Home Improvement 411: Tools, Tips and Savings for Homeowners

Insulating a basement can save hundreds of dollars per year in fuel costs. With a wide variety of options to choose from, a homeowner should weigh both their needs and the specific details of their property carefully, in order to make the most informed and appropriate choice for insulating their home. Local building codes and requirements for the R-value of insulation must also be taken into account before any insulation installation commences.

Insulation is graded by its ability to retain heat. This grade is called its “R-value” and different regions of the country will have different R-value requirements written into the building code. Finding the appropriate R-value for your region is imperative, not only for optimal heating of the home in that particular climate, but also for the installation job to pass a home inspection.

Basement walls can be insulated from the exterior or the interior. Insulating from the exterior is sometimes impractical for an existing structure and is more appropriate for homes still under construction. Retrofitting a home with exterior insulation can also be quite costly. Most exterior insulation options can invite insect infestation. In addition, if the surrounding soil happens to contain radon gas, the homeowner will need to install a radon mitigation system.

In spite of the drawbacks, there are also advantages to insulating exterior walls. Insulation applied to the exterior will not take up valuable square footage inside the basement. It will also help to serve as a moisture barrier, protecting the interior space from leaking or weeping walls. It may also protect the home`s foundation from the rigorous effects of freezing and thawing in extreme climates.

Most homeowners find insulating their interior basement walls to be the most cost-effective option. There are also far more insulation materials to choose from. While insulating the basement ceiling is also a good way to improve a home`s thermal value, insulating the walls can be cheaper because walls have less overall square footage, while still providing the same amount of thermal value.

Typically, basement interior walls are insulated with blanket insulation. This can be woven from substances such as fiberglass and have a variety of different backing materials, such as paper or foil. This is the most common form of insulation, as well as being the cheapest at $.75 per square foot. It can be trimmed easily and installation can be managed by non-professionals.

Slightly more expensive is foam board insulation, at around $1.00 per square foot. Thin sheets of polyurethane or polystyrene can be quickly mounted to walls, providing excellent insulation properties with less space than blanket insulation. Another option is to use loose-fill insulation. At $.50 per square foot, it is cheap, but the labor cost can run up to $5.00 per square foot, making it the most expensive of the three. Small pellets of foam or fiber are poured or blown into a space between the foundation and the drywall. The main advantage of loose-fill insulation is that it will conform to any shape and is the most efficient of the different insulation types.

Installing some forms of interior insulation is a job requiring few specialized skills or tools. Installation of blanket or foam board insulation requires little more than a staple gun or a drill and masonry screws. The combined factors of being low-cost and using non-specialized labor make installation of insulation in a basement an attractive and practical DIY project for many homeowners. Not only will it pay for itself over time, but it will also provide a valuable selling point to prospective buyers.

Water is always the cause of mold and mildew, but finding the source of the problem can seem like an unsolvable mystery. Follow our tips for using some handy gadgets and basic detective work to find and eliminate your mold and mildew problems for good.

• Check for plumbing leaks
• Don’t ignore mold
• Look for outside leaks
• Inspect the ductwork

Earthquakes are an unpredicted, natural disaster and people should be ready with earthquake emergency kits. They are the scariest ones that can cause a lot of damage in a short amount of time. The only way to fight an earthquake is to be prepared. Having an emergency kit allows you to be prepared for an earthquake. This kit should last you for three days if caught in a disaster.

Nothing puts your square footage to better use than a built-in. Whether that means a desk framed within a seldom-used closet or a bookcase tucked into a niche beside the fireplace, built-ins maximize every available inch in your floor plan. They handily transform the dead zones under stairs and below windows into functional space and help you get organized by adding new storage options without adding on to your house.

Most home appliances have become more efficient over the past 30 years, but those gains have been offset by the influx of personal computers, televisions and related devices, according to data released today by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).

In the latest update to its Residential Energy Consumption Survey, which is has updated periodically since 1979, EIA found that:

• 58 percent of U.S. homes had energy-efficient, multi-pane windows, up from 36 percent in the 1993 survey.

After buying a 1920s bungalow in Newton, Mass., architect Todd Sloane and his wife, Elizabeth, considered replacing the narrow porch entry off the kitchen with a mudroom addition, but property setbacks wouldn’t allow it, and neither would their modest budget. Instead, they put their money into a family room addition and simply enclosed half the back porch, turning it into a mini-mudroom. When you get right down to it, a smaller mudroom does everything a larger one would have done, only better, because it doesn’t take up the whole porch and thus cut off the kitchen from the backyard.

A century ago, and for about 400,000 years before that, most people burned wood to stay warm. Then the arrival of oil- and gas-fired central boilers and furnaces liberated them from the toil, mess and smoke. Today, fluctuating prices, a desire for independence and a new generation of clean, efficient stoves have attracted homeowners like Richards to a flourishing back-to-basics home-heating movement. Annual shipments of pellet stoves, which burn biomass in the form of compressed sawdust from lumber mills or managed forests, jumped from 18,360 to 141,211 units between 1999 and 2008, a 650 percent increase. Large-scale installations include Vermont’s Bennington College, which uses a wood-chip-fueled biomass boiler to heat 85 percent of its campus.

The editors here at Popular Mechanics would like you to know that we’re not perfect. Whether tackling home improvements or making automotive repairs, we’ve all made our fair share of mistakes. Here are some of the worst. If you’ve got some that you’d like to share, send them to pmwebmaster@hearst.com, along with any lessons that might have been gleaned from the experience.

Some home security systems are complex and should be installed by a professional. However, there are many good home security systems sold in kit forms that can be installed by any do-it-yourselfer. Most simple systems use a bell, loud buzzer, or other sound source to note intrusion.

Plants bring out the freshness in our home and create a refreshing ambiance. Add up the elegant planter like the Bones, you surely will get not only a refreshing but also an elegant ambiance. The Bones planter from Vondom has clean lines and glossy white finish making it an ideal addition to your interior design. It makes an ideal décor for your windowpane, terrace, poolside, and even in your living room. In addition, it can also be a perfect planter on top of your office cabinets and counters. With its sleek and glossy finish, you surely can match it with any of your décor and furniture pieces without any problem at all.