Before Undertaking A Bathroom Remodeling Job

Things To Keep In Mind Before 
Undertaking A Bathroom Remodeling Job

In times gone by, the bathroom was little more than a closed in area to get into and out of as quickly as possible. Today, however, realtors will tell you that the bathroom, next to the kitchen, is what buyers look at the most. You can add thousands to the value of your home if you undertake 
bathroom remodeling.

Before you jump in with both feet, test the water, so to speak. You must have a budget and stick to it. If you just go shopping, you may end up spending more than you had planned. Also, decide on the space you are working in, are you going for a full bathroom remodeling or just staying with redecorating? Also, keep in mind how much stress this it going to put on your family. If you go from 2 bathrooms to 1, it may be more stress than you realize. 

One of the first places people look to when doing complete bathroom remodeling is the shower or tub. If this is the way you are looking to go, do your homework before you begin ripping out fixtures and walls. There is a large assortment of products available from cast iron to porcelain; glass doors on the shower or a curtain? Try to stay with the current plumbing set up you have. If the showerhead is in the same place in the new shower as the old, you won't have to tear out plumbing. This will save you hours and money. 

Another thing to consider in bathroom remodeling is, if you are going to replace tiles, you want to have the entire room flow together. Also, if you are looking to get a new look for your bathtub or shower, but not go through the expense of replacing it, having an acrylic molded over the existing bathtub will give you the best of both worlds. 

It is important to do your shopping before you start your bathroom remodeling project. There is such a wide variety of fixtures and materials on the market today that it may be overwhelming. There are a few things to keep in mind while you shop.

As with any major home improvement project, make sure you get the correct permits and restrictions in your area with the local government. That is important to do if you are going to do major bathroom remodeling changes including electrical or plumbing work, such as installing heated floors or moving the sink from this wall to that one. 

If you are thinking of undertaking the electric or plumbing yourself, make sure you know what you are doing and spend time doing your research. In most cases, hiring a contractor may be your best bet. They know what they are doing and will know what to do should they run into something unexpected. You should find a bathroom remodeling contractor that shares your vision of the your plan and is willing to work within your budget. Let him 'do his thing'. Then you are free to paint, wallpaper and decorate to your heart's content.

When making your plan for bathroom remodeling, here are some things that you may want to think about. 

Making sure the shower head is comfortable for everybody who uses it. Also, choose easy to clean fixtures. You want to make sure you have tempered glass for the shower door; if that is the way you are going.

Keep in mind that you want to be able to reach the soaps and shampoos, so keep them in easy to reach areas. Another thing to keep in easy reach are the towels and washcloths. Don't forget that bathrooms are high humidity areas, so be sure to have enough ventilation to keep mould at bay. 

It is very important to make sure that all outlets are grounded. This is going to help prevent eclectic shock from plugging in appliances such as hair dryers. 

To create a stylish yet functional bath room, be sure you pay attention to detail. With your time and effort it will be another part of your home, other than just another room in your house.

In times gone by, the bathroom was little more than a closed in area to get into and out of as quickly as possible. Today, however, realtors will tell you that the bathroom, next to the kitchen, is what buyers look at the most. You can add thousands to the value of your home if you undertake bathroom remodeling.

Seasonal Spackling or: My First and Only College Thanksgiving

There have been only two instances in my life when I have not been at home with my extended family for Thanksgiving. Two years ago, I made the grievous mistake of attending Thanksgiving dinner at my then-girlfriend’s stepfather’s home in Concord, New Hampshire. It was a bad drive topped by one of the more uncomfortably confrontational family dinners I’ve ever been a party to, in which a slice of pumpkin pie was, I kid you not, thrown at someone’s face. That was the last straw for several situations, including that particular relationship, but most of all, it reaffirmed that the only place I really wanted to be on Thanksgiving was upstate with my family, as much as the idea of staying home and doing some freelance NYC handyman work to make some extra dough allures me.

Indeed, the only other time I ever abstained from my annual November trip upstate was my junior year of college, which I have surpassingly fond memories of. Not of the food, mind you: the turkey came out drier than plywood, the mashed potatoes were served as a type of soup essentially, and the stuffing was like gobbling down a plate of salad croutons. The preparation for the meal is what I remember, especially since it put me in contact with a lifelong friend, currently a general contractor for a NYC handyman outfit out of Jackson Heights.

By preparation, I mean less the strewning of festive colored paper and cardboard turkey cutouts, and more the repairs to this particular apartment. See, the apartment we decided to hold it in was very tiny and we had a lot of people who were staying at college, due largely to the clash between slim college-kid budgets and somewhat unreasonable travel costs. So, we had to get a larger table into a living room about the size of a dorm bedroom, and also had to move around furniture. This may have been an easy task if the group of men responsible for this, my NYC handyman friend and myself included, weren’t stone-cold drunk at the time we performed this miraculous move around. 

As you may expect, there were more than a few holes in the drywall by the time we were done wedging the long dinner table, which we had borrowed from a friend of a friend who worked as part of the janitorial staff in the compute science building. The relief that we would indeed be able to feed all 20-odd people was immediately replaced by the burden of having to convincingly repair these holes. We may have been able to wait a few days to make repairs but the girl whose apartment we were using had what might kindly be referred to as a hissy fit. To be fair, she was a few glasses of dirt-cheap white wine in as well but still, her complaints rang louder and more routinely than even those god-forsaken college fire alarms.

So, we walked across campus to my NYC handyman friend’s dorm and picked up some extra spackle he had brought home from the studio, and newspaper for the bigger holes. It turned out to be a simple fix when we returned: most of the holes needed only a little spackle, followed by some sanding a day or two later, and only one of the holes required a layer of newspaper to fill it. What I have a very vivid and happy memory of is the rest of our friends, happy enough to crack a few more beers and relax while we did the work, commentating on our job as if they were announcers for the NFL. Until you have a drunk philosophy major remark that you have “stepped up [your] spackling game since last season” and “must have really worked on [your] sanding during the off season”, you really haven’t lived.

But as much as I have fond memories of these days, this year I’m thankful to be getting home for a few days and getting a breather from city life. I imagine my short time spent at Penn Station tomorrow will be a hell not worth remembering, but it’s worth it in the long run. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.  

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Hippy Dippy or: My Trip to the Communal Boiler

The idea of communal living was always something that interested me until I saw it first hand. Coming out of high school, I found myself accepted into a Dramatic Writing conservatory at SUNY Purchase, one of the more left-leaning campuses in the SUNY system. It was there that I came face-to-face with communal living, radical politics (on both ends, oddly enough), and an invigorating culture of craftsman (some of whom eventually became NYC handymen friends of mine) and artists who believed steadfast in the do-it-yourself approach. For most, money was tight, used mainly for booze, gas, and a monthly trip into the city, but materials were plentiful and there was a spirit of invention that still attracts me to this day.

This was not the same sort of spirit I encountered when I found myself giving a ride to a NYC plumber friend early this year while her truck was in the shop.  A call had come in from a house all the way out in Bay Ridge, an area I remembered largely as a community of firemen, police officers, construction workers and other various day laborers. I had lived in an adjacent neighborhood, Sunset Park, for a few years after college and was shocked to find that there was a large house (12 bedrooms!) that served as a sort of commune for a pack of Brooklyn college graduates in the middle of the Ridge.

What was not so much of a surprise was that none of them knew anything about boilers and what exactly they do, though, to be perfectly frank, neither did I until a different NYC plumber friend of mine gave me a shot-in-the-arm tutorial about the whole shindig. We arrived at the house and my friend immediately followed the ringleader of the outfit to the basement, where their gas boiler was clearly malfunctioning. The house itself was freezing and at every corner of the house, I could see a blanket or a quilt being used as a heating alternative, either being wrapped around some being or being pinned up to cover a window. In fact, there was a young woman wrapped in a quilt, working on knitting another quilt.

My friend came up and informed me that it was a simple blown fuse and that we would be done within the hour. Seeing as it was frigid outside, I graciously took up an offer to hang out with other members of the household as my friend did her work. It turns out that most boiler problems go back to tripped circuit breakers, blown fuses, an unlit pilot light or, in rarer cases, a problem with the thermostat. A blown fuse is, in fact, something that should be left to a professional. The others are easy enough to learn, but are hugely dependent on brands and models, thus why I must sadly decline a quick tutorial.

Anyway, as I was saying, my memories of living with metal and wood workers at SUNY Purchase was not exactly matched by the group of people (most of them were about three years my junior) I came into contact with at this house. There was a silence to the house that not even the seemingly on-loop recordings of Bob Dylan and Fleet Foxes that echoed through the rooms seemed to help. I attribute this to the fact that many artists, especially writers and graphic artists, do their work online and it is not my intention to say that this band of communal believers aren’t as ambitious and unique as the people I knew, who are now, as I said, NYC handymen, plumbers, stagehands, furniture makers or old-fashioned artists. I guess I miss the sound of activity, which has been replaced with the tapping of keyboards, for better or worse. (If I’m being totally honest, it’s probably for the better.)

Soon enough, me and my friend left and I dropped her back off at her shop in Dumbo. I told my girlfriend at the time about the house and similar ideas as the ones I have expressed here and she, perhaps rightly, figured me as an “old fuddy duddy.” It’s not as if I’m expecting everyone to go out there and learn how to perfectly maintain a boiler or hot water heaters or anything else of the sort, though I hardly see the harm in that being an ambition. My business, and others, might suffer but I can hardly contain a grin when my younger cousin tells me that he learned how to relight a pilot light or reset a thermostat on his own.       

Why A Remodeling Contractor Is Important

Why A Remodeling Contractor Is Important When Planning A Renovation Of Your House

Everyone has a room in their home that they want to remodel. That one room that is an embarrassment and you close the door when you have company. If you are planning a total remodeling of a room or your entire house, you may want to consider hiring a remodeling contractor. If you try to take on a project that is too big, it will cost you a lot of time and money.

A remodeling contractor is a person who has skill in both carpentry and building. He or she will take consult with you on what you want the outcome of the project to be. A remodeling contractor will also help you design what you want.



He or she has the sub-contractors that you will need to remodel you home and they are already figured into the estimate that you will receive. If you do it yourself, you will be paying huge fees to each sub-contractor. A remodeling contractor can get the job done in a shorter amount of time with fewer errors and for a lower cost then you can do yourself.

Another benefit to hiring a remodeling contractor is that they get special discounts from supply companies and pass the savings on to you. They can also buy used materials that are still in good condition to save you more money. A really good contractor may even be able to sell accessories and fixtures from your project.

The process is really very easy. A remodeling contractor will sit down with you and discuss exactly what you want to do with your project. He or she will ask you for your ideas and suggestions. He or she will ask you what your budget for the project is and advise you if what you want can be done within that budget.
A good contractor will have years of experience and will be able to add touches here and there to enhance your home.

Plans will be drawn up for your approval and estimate will be given. The contractor will also give you an estimated time of completion.

The contractor, upon your approval and acceptance will get everything in place to start your project.

If you decide to hire a contractor for remodeling your house, do not choose the first one you interview. This is a highly competitive field and you may find cheaper rates with someone else. Make sure that you have all of the paperwork and estimate when you apply for financing, your lending institution may require proof that you are remodeling.

If you have decided that remodeling is right for you, check out the services of a remodeling contractor. He or she may be able to save you thousands of dollars on materials.

The Lamp Lady or: The Virtues of CFL and LED Bulbs

Sometimes, you can’t help but be amazed by the unique idiosyncrasies of people, especially when you’re in a business that involves visiting homes often. The holidays are coming up so heating and electric bills have been on my mind these last few weeks and it led me to think about one of the better projects I came across in September, when this blog was just starting. I’m not a NYC electrician but some of my friends are and one of them asked me to be a second pair of eyes for him on a design project for an elderly woman living in Tarrytown.

When we arrived, she showed us in and I was stunned: Lamps! In the living room alone, there were eight (that I counted) lamps on various surfaces, each with a unique style; one was in the shape of a lighthouse, another one had the bulb coming out of an elephant’s trunk. It was like being in the best antique store in the world but the problem was also plainly there: We needed to consolidate her energy use. She told my NYC electrician friend that she usually had three or four of these lamps on as soon as it turned dark, as well as one or two in the dining room and an overhead light in the kitchen. What’s worse? They were all old-school, incandescent bulbs, from a stockpile she had in her basement.

Incandescent bulbs are energy killers, plain and simple, and with the energy bills rising these days, I told her that she should not only cut down on the amount of lamps but toss out most, if not all of her incandescent bulbs. It took some convincing, over two cups of the strongest Russian tea I’ve ever had in my life, but she finally agreed and me any my friend got to work. Over the next week or so, we helped design a system of recessed lights in her living room, dining room and bedroom (which had at least five lamps, including one in the bathroom) and ran new electric lines and dimmer switches in all three rooms. We also ran a line and a new dimmer switch in her kitchen.

The biggest change-up was that we installed CFL bulbs in all the fixtures, including the lamps that she decided to keep out. (It’s worth noting that she agreed to sell me one lamp I particularly liked, the base of which was a suited man who looked a lot like Peter Lorre.) CFL bulbs are commonplace for most people but I feel the need to remind people of them constantly. They are the simplest of all energy savers and most NYC electricians will be the first to sing their praises; there are also LED lamps and lights, which are essentially Christmas lights but used in new designs and compacted to boost the concentrated light emitted. In fact, the drive back to Queens consisted of a long talk about the burdens of hanging exterior Christmas lights, though ultimately, this year, I have something bigger to dread: Hauling a tree up three flights of stairs. Does Santa know a good chiropractor?     

A Brief History of Clogs: Part 1

For several reasons that I don’t care to go through right now, there is no clear history of clogs in the United States, nor in any other country. This is a problem I thought the Internet would have solved, but as it turns out, the Internet has slacked off big time. I asked a NYC plumber that I routinely work with about it and all he could give me is remembrances of jobs he went on with his father to dormitories and military bases, where clogs were a weekly ordeal. But there was no talk about what must have been epic clogs in the 19^th century—just look at the facial hair from that day and age and tell me the constant trimmings didn’t cause some doozies.

I’ve been dealing with a rash of clogs in both my bathroom and my kitchen recently, the result, I suspect, of a not all that wise attempt to grow my hair and beard out a bit.  Most of them were fixed with chemicals, but Monday night, I found myself struggling with what I would politely call a ravenous beast of a clog in my shower. I called up a NYC plumber friend (my aforementioned colleague, in fact) and he talked me through the process, beginning with a homemade version of a clog dissolvent with baking powder and white vinegar, that ended up not working.

So, taking my friends advice, I popped open the drain with a screwdriver, straightened a metal hanger and got a plunger. I plunged the drain for what had to be ten minutes (my arms still hurt!) and lo and behold, when I took the plunger off, I could clearly see the clog some three feet or so down the drain. I then made a hook with the wire hanger, snaked it down the drain and with only a little bit of maneuvering was able to get the culprit, a wet wad of mess that I will spare detailed definition of, for your benefit.

This was the end of my nightmare but my friend was quick to point out that this is a 50/50 fix, meaning that the other half the time you will have to hire an actual NYC plumber and get a professional snaking job done, or at least get them to inspect the clog firsthand. But there is an easy fix: A simple two-dollar strainer that can be picked up at any hardware store and often cuts most clogs in half. Still, it’s a relief to have these moments when you can just ask a friend for some advice and put your own elbow into it. That’s old news but the feeling rarely feels old or tired.