I’m not massively into DIY, which is a bit of a stereotype really isn’t it? My hubby is and now and then he gets these project ideas. Crazy ideas. I can sometimes be a bit lazy and would prefer to get someone in, but not my hubby.
One such project was doing our entire bathroom up by himself in our old house. Picture this. Me being pregnant; the first trimester with the gremlin, sitting in a bath not sealed to the wall, almost vomming at the eggy smell of the undercoat plaster. It was not fun times I can tell you. It took about 3 months in total BUT saying this it was a massive achievement for him. It did look so much better and we managed to sell our house in 5 days last year, so I like to think the bathroom helped with that! You can see before and after shots below.
I decided to ask hubby what his top tips are for doing up your bathroom by yourself and here are some if his best bits of advice:
- Know your limits. This covers your skill, will (!), time and legality. Do you really want to start such a big project and have you got enough time? Legally, don’t go fiddling with the boiler or any gas pipes. You will need qualified people there. Also don’t be ashamed of getting someone in to do a small job if you are getting fed up. Towards the end, hubby decided to hire someone to do the floor tiling as he knew they would be so much quicker.
- Do your research. For example, if you are replacing your shower, do you know if your water flow rate matches up to the shower you are buying? Little things that need checking to avoid re-doing bits and a bit of a headache.
- Be prepared for the job to be bigger than expected. It is very likely to be, especially if you are replacing an old bathroom like we did. Hubby stripped the tiles to find to whole wall needing to be re-plastered from bare brick! Hence the horrible eggy smell for a while. See below.
- Shop around. Some of the big DIY stores have the bigger items, like your bath or toilet at good prices but other items will be more costly. So your taps, your bathroom door handles, even your screws make sure you look online and shop around. The radiator below we got for half the price. Look around for your accessories like bathroom towels.
- Use the right tool for the job. This will save lots of time. For example cut your pipes with a proper pipe cutter and not a hacksaw, unless you want your pipes to leak!
- Measure twice, cut once. Always double check your measurements. All is takes is a mis-measure and your £300 bath won’t fit in the room (this didn’t happen but you never know!!)
- Protect yourself and your nice things. Being safe is obvious but it is easy to forget the lovely new sink you have bought when using a chisel above it. It could be a very costly mistake.
So there you have it. I think he is glad he did it, as learnt a good lot, acquired a lot more tools (!) and in the long run we did save money. The labour can be really costly and a bit of DIY really helps!
Disclosure – this is a collaborative post.