Own work - floor coverings, painting, tiling, what else?

Hello everyone,

I am just wondering what you can do yourself on a single-family house to save some money. I don't have two left hands myself and can imagine that I can do quite a bit on my own.

What comes to mind right now is:

[*]Floor coverings
[*]Painting work (painting, plastering, varnishing)
[*]Tiling/shower/bathroom (my father is a tiler)

What else could be done on your own?

Best regards
Marko

Hi,

we have the same questions.
Are you planning to build conventionally (solid) or through a prefab house manufacturer?
I am also very curious about the answers.

The question is rather how much time you can/want to actually spend alongside work/family (if applicable).

In my opinion, it is worth buying and installing sanitary fixtures yourself. If you want something a bit special, it costs a lot of money right away.

Floor coverings/tiles/painting work is really a lot of work, you should not underestimate that.

We would have been credited €2400 for painting work done ourselves. If I now subtract the material, not much remains considering the huge effort. It would not have been worth it for us at all.

As it is nicely written in every book about construction, everyone first overestimates their own contribution. Wallpapering an entire house takes easily 3 weeks full-time for two people (without professional painters) including painting, masking, sanding the walls beforehand, etc... Flooring is also not just whipped up in no time. 50 sqm in 4 rooms took us 5 full days with 2 carpenters, and the flooring was very easy to lay. (including baseboards)

If you take time off for your own work, the house must also be ready exactly at that time for that work. If your own work is done earlier, later trades are delayed (possibly extra costs...), if construction is delayed you waste your vacation for nothing. You also have to consider that building the house can already wear you out and you need the vacation so you don’t collapse at some point. If you stay home unpaid, you have to offset your loss of earnings. So if you stay home for a month, earn €2000 net and save a craftsman’s bill of over €3000, you have generated own work worth €1000. And that’s exactly where the problem lies. Material is required anyway, whether you do it yourself, family does it or a craftsman does it. The only "real" own work that effectively reduces the final price are family members/friends who are professionals and do the work for low pay. Perfect for that (also because there are so many that the chance is good you know someone): tiling, electrical work, painting

Topics about this:


and, always important, considering all costs:


Experiences with own work:

Thank you for all the answers. We want to build using solid construction methods.

Then I will add the following point because someone suggested it.

[*]Buy and install sanitary fixtures yourself