Every drop of water, crack, ant, royally freaks me out at this point. I can’t afford to rent. I own a shitty house that is a fixer upper. So frustrating.
So many people who are mentally and cognitively bankrupt own houses. They never do any maintenance on them, or if they do, they never do it right. And yet, their houses aren’t (always) falling apart.
Houses are more sturdy than our anxieties convince us. Fix things little by little as they come, prioritize what comes first. Your house won’t fall apart or blow up. This is what I tell my wife when she gets nervous about something creaking.
Not really much advice other than being proactive about issues, but it is funny how concerned you quickly become with all types of water once you own a home. Rain intrusion, drainage in the yard, leaky pipes, dripping noises, frozen pipes, gutters, humidity, water heater, storms, etc, etc. It’s a real menace and so are squirrels (as I also found out after purchasing a home).
This right here. Every running water noise your ears perk up thinking that it’s the worst. Then you realise it’s just the dishwasher.
Did you hear that? I feel like the toilet flushed funny
I just fixed the dishwasher that is original to the house. I’ve never used a dishwasher before(ty technology connections). my god is it loud and keeps giving me a heat attack even a week after using it, but I can’t argue with clean dishes.
You certainly can argue with them. It’s only a problem if they start to argue back.
how concerned you quickly become with all types of water
LOL, yes! 99% of my problems these last 5 years have been related to water. It’s really made me want to learn more about plumbing.
I pulled the hydrometer out of my cigar humidor to became more aware of the dampness of my basement. I also spent over $1,000 on evicting a family of raccoons out from under my backyard deck. So yeah, I get it HAH
Ugh gotta repair my roof in a few weeks. At least it’s metal so cheap af… Damn snow pulled some flashing down.
NEVER start a plumbing project when the hardware or big box stores are closed.
Similar to auto repairs. If you have one vehicle and you start working on it make sure you have uber or a neighbor willing to drive you to the parts store because you forgot a part/wrong one.
Reminds me of dental issues too. If you bust a tooth it will ALWAYS happen from Fri evening-Sun when the dentist is off.
I did learn this one the hard way. This is excellent advice.
I know it is cheesy, but look at every maintenance project as an opportunity for learning a new DIY skill.
Start going to garage sales and flea markets to collect tools.
It helps if you can chitchat with someone IRL about mutual homeowner issues.
Homeownership is man’s continuous battle against water.
Homeownership is man’s continuous battle against water.
Yeah, a heck of a lot of household troubles can be put on the backburner, but anything involving water intrusion needs to be fixed right away.
My home is from the 1890s and has a sandstone foundation with no footer. It leaks ground water, but only after a torrential downpour or when a lot of snow melts. Sandstone was not designed to ever be completely watertight. Leaks are incredibly common due to it just being a stack of rocks in the ground.
Luckily it all leaks right into an old grey water line in the floor. It tends to slowly fill up, then makes its way back into the earth either through that or my brick floor.
It can be a little gross and stressful at times but I’m waiting til spring to install a sump pump
I know some people with a similar house. I guess the bright news is that when a house gets that old, but it’s still standing, you probably have some time, lol.
I’m trying to convince myself I need a table saw to replace a rotten board in my deck.
One board? Hell no. Circular saw it. If you don’t own a circ saw, buy that instead
Yah, I was going to just get a board cut but this is an excuse to buy a new tool, right?
I agree so much with the water thing. I spent two days on reshaping my yard
Remember this is a marathon and not a sprint. So think in long terms for fixing things. Even if you sell the house having something done correctly will increase the value. Fix something and maintain as best as possible to keep it working or as high value. This feels best if you do it room by room so you can enjoy the things you fixed.
Don’t tell me… I’m 36 years old. Five years ago, I bought my house—an old one in a small town here in Spain that needed a complete renovation, including the roof. After four years of very, very hard work, mostly done by myself, I managed to restructure the house. I redid everything except the exterior walls. I moved in six months ago. So, here’s what happened: last month, some workers were installing new fiber optic cables for the whole street. They climbed onto my roof without asking and drilled a hole in it to run the cables—without my consent. For the past two weeks, I’ve been battling the fiber company and insurance to get this fixed. Meanwhile, I’ve had a bucket in one of my rooms for two weeks, and the room is now full of humidity and mold. The entire ceiling, which is made of drywall, needs to be completely redone. My hair is falling out nonstop—I’ll be bald like a light bulb in a couple of months if this keeps up.
It would be a real shame if that cable which is on your property suddenly wasn’t.
Username checks out.
Learn/Improve your DIY skills, most things that need fixing around the house are actually pretty simple to do yourself
This 100% also most general contractors are just scam artists that will do a very shit job or make the thing worse.
I learned to fix it. Before YouTube, that usually means not so great. But now, I usually do at least as good as a job as the people I’d hire.
Fixing stuff is easy, and you have to accept that there’s no perfect fix.
Ants, set out ant bait traps. Look outside and see if there’s a trail, follow it to the source, and spray it with ant poison.
Cracks, YouTube that. They may be nothing.
Leaks, if it’s plumbing, you can buy pipes at home Depot and replace them.
Granted, it will take a while. Maybe all day. But you’ll get an endorphin rush when it’s done and eventually you’ll come to know all the ins and outs of your house.
But it’s you look at it and it’s too big, Google a company to do it. Even if you’re halfway, and find you’re stuck. No shame in getting help. This shines you don’t have a family member or friend who’s already handy.
But really, if you can’t fix it, can’t afford to have it fixed, just do what you can to keep the house clean and work on it a little bit or put aside money till you can. That’s hard, but that’s owning a house. Like anything in life, it’s difficult. But it doesn’t have to stay that way, with enough time and practice.
You’re already smarter than many, asking for other’s opinions. Don’t suffer in silence. I believe in you!
no perfect fix
And if you need convincing, go measure some parts of your house. Peak around in places and see how its actually assembled compared to how you thought it would be. Then realize it hasn’t fallen over yet, so maybe perfection doesn’t matter.
We all want to believe that these rooms actually follow geometry with things like parallel/perpendicular walls.
I’ve just been making a wardrobe in an alcove where in the space of 1200mm they have managed to be out by 40mm (1.5 inches in 4ft for our American folks) Trying to be within 1-2mm and deciding on referencing a side wall that’s curved but making the room “more square”, and having a variable depth wardrobe or making something that looks right but that I know is a parallelogram. Either way a future guy with a tape measure will ask “what idiot built this?”
Great advice. Here’s another hint for first timers: you’re going to get it wrong. Spend half a day replacing a faucet, following all the instructions and the collective wisdom of YouTube. Turn the water back on and… drip, drip.
Patching drywall, fixing a drawer slide, replacing a loose electrical outlet… No matter how much you read or watch there is some finesse to each. Practice and experience will make it so you get it right the first time more often, and then when you’re an old person like me you reach a point where you can pretty much do it better than the fly-by-night contractor you’d hire.
One more piece of advice. Don’t mess with live electricity. Wall current can stop your heart instantly or start a fire in the middle of the night. Turn off breakers and be diligent about tightening connections and keeping things to code, but don’t be too afraid of it. A little bit of awareness is all it takes. And the first time you turn that breaker back on it may pop, then you’ll see what went wrong and never make that mistake again.
I know I said one more, but here is one more “one more”. Hit yard sales or estate sales for cheap tools. You’ll have to do this proactively and not when you actually need them. Usually you can pick up stuff for pennies on the dollar. An old caulk gun, adjustable wrench, half box of drywall screws… All good to pickup on the cheap.
I know DIY isn’t everyone’s favorite past time, but after the first few things you tackle you might find it actually enjoyable. I know the combination of saving money, securing my home’s integrity, and completing a job well done is something I look forward to.
And if you are not 100% confident, take lots of pics as you go. And every step, do something that you figure you can undo. Worse case scenario, it goes back to how it was…
It beats having a landlord.
This is it for me. There are a lot of things that aren’t awesome about owning and maintaining a house, but not dealing with a smug, PITA landlord every month is absolutely worth it to me.
Same sentiment for me, at least I’m paying myself ( mostly ) every month to live in this place
If you can afford the down payment, it really makes a lot more sense to buy your home than rent it.
Never, ever, under any circumstances, think that you’ve finally done everything that needs doing.
Bought cheap and underestimated the effort needed to make it your ideal. At least that’s my experience. It can get overwhelming at times but I find a certain peace I’m taking it as the demon you know. I get a lot of bugs in the spring when the weather starts to warm and it’s damn annoying, but know that when the weather gets more stable they’ll leave and I can get back to normal. It’s sort of a zen thing to recognize that it’s almost 100 years old, so yeah, there are going to be some annoyances, can’t call it unexpected.
Basically just make it your own, and do what you can when you can. Unless you’re rich and have all the resources/time in the world there’s no point in getting in a panic that it can’t all be done at once.
Try to only tackle one project at a time. It gets exponentially more stressful trying to juggle a bunch of incomplete projects. Also, you’ll never be “done”. That’s not the point. The point is shelter and comfort.
This is probably some of the best advice here. It’s important to prioritize what is going to be the most costly if you don’t fix it now, and if you try to do 7 things at once, you will feel like none of them will ever be done, which contributes to your stress more than still having 6 broken things after fixing one.
I remember going from being super excited that I owned the walls and fixtures around me to then realising I owned the walls and fixtures and no-one else was going to fix them. Not everything needs doing now though, so separate the issues into things you can live with, mid-term renovations and now things.
Oh, and always remember you’re not paying off someone else’s mortgage anymore!
That’s how i deal with it.
It’s not causing more damage, it can wait.
It’s not someone else who’s benefiting from my hard earned money
I don’t have a fixer-upper per se, but the dude who flipped my place to sell it really cut corners. I do as many repairs myself as I can. I consult the Internet, local hardware shops, and people I know who have done home repairs. I’m currently dealing with a toilet that won’t stop running unless I cut the water supply to it. I know that I need to replace all the parts in the tank, but I haven’t been able to make it to the hardware store to get the parts.
Also redneck engineering temporary fixes is totally a valid strategy. My parents put flex seal on a fucked up part of their roof and it kept the leaks at bay for 4 years. It could have lasted longer, but they got the whole thing replaced.
My screen door is broken, and I haven’t been able to replace it, so I have it tied open and held in place against my porch railing with some yarn. In bad storms, before it broke really bad, I used duck tape to keep it shut so it wouldn’t go flapping around.
Parts of my porch siding (plastic lattice) would also start blowing around in bad storms, so I used spare boards to prop everything in place until I was able to cut all the lattice down.
i had the toilet running issue. turned out i just needed a new seal for the bottom of the flush mechanism.
was a little more expensive than i’d like on account of the fact that the mechanism in my toilet is no longer produced but managed to find one.
Still cheaper than replacing the lot
I’m not 100% sure what part is causing the running, so I’m just replacing everything. It’s all probably due to be replaced anyway lol
well check that bottom seal, it was pretty obviously toast when i looked at it
I did. It looks a little rough, but doesn’t seem to be complete toast. There’s also another mechanism that might be malfunctioning. I adjusted it like I was instructed to and the dripping got worse.
Drop of water depends on where the water is. Watch online videos to diagnose problems, it’s the opposite of doing this for personal health. People have some crazy cheap ways to address issues.
Crack, draw a line parallel to the crack on each side. Measure it and it on the wall. Check back and see if the measurement is changing. Patch it if it’s stable. If it’s not stable, probably not good news, start with videos of what others have done.
Ants are the easiest. There are barrier sprays that will keep out any insects. Fall instructions on the product but typically just spray it on the outside of the foundation once a year.
Houses are over engineers to stay standing up so don’t worry too much. The expensive stuff will come around ever couple decades like roof replacement so plan for that but most everything can be remediated with little effort, especially if you don’t care how it looks. You said it’s a fixer up, each patch is just another layer to its character.
