Walk Through With New Home Owners – using that lowes coupon for all it’s worth!
Last Updated on Thursday, 15 July 2010 03:06 Written by admin Thursday, 15 July 2010 03:06
I have been thinking a lot lately about all the money I spend at Lowes and how I rarely use a Lowes Coupon unless I am legitimately helping someone that has recently moved. Because it is my business to remodel, do additions, etc I run into a lot of different situations. I was thinking about first the money I spend with the people just moving and really they come into two categories.
The first is the person moving into a relatively turn key home. This person can do everything on a single lowes coupon if we plan right because they rarely are spending more than $5,000. While it is not uncommon for us to pick up a new refrigerator the rest of the purchases are usually personal touches when dealing with this turn key home buyer and really all of these personal touches are fun to buy with the homeowner. First we go through their new home and take an inventory. We talk about what it would be like to use each room. The living room, where to put couches, lighting, ceiling fans and throw rugs. The bedroom where to put a new tv jack, mirror on closet doors, ceiling fans, window locks. The kitchen we talk about towel holders, cabinet storage solutions, pot and pan racks, new built in appliances etc. It is really a fun part of my job because when we do it right and inexpensively using ever trick in the book including yes a lowes coupon we can do a lot to a home for not too much money. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. We also go into the bathroom and yes I have them sit on the toilet, lid closed of course, to get an idea of if they like the toilet paper holder, if they fit (yes it is an issue in some smaller bathrooms), lighting, exhaust fans etc. I know you are thinking all of this takes a lot of effort but really in this slower economy it allows me for a minimal amount of money to put a couple workers to work for a few days and it produces a little in income.
After we do the interior we then go outside and discuss things like gardening, lighting, security, and entertaining. There is a lot you do in a new home and if you are only working from a single lowes coupon you need to put it all on one tab. It is amazing to me how many turn key home buyers do not even own a lawn mower and yet they tell me all the time that a. they were not planning to hire a gardener and b. they never thought about it. We then have to discuss storage of the equipment and if they need a shed or not.
What’s fun about lowes home improvement is they carry everything. Yes I know the other guys do too but really, they may have every specific screw, but lowes has a larger variety of of nicer looking décor items. Anyhow I digress. We were discussing the aspects of the exterior walk through with the new homeowner. What many people do not think about is concrete aka known as a patio. It is relatively inexpensive to add space to a patio are to improve the entertaining experience. It is also time to discuss an enclosed porch area or maybe parts that are set apart from the landscaping. Like maybe a path to an area that holds a gazebo or something of the like. I think you are getting the idea. In later posts I will get into much more detail how, beyond a simple lowes coupon, which I know is the obsession at this site, but into greater detail on how to do all these improvements for a very low cost. But for now we are finished with the turn key home buyer walk through. As you can see a turn key homeowner is really oftentimes focused on many of the finer touches that personalize the home and bring everything into a much more “home” feel rather than just moving into someone else’s “house”.
For the non turn key home we have a lot more on our minds than just the “finer touches” we have the big stuff in mind. Now as you all know we are a licensed contractor but do not be afraid – everything I discuss, well almost everything, can be tackled by the astute DIY homeowner. Just thing about what I am pointing out and then take on one thing at a time. The Lowes customer service is great and they will help you, show you, assist you – as I have posted in other posts – they are really great. Go to their training DIY seminars and you will see what I mean first hand. Now I cannot emphasize enough – unless you are really good at things – tackle one thing at a time. There is no benefit to starting 10 improvements and not finishing any of them. Start 1 thing and take it through until it is done then move to the next. If you home is in serious need of a lot of work – take it from me. If you can afford it live in a hotel or keep you old rental home until the repairs are done. If you cannot afford it, and I know this sounds bad and I am sorry, but let your wife and family stay with in-laws during the major work. Living in a home being remodeled especially if everything is in poor shape puts a lot of stress on the family. Get the basics done first the move the family in.
OK the walk through. For the most part when dealing with a home that needs some serious work and is not “turn-key” I focus on making it fresh and clean. What I mean by this… well you will see. Paint is the number 1 improvement. If the home is an entry level home and has old plaster walls consider texturing them then painting. I know many people enjoy plaster walls and smooth wall but an entry level home can look modern, fresh, and clean simply by texturing all the walls, using a good killz based primer, then a good quality paint for the final coat. Painting is somewhat cheap. Using cheap paint is not smart and not cheap. If you are doing it yourself, trust me, spend the extra few bucks for good paint – use your lowes coupon – but spend the extra. Good paint is much easier to work with than cheap paint. Texturing takes a professional. Trust me. If you know someone that does texturing then buy him a pizza and rent the machine from lowes that does the texturing. A whole home takes more than just the sprayer with hopper on top – rent the stand alone machine with the hoses – its less than $100 and you can texture a whole smaller home in 1 day. There is no single improvement that makes a home look better than the texture and the paint.
The next is flooring. If you can afford tile – Great! Even DIY tile jobs are not difficult if you take your time – but do not rush either. Putting down linoleum in the bathrooms and kitchen is fine for starters. Remember you can always do tile later -t he goal up front is to get the home livable. Do not think “its better to do nothing then tile later – why do it twice” do not fall into this mentality – it almost ruined my marriage because we never had enough money. Just get that floor covered with a good looking lino – its livable and really it looks great!. For the rest of the home just carpet it. If you can afford wood laminate and love it then fine – but really I do not understand the obsession with tile and laminates – a great carpet is just that – great. Livable, soft etc. I know that many moms think its hard to clean – but just control your children and wash your pets. Carpet is a great starter and it’s fairly cheap. If you do not think so just remember you are doing a smaller entry level home. Go to a remnant store.
Well that’s it for this post. Sorry I did not finish the non turn key home – maybe next time. If you email me I will get to it sooner than if you wait for me. But either way I should get it done in the next day or so.
Get Your Permits! Lowes Coupon Example
Last Updated on Sunday, 11 July 2010 07:44 Written by admin Friday, 9 July 2010 06:45
I was thinking recently on how so many people are catching up on old projects now that the housing market is stabilizing a little. It seems that all of the old projects are finally shaking themselves out. As many of you know we at Lowes Coupon do a lot of entitlement work in southern California. Usually larger projects but lately we have found ourselves doing a lot of single family infill completions. In the next series of posts I will cover some case studies. For example a customer recently brought me a garage he had built by who he says was a 
licensed contractor and who clearly built the garage without a permit.
For the sake of the readers lets cover several issues that were resolved – this will help you with your general knowledge of what to do and not to do.
First mistake was the owner did not check out the so called contractor – he failed to look anything up and is paying dearly for it. This happens time and time again. Somehow owners just trust the person in front of them and start handing over significant amounts of money. This particular homeowner I believe was won over by greed. The garage he was building was very large and tall. 40X40 with 12 foot walls with a gable that reached almost 20 feet all attached to a manufactured home of all things. For those that are “in the know” you cannot “attach” to a manufactured home but must leave a 1” breezeway between the garage and the home – but I digress. Anyhow he was getting the entire structure completed for $15,000. Now $20,000 would be reasonable for this particular garage but this was built during the housing boom. So really it should have cost around $30,000. $20,000 would be the price today. Even the best Lowes do it yourself training could not help you do this one. This one required a professional. Anyhow it was greed and a lack of thoroughness that caused this project to go downhill fast.
Second mistake was not pulling permits. Now properly addressing the first mistake would have cured this second one. Now we at Lowes Coupon are all for the do it yourself – but 20 foot gables on a 40×40 garage – well just pouring the foundation is a little much for anyone but true professionals. Permits are very important. I understand not wanting to pull a permit when you change out a toilet but trying to build a garage with a contractor you have not “checked out” is not wise. There is a reason that cities require permits. It is primarily for public safety. It is so that a trained person can not only verify that the structure was designed properly but also so you have a 3rd party coming by at various stages to ensure it is being built to the plans. These 3rd party verifications are critical to ensure public safety. Design flaws can take down anything. We have all seen the video of the bridge that began to sway and then eventually fell down before it was ever put into regular use? That was built with professionals but for some reason they did not “catch” the flaws. Getting a permit puts your design through “plan check”. “plan check” is more than just a 
hassle – plan check is there to check your plans. It allows someone to review your archetects work to ensure compliance with every single design rule. It’s like a spell checker – if you read your own work you can miss the same error 20 times over – but when another reads your work they can oftentimes correct what your overlook.
So that’s the lesson. Do not be taken in by a cheap price – you can pay a cheap price for someone to weed your garden but do not try to skimp on a 1600 square foot, 20 foot tall, garage. For that you are asking for trouble.
By the way we are still in plan check with this garage. It is going to cost $15,000 to fix at the minimum. First they allowed the structure to lean on the roof of the manufactured home. This is not allowed as a manufactured home is to be completely structurally independent of the accessory building, in this case the garage. Then comes the sheer wall. Sheer wall is very important to keep your building from falling – it allows extra support for the misc pressures on a building. Then there is the foundation. Yikes! Can I say that? They did not put any footings on th foundation. So basically there is a slab of concrete with a 40×40 garage on top that is 20 feet high and leaning on a mobile basically sitting on a slab of concrete that can slip at any time because there are no footings holding it in place – and this is California – one good Earthquake and this thing could easily come down and kill someone. So now they are talking about digging below the 4 corners of the slab to build 4×4 (that’s 4 feet by 4 feet ) footings 3 feet deep with rebar epoxied into core holes in the top foundation. I think the engineer is crazy and they should start from scratch. They are going to be spending a lot of money at Lowes Home Improvement and hopefully lowes has mercy on them and gives them a discount equivalent to a Lowes Coupon or even lowes coupons.
Lesson learned and hopefully you enjoyed the little case study – please, do things right the first time. It will save you a lot of hassle later.