.


Nessmuck... we are not all tards.

Even if I dislike a project here is my thinking. I am just tossing out numbers to go by. Say it takes me a weekend to do a $2000 job for a contractor. $500 dollars of material and 16 hours of labor. 1500 divided by 16 is $93.75 per hour and if pay someone else that is after tax money so add another 20% or so. I get good money for my day job but not $93.75+.

well i dont mind concrete .. minus wheel barreling a basement .. ugghh




i dont mind painting indoors or out ...




but my top 2 dislikes are
1) plumbing ... nothing new ever lines up with the old and a simple task turns into a complete rebuild ..
2) not really a house thing but working on cars is right up there with plumbing !! like plumbing a simple thing always turns into a project for me .. my worst was all my spark plugs were froze up in a f-250 i had .. i think i had 16 hours of heating , snapped plugs , broken eazy outs ect ... after the first one snapped i called a dealer who said the year i had was common and he had done 7 trucks in the last 4months and ford knows but not enough for a recall .. bottom line the dealer said $1300 on average to do it ... 16hrs later i was ahead bout $1250 and back on the road ..lol

I do all my own housework-Plumbing, electrical, sheetrock, painting, floors etc. etc. I really don't mind any of it at all because I am a miser and realize the cost savings in doing my own work is where my relief comes from. I painted some fascia the other day which entailed ripping down 2 boards that were hung out of level and renailing them in place square and level. It was work and my sinuses are quite unhappy with me, but it looks like it should now. The prior homeowner did things, shall we say, wrong. I am constantly backtracking through the house fixing things that were done incorrectly in the past. He slopped all kinds of paint on the brickwork which is a pet peave of mine. Everytime I look at it I get upset. I have poured a BUNCH of concrete in my day. From wheel barrows, but mostly from trucks. Poured a bunch in the Navy and since I got out with my Dad. He does concrete work. I like concrete. Just don't let it get away from you. I like screeding it, then flaoting it, then steel troweling it. Get a nice smooth finish and walk away from it hoping no knucklehead kid scratches their name in it or rollerblades through the middle of it (happened to me).

Drywall...spend a weekend with that and you quickly learn to hire that out.

Tree trimming. I have 8 huge oaks on my property that grow like weeds.

Originally Posted by 32t

Even if I dislike a project here is my thinking. I am just tossing out numbers to go by. Say it takes me a weekend to do a $2000 job for a contractor. $500 dollars of material and 16 hours of labor. 1500 divided by 16 is $93.75 per hour and if pay someone else that is after tax money so add another 20% or so. I get good money for my day job but not $93.75+.

Definitely a solid line of reasoning. The only thing I'd toss out is that you wouldn't be using up your work time, so I think the $/hr takes on a slightly different meaning. But I do agree there is a point where it's worth paying for it.

Weeding.

James.

Originally Posted by Jimbo

Weeding.

James.

That why they invented Roundup.

I personally cant think of anything more disgusting then plumbing, i wont go into the details but i will only say that my house was built in the early 60's with a septic system..................... and i just cant justify paying somebody $50 an hour to work on my pipes.