Tax Credit – part 2
04 Apr 2011 Leave a Comment
So the other half of the tax credit – what did we spend that on? Lighting and electrical work. We definitely did not feel comfortable doing this on our own. This part is three-fold: new box, updated outlets, and overhead lights.
When the house was inspected, the inspector showed me the electrical box. He said it was too full and should be updated. We decided since fires could be involved if we did it wrong that this was best left to someone who knows what they are doing. Wish I had a before pic, because even I who know nothing about this stuff could see that it was overloaded. Here is the after – complete with labels added by the electrician.
Onto the goofy outlets that were everywhere in the house. Since I don’t have a before pic, I drew one below so you would get the general idea. What a pain! Anything with three prongs could not be plugged in without a converter. And evidently, the outlets were a bit dangerous. So we had all the outlets updated.
The people that lived here before just used lamps to see in the dark. In my opinion, lamps just do not give off enough light to fill a whole room. At night, it was dark in the house. So we added recessed lighting in the living room:
See the light fixture in the background of this picture – the drum light hanging over the table? I made it and will show you how in a post soon! I am super proud of the light, but not so proud of the corner cabinet. That is going when the family room and kitchen get a make-over.
The family room got recessed lighting on one side: Soon I hope to knock out the wall between the kitchen and the family room and make it one big room. We did not put any lights by that wall and it is dark on that side of the room. The third picture shows the wall I want out.
And ceiling fans with lights in 3 of the 4 bedrooms: I know that chandeliers are way trendy right now in bedrooms, but we just like the function of ceiling fans. (We use one of the bedrooms as a playroom.)
In the boy bedroom, though, we decided a ceiling fan would be a wee bit dangerous. Can you imagine my five year old getting up in the middle of the night to pee and remembering to duck under the ceiling fan (he sleeps on the top bunk!)?
And the electrician added a fan in the bathroom: too wet and stinky without one. Sorry, that was a little nasty but a lot true.
So, another 3000 bucks gone, but a big upgrade to the house. No regrets here, especially when it is dark outside and oh so nice and bright inside!
What jobs, if any, did you feel were beyond your capacity that you hired out? Any regrets?
