home improvement tips – The Lawhead Team

Home Improvement Tips

The Lawhead Team Blogger — Mon, 04 Feb 2013 21:58:25 +0000

Home improvement for your home.

The Lawhead Team came across some helpful tips on home improvement from US Bank.

When looking to make home improvement projects to your home, knowing what projects will be the most cost-effective and valuable will help benefit you in the long run if you decide to sell.

Update your home and take away that dated look. The renovation of dark or dated kitchens is one of the most profitable home improvement projects you can make.

Refinance your mortgage and take advantage of the low rates. If interest rates are lower now than when you closed on your current mortgage, you may be able to save money by refinancing.

Updating your bathroom is a great home improvement project that is both profitable and easy. Another great idea is to add a second bath as this is a significantly profitable home improvement.

If you are planning on making the following home improvement projects, see how long they last:

new chimney: 100 years or more
asphalt shingles: 15 to 30 years
a wooden deck: 15 years
ceramic tile or terrazzo: 100 years or more
vinyl flooring: 20 to 30 years
oak or pine floors: 100 years

If you have to buy new appliances, see how long they generally last:

refrigerators: up to 20 years
microwave: 10 years or more
stove: 15 years or more
washer and dryer: about 13 years

Spending a little extra on something such as an energy efficient refrigerator, will end up saving you money over time with the lower electricity bills.

What types of home improvement projects have you made on your home? Please comment on our blog and let us know!

Easy Home Improvement Ideas That Go A Long Way

The Lawhead Team Blogger — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 16:42:27 +0000

Small home improvement ideas that make a big difference.

The Lawhead Team would like to share some tips to making small home improvement ideas that make a large difference. Below are suggestions on how to brighten up your space and make it feel like your own.

Window Treatment – The easiest way to brighten up your home and make it a little more cheery is to simply keep the curtains open. The best way to do this home improvement project while still keeping you privacy is to install two rows of curtain rods. The outer rod should have thermal curtains (energy saving curtains) and the inner rod, closest to the window, should have pleated curtains. White is the best choice for pleated, as it allows the most sunlight to shine through. This curtain set up works wonders. It’s amazing what waking up to a little sunshine can do for your morale, let alone your home. Waking up naturally to the sunlight will keep you more energized throughout the day, as opposed to waking up to the horrid beeping of the alarm clock.

Blinds are another easy route for home improvement. While at home, keep the blinds pulled up. At night, pull the blinds down, but keep the panels open to allow light to shine through in the morning.

Regardless of which you chose, be sure to keep the windows clean! Finger prints, dirt smudges, rain stains, etc. can quickly take away from the sunlight and sunny feel.

Plants – Plants – be it spider plants, potted flowers, small indoor trees – are not only aesthetically pleasing, but they also help the oxygen flow in your home and a great way to add a little home improvement. Plants promote clean air flow and give homes a sense of “life”. Once your plants are cared for and strong, potting them in your yard to create a small garden is also a nice “welcome home” everyday. If caring for plants is too much of a responsibility, fake/dried plants and flowers are also a nice addition to a home décor and add a little home improvement.

Scented Candles – Scented candles help created a sense of home. It is said that the strongest human sense associated with memory is the sense of smell, so creating a scent that you associate with home can help create a relaxed atmosphere. The mind can begin to associate your home with that given scent, allowing you to unwind more quickly once you’re home. Aside from smell, candle light itself is relaxing.

Paint Your Space – Paint the walls for a huge home improvement. Adding color and/or a fresh coat on the walls (don’t forget the ceilings!) brightens up any place instantly. Fresh paint gives any room a cleaner look. If painting the walls is too much of a project, painting the trim and/or the doors will do enough to give the place a more cheery feel.

Once you’ve added fresh paint to the walls, consider adding your own art to the walls with paint. Painting a mural on a wall is a great way to add your own touch to your space. Think of your favorite scene and you have a mural idea! Think beach scenes, waterfalls, golf courses – anything or anywhere that you love and find peaceful and relaxing. If you mess up or don’t like the mural, you can simply paint over it.

If you aren’t artistically inclined for a painting home improvement project, a projector is a simple way to transfer a photo to a wall. Projectors enlarge photos and project them on the wall, allowing you to trace the image using a pencil. After the image is traced on the wall, shut off the projector and paint the image however you’d like. This is a fool proof way to make sure art on the walls turn out how you’d like.

Wallpaper is another option, but over time paper begins to peel and can make rooms look cluttered. Besides, if you hang art/decorations/shelves on the walls, the holes in the wallpaper cannot be hidden. It is also a much more complicated process than painting if you do the papering yourself.

Whether you choose paint or wallpaper for your small home improvement project, be sure to recruit friends to help out. Not only does it divide the work, but it takes away the aspect of work. In addition, always ask friends, family and neighbors if they have any spare materials you can borrow. Paint brushes, painting tape, drop cloths and the like wrack up a high bill.

Decorate Your Space – Before you begin your next home improvement project, figure out the direction you’d like to go with the selected room. Do you want this specific room to have a theme? Or do you want another room to just be decorated in the same color, in varying shades? Think about this before you begin nailing art to the walls and decorating your spaces.

If you choose a certain theme, be sure to follow it. A common theme for bathrooms is a beach theme. Many people hang art of beach scenes or boats on the walls, decorate the shelves with seashells and use shower curtains with bay scenes or surf boards. Use light tones for paint.

If you’d rather use a color theme, use varying shades of the selected color to give the room variety. If you use green, for example, decorate with green curtains and bed sheets. Paint the walls green as well. Add another accent color, such as white or light yellow, to make the green come together and “pop”.

Adding decorations to rooms will add personality and liven up any space. Pre-printed art – with or without a frame – can be purchased at most home goods stores, such as Target and Walmart. If you have photos on hand that you are particularly fond of, you can either frame the photos, or enlarge them before framing. Shutterfly and Kodak are great options for enlarging photos. To save money on frames, consider stopping by your local thrift store for old frames. Some of the frames may be a little worn out, but it’s cheaper to spruce up an old frame with some glue and paint rather than purchasing a new frame. Photos can be also enlarged and placed on canvas as another alternative to framing for a quick home improvement project.

While you’re at your favorite thrift store, shop around for shelves or knick-knacks for a simple home improvement project. You’d be surprised what recycled treasures you can find at thrift stores. While shelving and knick-knacks are recommended, stay away from furniture such as couches, mattress, bedding, etc. Anything fluffy/plush/soft can harbor bed bugs.

Creating your own decorations is also nice way to make your space more your own, as well as more cheery. For this home improvement project, gather old fashioned milk jugs or jelly jars and clean the jars out completely. Then, fill with sand, seashells, gems, beads or any other small, lively objects you’d like to use. These jars could also be used as vases, pencil holders or change jars.

Keep It Clean – Above all, keep your space clean! Nothing is more homey and relaxing than a clean home. Keep tables and couches cleared, run the vacuum often and be sure to dust. As they say, a clean home is a happy home. Enjoy!

Table and Chairs Repair

The Lawhead Team Blogger — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 17:45:23 +0000

Repairing your table and chairs.

Are your table and chairs in your home looking worn out and in need of repair? Check out our quick and easy fixes for your table and chairs.

Home furniture experiences a great deal of everyday wear and tear. With all the use, tabletop stains, wobbly chairs and scratched floors are almost inevitable. Here are cheap, quick fixes for some common table and chairs furniture problems.

Wobbly Table: If a trip to the hardware store is out of the question, turn the table over, put a blob of silicone sealant on the bottom of the offending leg, and let it dry. Then flip the table over and it should be stable. However, you can do a more formal fix by purchasing nail-in leg guides (small plastic feet). Buy the adjustable kind to ensure you can stabilize the table. Use only one if a single leg is noticeably the short man out.

Pitted Table: Small dents are a cinch to remove. Prick the surface of the dent several times with a fine-point needle and then cover with a moistened cloth. Put your iron on low heat and iron the cloth until it begins to steam. The moisture will infiltrate the wood and swell the wood fibers, filling out the dent. The steam will raise the grain so you’ll need to lightly sand after raising the dent. Note: A word of caution! Don’t use this technique on a table covered in veneer–the veneer will separate and peel up once you steam the underlying adhesive. Now there’s a table and chairs fix we bet you didn’t know!

Wooden Rings On The Table: Drip a few drops of machine oil on the surface of the wood and mix in some ground pumice (available at home centers) to make a loose paste. Rub the paste around the rings with the tip of your finger until the rings are gone, then wipe off the paste with a damp cloth and dry the surface.

Table Finish Wearing Off: Rotate the dining room table just as you would a mattress. Small families tend to sit at the same places, causing undue wear at those points on the table. Rotating evens out the wear for both your table and chairs.

Candlelight Dinner Disaster: Don’t despair. Freeze the wax with a freezer-pack or an ice cube in a plastic bag. When hard, the wax can be chipped off the table with the edge of a credit card.

Replacing The Rubber Stoppers: The metal legs of your kitchen chairs cut right through their end caps, scratching your linoleum. Replace the end caps with new rubber leg tips (available at home centers) and stuff a coin or metal slug inside each tip before slipping it on the end of the chair leg. The coin or slug prevents the end of the leg from cutting into the rubber tip. Voila, new table and chairs!

Chair Rungs: One of your dining room chairs is complaining and splaying every time someone sits down on it–a lawsuit could be only a matter of time. Over time and prolonged use, chair rungs can work themselves loose. The simplest way to remedy the situation is to inject white woodworker’s glue around the rung and clamp the legs until the joint dries. Chances are, you don’t have woodworking clamps lying around, but don’t let that stop you. Strap a belt around the legs, compressing them together by notching the belt as tightly as possible. Once the glue dries, chisel any excess glue that has bled out, and the chair will be stable once again. Nothing better than a stable table and chairs.

Rocking Chair Repair: That favorite rocking chair is in danger of leaving its mark on your lovely–not to mention expensive–hardwood floors. Line the bottom of the rocking chair runners with the self-adhesive protective felt stripping often used on the bottom of doors. You can find it at hardware stores and home centers.

Home Improvement Tips

The Lawhead Team Blogger — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 17:14:14 +0000

Home improvement tips for any home.

Home improvement projects not only creates beautiful upgrades to your home but can also increase its overall value.

The following tips from The Lawhead Team offer some of the most cost-effective and valuable home improvement enhancements you can make to your home. Whether you are looking to sell or simply improve the quality of enjoying your home, these home improvement tips will add value to your home.

Helpful Tip #1 – Updated homes frequently sell faster. The renovation of dark or dated kitchens is one of the most profitable home improvements you can make.

Helpful Tip #2 – Time to refinance your mortgage? If interest rates are lower now than when you closed on your current mortgage, you may be able to save money by refinancing.

Helpful Tip #3 – Updating an old bathroom is one of the most profitable home improvements you can make.

Helpful Tip #4 – Adding casual living areas like a den or family room is a smart home improvement.

Helpful Tip #5 – The following are great home improvements which will last years:

new chimney: 100 years or more

asphalt shingles: 15 to 30 years

a wooden deck: 15 years

ceramic tile or terrazzo: 100 years or more

vinyl flooring: 20 to 30 years

oak or pine floors: 100 years

Helpful Tip #6 – Planning to buy new appliances? Here’s how long they generally last.

refrigerators: up to 20 years

microwave: 10 years or more

stove: 15 years or more

washer and dryer: about 13 years

Helpful Tip #7 – Adding a second bath to a house can be a significantly profitable home improvement.

Helpful Tip #8 – It’s true: sometimes you have to spend money to save money. Buying a new refrigerator can save you money on electricity. Insulating an attic can save on heating and air-conditioning bills. The home improvement you make not only save you money now but may also increase the value of your home.

Have questions on other helpful home improvement tips? Ask The Lawhead Team!