How many of these house maintenance/diy type jobs do you do yourself?

[Iknowyouknow]

These are all the things around my house that need doing:

• fix kitchen cupboard door
• fix door handles
• jet wash paving stones front and back garden
• paint fence front and back garden
• decorate dc’s bedroom
• clean stone walls at front of house

I am a single parent and during lockdown my house has got really tatty as I haven’t kept up with all the maintenance around the house. I don’t know whether to get someone in and do it all or do it myself. Problem is, I can’t get the motivation. My ex used to fix everything and actually enjoyed it and that is the only thing I miss!

Wondering about who does those type of things in your home?

I can do All of them. If time is an issue and budget allows I will pay someone

I suppose it depends if you enjoy doing it, DH does, I don't. We are both retired so time to do it is not an issue.

In theory I would do them all myself, but in reality I would only do:

• fix kitchen cupboard door
• fix door handles
• decorate dc’s bedroom

And pay one of the local teenagers / handyman to do:

• paint fence front and back garden
• clean stone walls at front of house
• jet wash paving stones front and back garden

I'm a lone parent and I'd just do these myself tbh.

The paving I'd get the hose out and use a Broom over it. Would be hard work, but I couldn't justify the cost of paying someone. Or hire a jet wash or buy if competitively priced.

@Iknowyouknow

Well I’m inspired to give some of them a go and see how I get on. I can get someone in then if I get stuck.

No, dc is a teenager with no interest although might hold something for me to put it together.

Funnily enough I don’t mind putting a flat pack together. I’m not so keen on grubby jobs and can’t do heavy either.

Given you have a teen I'd be expecting some help tbh. Or they'd have to help in the house as I was doing the outside jobs. You should be a team, and a teen is more than enough capable.

I do all of them including plumbing. It wouldn't cross my mind to get someone in to do those jobs.

I'd do all of those. My painting isnt the as pure ceilings are really high and I'm not super happy up a ladder but I tend to just crack on

I've just re-laid some 5 metre decking boards (heavy buggers they are!) myself. I had the decking replaced a few weeks ago by what was supposed to be a local "reputable" gardening/landscaping firm.

The couple of guys they sent were pretty useless. A one day job turned into 3 days because they were incapable of doing a "like for like" replacement. They put the newell posts in different places so the "gap" wasn't only in a different place, it was a lot wider. So, they had to re-do that which involved a lot of eye rolling and sighing. Then they laid the boards in the wrong direction, which I only noticed half way through, so they had to take those up and relay them too. Then they didn't take off the facia boards around it and put new boards on top of old, which meant the facia boards stood out further than the top which looked stupid, so they had to re do that as well. I was pleased to see the back of them to be honest as they just did what the hell they wanted and kept ignoring the brief.

After a few weeks, some of the boards had warped and the rain puddled in the middle (they hadn't levelled it properly!). Rather than get the clowns back again, I just thought I'd give it a try to sort out myself. I managed to unscrew the offending boards and then worked out why the levels weren't right, screwed some timber to the joists/beams to sort out the levels, then got a few new boards delivered, used the old ones as templates to saw them to the right size/shape and screwed the new ones in place. A brilliant job, and having checked this morning after rain overnight, no pooling of water in the middle.

A lot of "manual"/trades jobs are actually pretty simple if you've got the time and a few tools to do it yourself. Some "professionals" are in too much of a hurry and love to pretend things are harder than they really are.

Ultimately I think it depends on willingness, knowledge, capacity and capability. One person who can, is no better than one person who can't.

I used to. I can. I just don't want to any more, and if I have the money, I'll pay someone else.

No way is the right way.

It's all dependent on your skill-set, your time-availability and your budget.

I've refurbished houses in my time. Couldn't be fucked with it now.

We're all different

I'd tackle all of those. Cannot afford to pay someone else. Door handles are a pita though. You could ask around to see if there is an odd job person that people have used.

I could do all of them.

But I don’t.

I am lazy. Also I like to let my husband feel like a Real Man so I let him do them

Could you get some quotes for the stuff that needs doing and then offer teen maybe 2/3 of the price for them to do?

When DS was a teen, about 14-17 before he got a pt job we used to pay him to do a lot of the more boring lengthy jobs like wallpaper stripping, cleaning paths, etc, he also did DMs jobs like that, we paid him what the adult NMW was at the time per hour.