Spend a Lot of Money Day
March 30, 2008 by Deborah Ng
Filed under Doing it Yourself
Today was spend a lot of money day at the Ng’s. This happens every now and then and while most of the spending is necessary, it’s still a jolt to see the grand total.
Our backyard fence is in major disrepair. I can live without a fence but since we have a pool one must go up. Plus we have a puppy who enjoys spending the day outside. I’d hate for him to get out into the busy road.
For the past two years, every time a fence panel blew over, Mr. Ng would go out and nail it back up again. This winter was the last straw as some of the panels splintered as they fell. There’s no saving them and we have no choice.
The good news is that Mr. N is rather handy with a hammer. He used to be a carpenter so DIY stuff is fine by us. Since the fence posts are still good, we only need to replace the panels. We ordered 48 unfinished fence panels which cost us a pretty penny. We thought about getting them pre-stained, but it’s a lot less to do the work ourselves. So that’s fencing and ten gallons of stain.
I did buy a couple of extras. A blueberry bush that was on sale for having some leaves missing and a six pack of broccoli plants. We have a strawberry bed and I wanted some blueberries as well. This was a nice sized bush and there’s nothing my family enjoys more than fresh berries. The broccoli will definitely save us money as we eat a lot of that, plus I like to grow my own fresh veggies if I can. Oh and we bought grass seed too. The only impulse buys were the broccoli and the blueberry plant - we knew we were buying the rest.
The grand total: $1200.00. Yup. I know. We have an account for renovations so it’s all paid for free and clear, but I hate dropping that much money in one day. We did the math, for pre-stained panels we would have spent around $4,000 and if we went for fancier fencing we probably would have spent $6,000 to $8000.00.
The problem with renovating is that there are more spend a lot of money days than we care to admit. Good thing we saved up.
Image © Deborah Ng
LRN
I think I have that beat. We just started our kitchen remodel. It all started because we needed new hardwood in the living room and ended up being a full first floor flooring project, the entire kitchen, and some extras. Total project is about 25,000 (and we are doing this on the inexpensive side).
Ouch. Home repairs are costly, but thankfully, most of the time they increase the value of your home.
I want that puppy!