Regular Maintenance v Home Warranties

You may have been advised that you should purchase a home warranty to help you avoid extra expense if a major appliance or home appliance system should fail.

You may also have been told that you should not buy a home warranty because they are a waste of money and many are so expensive that they border on being a scam. Confusing to say the least. Which advice is correct?

Although there are some instances when a home warranty can be a good idea, if your home is brand new for instance, usually home warranties are just expenditures that homeowners do not need to make, especially in this economy.

Yes, it is true that if an HVAC system breaks down altogether it may cost as much as $10,000 to replace. However that is less likely to occur if you have it checked by an HVAC professional on a semi annual basis. For safety’s sake you should do that anyway, warranty or no warranty, so the extra $400-$500 spent on a home warranty may not be worth it.

The other thing that some people do not realize until it is too late and they have already taken out a home warranty is that very few of them cover some of the very appliances that are likely to break first – your washer and dryer.

In addition, many warranty companies will try to repair an appliance before even considering replacing it, so you may be holding on to a fridge that is energy inefficient when buying a new one would make more sense.

Instead of purchasing a home warranty consider investing the money you would have spent in the form of annual check ups for your appliances. The old saying that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure holds true for your home every bit as much as it does anything else.

The last snows are melting all over the country, temperatures are starting to rise and people are beginning to turn their attention back to the space outside their homes.

The spring is a great time to implement a landscaping makeover and, whether your current budget will only run to a mini makeover or you are ready to tackle a larger project, now is the time to start planning, before all the best landscapers and contractors in your area are booked up and too busy to help you. Here are a few ideas.

Have a Floating Deck Built

Is there a corner of your yard that gets great sun, is rather spacious but, because it is set quite a way from your house, you really don’t do that much with it? If so, then this may be the perfect spot to have a floating deck constructed this year.

A floating deck is built much in the same way a “regular”” deck, it just serves as a free standing structure rather than one tethered to the side of house. This opens up far greater design possibilities as you are not limited to having to choose a deck style that matches the lines of your home. Find a good deck builder and if you want an octagonal floating deck you can have it.

Add a Pond

Water features are still a hot landscaping trend and a pond is one of the most spectacular yet relatively easy and inexpensive to commission. Find a good landscaper and not only will they be able to help you plan and design the perfect watery addition to your garden but will even help advise you about what should live in it, both in terms of plant life and fish.

Give Your Landscape a Theme

Love the traditional look of a bloom filled English garden? Or perhaps you prefer the tranquil calm of an Oriental style outdoor space? If you can give your exterior space a theme in the same way you may have to the interior of your home your general enjoyment – and the curb appeal – of your home’s exterior will increase significantly.

All good landscapers will be happy to spend some time consulting with you about your options before you make any decisions. What you can and cannot do may be limited by local soil conditions, average temperatures and other regional factors so requesting such a consult can save you a lot of money on dead and withered plants and flowers down the line.

Consider Lawn Alternatives

Many homeowners fight what often seems to be a losing battle trying to keep their large lawns in decent shape. If you are one of them, one of the things you could consider is cutting down on the actual amount of lawn you have to deal with.

There are a number of attractive and easier to maintain alternatives to grass – including decorative stone, cedar chips and you could even consider adding a stylish patio to make better use of some of that green space.

Which is the Right Choice for You?

Spring is just around the corner and many a homeowner will be considering adding onto their deck or replacing their old deck with a newer model. Others will be adding their first.

The slowdown in the economy has meant that most of us are spending far more time at home and every square foot of space – including that which is outside – is being put to better use.

Before you ever get down to the particulars of the design of your deck and which bells and whistles you want added to it, there is one important initial decision to make. Are you going to have a traditional wood deck built onto your home or opt for one of the newer composite material decking options? Here is a little information about both options that may help you decide.

Composite Decking

Composite decking materials are a relatively new innovation and on many levels perform just as well as real wood. The one big advantage that composite decking has over traditional wood is that it is far easier to maintain. Composites are comparitively extremely weather resistant and stand up to water well, making composite decking the better choice for use around a pool area. On the downside though you are going to end up with a very uniform look across the length and breadth of your deck – the variations you would find in natural wooden decking just will not be there.

Wood Decking

If aesthetics are your primary concern then wooden decking is probably going to be the right choice. Although you can buy composite decking materials that are created to mimic wood, most of us can tell the difference.

Wood decking will require more maintenance than composite decking. However, taken care of properly, a wood deck should last far longer than the twenty years that most composite deck material manufacturers guarantee so the durability factor might make wood the better choice as well.

In the end the choice between wood decking and composite decking is a personal one based on preference and budget. Ask your deck contractor if you can see samples of both materials and examples of decks they have built using them before you make your final choice.

At first it may seem like completely repainting the exterior of your home is an expensive prospect, whether you choose to to do it yourself or hire a professional to do the job. However, neglecting to do so when it really is time can end up costing you far more.

The more you delay a repainting job the longer the exterior of your home is exposed to the potentially damaging elements – and structural problems are certainly going to be more expensive to remedy. With all of this in mind when is the right time to call in the painters and give your home the face lift in a can it needs? Here are some pointers.

Is Your Home Three to Five Years Old ?

It may seem strange that a three year old house would need to be repainted but the fact is that these days most new houses have just a single coat of paint over the primer and, while it may look great in the beginning, after three years or so the paint begins to stop doing its primary job – protecting what is underneath from the ravages of the weather – and it really is time for a new coat or two to be added.

Is Your Home Blueish, Grayish or Brownish?

If you tend to describe the exterior of your home in these terms it is unlikely that this is actually the color that was originally picked out. Even the best exterior paint will fade over time and, when it does, it not only looks less appealing but is, once again, exposing your home to the climate more than is good for it.

Try this test on your -ish paint. Run your fingers over visibly faded sections of the paint job. If they come away chalky that is an indication the resin that was actually holding the paint onto your home’s exterior – and providing much of the protection – has broken down, leaving only the paint’s pigment behind.

Blister, Cracks, Flaking and Chips

If the exterior of your home has degraded to this extent then there really is no time to lose. All may not be lost however. If the chipping and flaking is confined to certain areas, under the windows for instance, excessive moisture may be the culprit, not the paint itself. This can be remedied fairly easily with a good re-caulking job around the offending windows.

If, however, the paint flakes are everywhere it is a signal that your exterior paint has failed. At this point you will be best served by bringing in the experts to determine the extent of the damage. If they find that they can still see the paint underneath the chips you may only need a scraping, sanding, and repainting job. However, if the wood underneath is bare you will need your house painter to remove all the old paint and start again from scratch, a far more expensive prospect and one that could have been avoided by acting more quickly, biting the bullet and treating your home to a new coat of paint when it first needed one.

There are an awful lot of things to take into consideration when you are planning and commissioning a large home remodeling project. One of the things that many homeowners tend to overlook is how their insurance – and that held by the contractors they hire – stacks up. Here are the things you should be checking before work begins to make sure you are fully covered and not leaving yourself open to any nasty surprises down the road.

Home Remodeling and Your Homeowner Insurance

Before the remodeling work begins, schedule an appointment with your insurance agent to determine whether or not changes need to be made to your homeowner insurance policy. Your agent should be able to help you determine whether or not leaving the policy as is would cover all your financial losses and liabilities should the worst (a fire, a flood, bodily harm) occur while the remodeling work is in progress.

You also need to determine how your remodeling project is going to impact the value of your home once it is completed. Most large remodels will add value to it, some of them significantly. Although you will not need to make insurance policy changes reflecting this until the project is finished, it helps to bring your insurance agent into the loop early so that they can prepare a new policy that can go into effect as soon as everything is done.

Home Remodeling and Your Contractor’s Insurance

It is absolutely essential that you are comfortable with the level of your contractor’s insurance before the project begins. Many reputable contractors are surprised by just how few homeowners bother to ask about such things, let alone request proof in the form of insurance paperwork. A good licensed remodeling contractor is required to carry a certain amount of insurance by law. This typically includes accident and disability coverage, in addition to liability (or errors and omission) coverage. Ask to get a copy of all these details in writing and then have your insurance agent take a look at it to ensure that between your contractor’s insurance and your own homeowner’s policy you really are fully covered.

There are a lot of questions homeowners have to ask themselves before they commission a large remodeling project such as a complete kitchen remodel or a room addition. How much money do I have to spend? Are we willing to live with all the disruption or will we have to stay somewhere else while construction goes on? How do I find the right contractor for the job? There is another important consideration though and one that people do not always take into account – how long do you intend to live in your home?

How long you actually intend to stay in your current home can help you clarify the actual value of the remodeling projects you undertake. Not the resale value or the ROI because if you never intend to move, if you have found your dream home, then such a thing is rather irrelevant. Here are some basic considerations:

Moving in Five Years

Some homeowners know they will be moving on in about 5 years. Perhaps they are a younger couple who intend to start a family by that time or a family whose older children will be heading off to college. If this is you then you should understand that there are basically three rooms that are going to sell your home – the kitchen, the bathroom, and the master bedroom. Therefore any remodeling projects undertaken in these areas should provide that all important good ROI you will be looking for when you are ready to sell.

Moving in Five to Ten Years

If you fall into this category you will still want to take ROI into consideration but you will be staying put long enough to really appreciate any home remodeling tweaks you make. Adding additional square footage – whether it is a basement room or a room addition to accommodate the extra “surprise” kid makes sense. These types of projects not only add significantly to your home’s value, they make life in your home just a little bit better every day. If you intend to be in your current home for at least a decade you can think about personalizing it a little more as well.

Never Going Anywhere

If you have arrived in the home you intend to stay in (barring hugely unforeseen circumstances) resale value is fairly irrelevant. Remodeling is all about the ultimate enjoyment of your home at this point. This is the time when remodeling can mean changing those one or two things that have always bothered you about your home.

Sick of having to struggle downstairs to the basement with baskets full of laundry? Hire a good general contractor to come in and build one upstairs. The difference it will make to your everyday life will be huge. It may also be worth looking at who you will be in fifteen to twenty years time. Widening a narrow bathroom door or adding a downstairs bedroom now may make your home more accessible in the future, meaning you really will be able to stay there for good.

Make Your Home Safer

Having a home that is as secure as possible is important to most of us. Making it so does not have to mean investing in three guard dogs and a secret agent style security system. Here are some tips for making your home a safer place for you and your family to live in.

Locks

When you move into a new home there are so many things to consider. One small thing but important thing you should do though is change the locks.

You may have met the previous owners and they seemed like jolly nice, respectable people – but who knows who they gave a spare key to over the years or how many times they lost theirs?

Changing the locks is quick and easy if you find the right locksmith and it just means that you really will be getting a fresh start in your new home without having to worry about who else may have access. In addition, if you or a member of your family does happen to misplace their keys and simply cannot find them it is not a risk worth taking to not change the locks again just to save a few bucks.

Landscaping

If you have a lot of trees obscuring the front of your home, that is a gift to a potential intruder because it provides lots of cover and shadowy spots to hide in. You should consider hiring in a landscape gardener or specialist tree surgeon to cut them back or even remove them together. You will actually probably add a lot more natural light to your home as well, something that is almost always a visual bonus as well as adding real value to your home.

Outdoor landscape lighting is just as important for security and safety reasons  as it is for aesthetic ones. Aside from the fact that good outdoor lighting will mean that you do not have to stumble and bumble your way up the garden path at night it will also deter intruders from coming too close. You don’t have to light the place up like one of those house sized Christmas light extravaganzas, just make sure all those dark nooks and crannies, as well as all the entrances to your home are well illuminated.

Security Systems

Having some kind of modern alarm system installed can give you extra piece of mind. Modern alarm systems are really effective and affordable even at the bottom end of the range. High end systems can even email you a photograph or record a video when they detect movement, others will even phone the police or a private security firm for you.

Do not fall into the same trap as some home owners do though. You pay for a good security system and then fail to use it because it is too much of a hassle to set it before you head out or your teen keeps forgetting the code when he comes in from school and has set it off three times this month. Choose a security system that is relatively easy for everyone to operate and then actually use it, otherwise what is the point?