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DH can and has done just about anything I can think of as DIY projects. Now he doesn't have the breathe capacity (COPD) to do a lot in a timely manner and we have the funds to be able to hire someone to do the big things. He still does the small things around the house, like fixing the toilet and taking apart the dryer for the repair man. (He wanted it apart to clean it really well and to reduce the time charges.) He COULD have replaced the belt, but it was a finicky task and he didn't have the patience to deal with it.
....... I was in the car dealership waiting for a part when I overheard a customer complaining about a $500 service charge for having a bulb changed.........
.........How DIY are you?
I have a car where it costs $350 to "change a light bulb". That's because you can't "change a light bulb" if a headlight goes out. The headlights are a modular system and if one light goes out, the whole module has to be replaced. It's designed so that one light bulb can't be changed.
You can't just take out the headlight module. You have to take apart the wheel well to reach it.
Maybe on one of the high cost foreign import cars, $500 is what it costs.
My son does all of the car maintenance and he had to "change a light bulb" on my car headlight and the part was close to $175 and it took him a couple of hours to do the job. Now, he'd never done one before, so a mechanic at the dealership might be able to do it faster, but still, it is not just popping out a light bulb and replacing it.
I don't do a lot of do-it-yourself any more, but at my house, minor plumbing and minor electrical is all do-it-yourself. My son can put in hardwood flooring and does a better job than the professionals who charge thousands of dollars. I do all the gardening and mowing.
A whole lot of people live in rental properties. If you do it yourself, you risk screwing it up, and then becomes the risk of the landlord throwing you out. Landlords do not want DIYers unless it's in the agreement that YOU will pay for all damages to the property. A landlord also does not need the additional worry of someone, or many, fixing whatever they want however they want.
High prices for services have two causes:
1) You are paying for the wages, benefits, other overhead, and the company owner's vacation, retirement fund, and daily expenses;
and
2) Some people will pay even more, because they are clueless or because they have so much money it doesn't matter to them.
So it doesn't matter how cheap and easy the job actually is.
A whole lot of people live in rental properties. If you do it yourself, you risk screwing it up, and then becomes the risk of the landlord throwing you out. Landlords do not want DIYers unless it's in the agreement that YOU will pay for all damages to the property. A landlord also does not need the additional worry of someone, or many, fixing whatever they want however they want.
Why would anyone DIY a landlord's property ? Call them, let them do it. Heck, back when I had rental units, that was the exact OPPOSITE of the problem. Tenants would let a sink trap leak to the point of rotting out the bottom of the cabinet and not bother to mention "Hey....it's wet under there"...and that's NOT something you see in a casual occasional inspection folks.
I NEVER had a tenant that seemed to give a flip about my properties....and these were NICE, fairly new single family houses, not low end HUD stuff. One of the reasons I sold them off was 'tenant mentality' where they have no respect for my property.
Many of us are working long hours just to stay afloat and we are time starved. Time has a value too.
I pay someone to do our yard work because I am not going to spend my weekend after working all week, doing something I hate to do, even though I do have a lawn mower and could do it myself.
Just an example.
Sure...valid point. However, realize the TRUE cost of the "Maytag Repairman".
You have to earn whatever you pay someone else to do the job PLUS THE TAXES on your income to have the after tax money to pay them. Once you figure out the job is costing you personally a LOT more than the invoice, like maybe 20-30%, you might get more DIY inclined.
By the same thinking, DIY is like tax free income. I built my house, as in drove every nail built. Not only did that save TONS of interest money I didn't have to borrow (and of course the taxable income to pay the interest), but also tons of money I didn't pay someone else to build it. A penny saved really is a penny earned....so several pennies with today's tax structure. Today we have a 300-400k house with less than 100k in it.....and never had a mortgage.
<snip>The research took me a few hours to make phone calls and drive to the specialist for an inspection of the work to be done well worth the $660 savings.
For many people they do not have the time, knowledge, or interest in DIY projects. Others blindly believe their hourly rate is much more valuable than it actually is. Age also definitely plays a factor. As stated earlier, certain projects require strength, agility and balance that few people feel the same comfort at 80 that they did at 30.
What I took away from my encounter with the bozos who wanted $672 for minor work is that I need to do research and get competitive bids. My late husband usually did the legwork and now that I'm starting to see the dramatic differences in charges for the same work, I need to do that myself. I also have two VERY good resources on repair work- my brother, who inherited Dad's fix-it gene, and a friend from college. Both live far away but they're very generous with their insights when I have questions about whether it's likely I need something fixed, and how complicated it really is. I also need to check YouTube, where I can get a good feel for whether it's something I want to take on.
And did I mention that the HVAC guys checked out my electrical system and offered to replace a faulty GFI outlet for $542? The outlet actually works- it's just that if I plug a hair dryer into it and use it while taking a bath in the nearby bathtub and drop the hair dryer into the water I may get electrocuted.
Why would anyone DIY a landlord's property ? Call them, let them do it. Heck, back when I had rental units, that was the exact OPPOSITE of the problem. Tenants would let a sink trap leak to the point of rotting out the bottom of the cabinet and not bother to mention "Hey....it's wet under there"...and that's NOT something you see in a casual occasional inspection folks.
I NEVER had a tenant that seemed to give a flip about my properties....and these were NICE, fairly new single family houses, not low end HUD stuff. One of the reasons I sold them off was 'tenant mentality' where they have no respect for my property.
Believe it or not, in some other places where you do not live or have renters, some tenants do indeed go about paying to install things and fix up their places at their own expense, and sometimes these are lower income (probably not too often lowest income). Yes, some people out there do give a flip about things even when those things are not owned by them.
I do some things myself and pay to have others done. It all depends on the difference between my skillset and the cost of hiring it done, as well as where it sits in the honey do list. I've done some hard jobs because I had the time to do them and I've paid for some easy jobs because LOML wanted them done now and I wouldn't get to it until fall.
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The outlet actually works- it's just that if I plug a hair dryer into it and use it while taking a bath in the nearby bathtub and drop the hair dryer into the water I may get electrocuted.