Archive for March 2014

How Laminate Flooring Could Change Your House

Monday, March 31, 2014 – 2:22 AM

Laminate flooring is an excellent alternative to carpet or vinyl. Comparable in price, it delivers a luxurious feel that is elegant and refined. Easy to clean and simple to install, it should be one of the first options you look at when it’s time for new flooring.

Every Room

When you want a different look in the bathroom or kitchen, consider laminate flooring. In addition to being the ideal choice for family rooms, living rooms and bedrooms, its ability to hold up against some water makes it perfect for areas that are prone to spills and splashes. Install it in the dining room for quick and easy clean-up after every meal. Put it in the bathroom to have the look of wood without the worry. Choose it for homes on slabs where installing wood is a major chore. Finally, choose it for basements where you want an upscale look but need something that can withstand the slightly damp environment.

Affordable

There is a wide range of pricing for laminate flooring, but you can easily find good quality choices that are a very affordable two dollars a square foot. Some businesses will even have special deals where you can get laminate for even less than that. While the higher-end options can easily run five to six dollars a square foot or more, the fact remains that laminate is incredibly affordable. It’s the perfect choice when you need new flooring but are facing budget restrictions. An added benefit of laminate is that it can be installed by the average homeowner without having to purchase expensive equipment or rent power tools.

Choices

There is an incredible range of colors and styles when it comes to laminate. Choose a deep cherry, warm honey or the look of stone for a contemporary décor. Stay traditional with the look of welcoming oak or make the home feel more luxurious with laminate that mimics exotic woods like Brazilian hickory or Hawaiian Koa. Whether you love the raised feel of a heavy grain or prefer pieces that are smooth to the touch, you can find exactly what you’re looking for with laminate.

Easy Installation

Installing laminate is easy thanks to the click-lock application of most brands. Pieces are laid in place, snapped together and then left alone for the small glue strip to cure. A basic saw is needed for cutting the pieces, although a power miter saw is the ideal choice for this. Other tools required include a mallet, shims to maintain spacing along the walls, tape measure and a pull bar.

Low Maintenance

Laminate is known for being easy to clean. It’s not prone to staining or tearing, so clean-up is usually as simple as sweeping the floor and then damp mopping it. Ideal for people with allergies, it’s considered a step up from linoleum.

Laminate flooring is not slick like tile, nor is it cold like tile can be. It won’t stain like carpet or rip like linoleum. Providing you with the great look of wood without any of the problems or expense, laminate is the perfect choice for most homes.

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What You Should Know Before Signing Home Improvement Contract

Thursday, March 27, 2014 – 2:30 PM

The value of your home will largely depend on how you are going to handle and manage various home improvement options. Your options will range from simple home enhancement jobs such as renovation of windows, sidings, doors and repainting to the more complicated and capital intensive projects such as home additions. Regardless of the scale and nature of the tasks involved, the success of any project will largely depend on the expertise and skill set of the person in charge.

The responsibilities of a professional shall include planning, scheduling, coordinating and executing home improvement designs and plans and delivering the desired results in a timely and efficient manner and within the established budget range. Following a simple guide, you can find the perfect specialist for your t project. The most simple and fastest way of finding a good specialist is by checking online home improvement sites and directories. You may also get some lead information from outlets. Your choice parameters must include skill set, track record and, of course, offered rates.

While it may seem obvious that you stand to save a lot if you will go for a DIY, you stand to lose BIG time if you end up with a botched-up job. Thus, it is extremely important that you carefully assess your competency and capability in performing complicated and delicate home improvement tasks. In which case, getting the services of a professional home improvement specialist is a better choice for you.

Here are several critical factors that you have to take into account when selecting the right contractor to do the job:

1. It is essential that you do your homework before you launch your search for the right contractor for your project. Home improvement projects are complicated undertakings which will cover tasks such as landscaping, swimming pool construction, tile setting and a lot of other specialized tasks that fall under the purview of home improvement. This means that you need to assess the level of competency and capability of the contractor for specific home improvement tasks.
2. It is important for your home improvement specialist to determine the actual requirements of your home. Once these issues are properly pinpointed and assessed, you must consider the reasons why you need to perform the home improvement project. Based on your declared budget, your contractor will prepare the quotation for the project. It is only after you agree on the numbers as well as the other terms of your agreement can they commence work on the home improvement project.
3. You must come up with a short list of contractors before hiring the best from such list. You may include in your short list of potential contractors those referred by relatives and friends. You can also consider contractors who have been recommended online. It is important that you check their references and review their track record before making your final choice. Your best bet when selecting the right contractor is to look for someone who has had extensive exposure to jobs similar to the ones required in your home improvement project.
4. Your contractor must list all the details of the project in their contract before the project commences. Check the details of the contract. Clarify points and issues that you might have regarding the contract. Make sure that you fully understand the content of the contract before you confirm and affix your signature.
5. Competent and reliable contractors will normally provide you information about their subcontractors and suppliers. This information is important since it is about the support system of your contractor. It is essential that you also assess the reliability of the subcontractors and suppliers.

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Interior Designing Mobile App

Monday, March 24, 2014 – 9:08 AM

Interior designing is an advanced mobile application developed for the home designers as well as for professional interior decorators. The application is compatible with almost all types of Apple devices including iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch. The users can buy ultimate version of the product for only $1.99 whereas the Lite version of interior designing is free of cost so it can be downloaded easily on all the device if you want to have a look at the features of the product. The application is available on all the geographical Apple Stores you can access it online or offline without any hassle.

Categories:
Interior designing is comprised of total of six categories. These categories are based on the different locations of the home that are worth-decorating such as:

Bed Rooms: You get 100 images to play and decorate your virtual/3D home with. The application contains several images of modern bedrooms, western styled bedrooms, and hosts of other styles (cottage, eclectic, Mediterranean, romantic, contemporary, Asian, coastal, modern, old world, and traditional).

Kitchen decoration: The users can get hands on 100 images in the section. The kitchen is the pivot of home where you have to put a large investment. Decorating this part of the home is costly, but you have done it you can take advantage of the investment for the lifetime. There are several styles of kitchen decoration and all of them have been loaded in the pictures within the application. Transform your kitchen as per your desire and choose a sturdy style for the embellishment.

Kid’s rooms: Over 100 styles of kids’ rooms are provided in the pictures under this category. You have ample options to choose from modern to classic and from contemporary to colonial. You can even upload more if you want a unique twist in the designing of your kids’ room.

Bathroom decoration: You might have seen several images on bathroom decorations. But what’s provided in the application isn’t available anywhere else. The category contains so many sophisticated designs and styles for bathroom décor. Use 100 images and beautify the essence of restrooms.
TV Lounge: Under this category you are going to find numerous state-of-art and eye-candid opinions for the decoration of TV lounge. Almost all styles of TV lounge can be found available in the section. You can still add more from the Internet.

Miscellaneous: It gives you access to 100 different images of different home locations that you might want to decorate like laundry, garden, lounge, dinning room, and more.

Versions:

Interior designing is available and sold in two basic versions; Lite Version and Ultimate. The Lite Version users can enjoy the features of the product, but there are some restrictions on using the pictures and features. They get limited number of graphics and images to use for creating a virtual home set-up for the designing. They will get over 100 pictures under each category of the application. On the other side, the Ultimate Versions users have freedom to access over 100 pictures present in each category. The more pictures on the version the greater outlook of the home will be. Users can access all the features such as Image Slideshow, Settings, Access all images, Update’s etc… but this option is only available in the ultimate version of the application which cost is only $1.99

Features:

You can decorate your dream home using different pictures and snapshots that are taken from the luxurious homes of the world. If you don’t want to make your home identical to these homes then you can just use the ideas and mix them to decorate your home in a different manner. Decorate your home virtually and make 3D home sketch through the application

The selected images can be put aside in the slideshow for rearrangement. You can add, set, and delete images in the slideshow and set the running time of it through slow, medium and fast options (You will find all these options in the slideshow settings).

After inserted any slideshow images into the slideshow you can view any of the slideshow images at any time via different transitions and speed (which you can set from the settings). Slideshow Basic Purpose is that you can view the favorite images in the animated form.

Once you have set your pictures altogether, you can save your work on the device. If it is needed to change the setting, you can do it anytime by rearranging the images and deleting the unwanted pictures from the slideshow. The pictures can be reset and deleted anytime after the setting.

Although, interior designing has an abundant of images, snapshots, and pictures you can still download more from the internet and add them in the application provided that you are a paid user.

Decorate your home using virtual application of interior designing and adore your home, office, and apartment yourself. The application is the fast and easy of decorating the sweet home. Take the guesswork out from the application, which is provided in the form of real-time images and graphics and decorate your home by remodeling your home on your iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch. Use an interactive platform to pile up your work and experiment with colors, pictures, and decorative materials through Interior designing.

Interior designing is certainly an innovation and exquisite application built for the connoisseurs of home decorators and internet designers who are seeking out an easy way of doing virtual designing as using 3D software(s) or applications may be very time consuming or costly to use. Interior designing is a well-thought of application whose development is done by AppzVenture (The world’s leading Mobile applications, software(s), and graphic design developers).

Share with friends and like the application:
Interior designing also allows users to share the application or end-product of home decoration or remodeling with friends, family, and world. They can use Email to promote or send their designs and also like the application accessing its Fanpage.

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A Guide To Kitchen Remodeling Ideas

Sunday, March 16, 2014 – 9:20 PM

After spending a few years working around a kitchen, the one who spends the most time there will probably have a few kitchen remodeling ideas to make their experience more enjoyable. Their thoughts will probably revolve around making the kitchen area more convenient and easy to use, provided there is enough counter and cabinet space. Color and design are important pieces of the remodeling puzzle, but many kitchen remodeling ideas revolve around convenience.

After surveying the room and making notes on the kitchen remodeling ideas being suggested, it also pays to have input from other family members. Since the kitchen is the most used room in the house for the entire family, they may want some input into any changes that may be made. Looking through home remodeling magazines and pamphlets from home improvement stores can also offer kitchen remodeling ideas that may not have been thought about.

When considering kitchen remodeling ideas, carefully consider the size and shape of the room as while many may look good in the magazine, they may not fit into the existing space. Conversely, if the kitchen in the house is larger than those in the magazines, it may not give the same impression on a larger scale.

Talk To Expert Designers For Utilizing Space

Several companies may offer free design services, provided their services are used for the remodeling project and will be reluctant to offer their kitchen remodeling ideas for homeowners who plan to do the job on their own. There is also computer software available that allows you to change room colors, cabinet colors and designs without leaving your house.

The information input into the software such as the room dimensions as well as the measurements of existing large appliances can help develop some kitchen remodeling ideas based on actual sizes. More powerful software, translated into more expensive design aids, will also allow the room to be rotated and viewed from all angles before printing a final copy to give to a contactor or sales representative at the home improvement store.

When putting kitchen remodeling ideas on paper, you will need to envision traffic flow as well as the future needs of the family. A small family planning to grow in the near future will want to make the kitchen project equally as convenient for additional family members so extensive remodeling in the future can be avoided. Planning ahead can save money in the long run and make convenience for everyone more affordable.

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How Master The Provencal Home Look

Friday, March 14, 2014 – 2:27 AM

To master the Provencal home look is all about using colours, textures and patterns taken from the French country side. To see the beautiful country side of Provence without actually visiting you can google the word “Provence” and look at the images. You will see a lot of yellow, greens, purples and golds which are the colour schemes you need to be looking at. You can get some beautiful fabrics with these colour schemes and Provencal designs for tablecloths, curtains and throws.

With regards to furniture you need to use as much natural wood items as possible and iron accessories. Wooden furniture with iron handles look the part. You can get some old furniture and do it up yourself by stripping down the paint to show the natural wood and then adding iron or metal knobs.

Seating should be comfortable in natural colours with bright coloured flower patterns on cushions. Living room accessories which will set off this look include picture frames made of natural materials; wicker baskets and candle stick holders make a nice touch. Fresh flowers are also a strong feature of a Provencal home so make sure you always have fresh flowers on display. As well as looking fabulous they will also make the rooms smell beautiful.

Now for the most important room in a Provencal home, the kitchen! This room should have a lovely aroma of herbs as you walk into it. Accessories in the kitchen should be brightly coloured and all handmade. French dishware comes in lots of different unique patterns and colours which will set the room off perfectly. Provencal tablecloths will make your dinning or kitchen table look really authentic. Some of the tablecloths on the market today are coated with Teflon which is a plastic coating which means any spillages are simply wiped away.

To sum up this look is really all about bringing the outside indoors. The look is charming, romantic, and very elegant. Comfy and casual are other words which spring to mind. If you really want to get a feel for what you should be creating, take a trip to Provence in the Spring time and see the beautiful spring flowers which form the country scenery.

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How to Pick the Right Rug Cleaner for Your Home

Thursday, March 6, 2014 – 12:43 PM

If you have a rug at home, it surely is making everything more beautiful and appealing. Rugs are great because it can instantly improve the entire room you place it. Rugs can likewise be a window to your own personality thus you can showcase yourself by using the color and design in the rugs you use.

But rugs sadly do not stay clean forever. Rugs can be a homeowner's nightmare as it can get very dirty and filthy which would leave you frustrated. What good is a beautiful rug if it remains dirty and unattractive? Well, the answer to your problem is hiring a professional rug cleaner for your home. Yes, rug cleaning professionals are a great way to get your carpets in spotless and in tip top shape. The issue with hiring professional cleaners though is that there are many options thus you may find it hard to pick the right one. If you are having this problem, check out the post below to guide you in your search for the right rug cleaning professional.

• Check Out Online Forums - One of the best ways that you can find the right rug cleaning company is by searching in online forums for potential cleaners that you can choose from. Online forums are great because it gives you information first hand from people who have actually tried using a rug cleaning service in their homes. They will be able to give you insight and feedback on which cleaners to use and which ones to stay away from.

• Ask Referrals From Friends - Another tip that can really help you in finding a good rug cleaner is to ask your friends and acquaintances. This is because being able to find out which professional cleaner does the rug cleaning at your friend's house can really be an eye opener. You can ask your friend about the services that they are using and the results that the rug cleaner is able to provide. This way, you can only choose a cleaner which has always satisfied the rug cleaning needs of your friends.

• Evaluate Skills and Expertise Carefully - When talking with a rug cleaning professional, it is vital that you assess skills and expertise carefully. Don't just believe everything that they are telling you as they may just be trying to get your business. Be sure to ask probing questions and if possible ask for references from local businesses and establishments to make sure that you are indeed hiring the best rug cleaner available.

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Save Money On Your Energy Bills With A Home Improvement Project

Saturday, March 1, 2014 – 10:48 PM

If you are looking to tackle a new home improvement project in your home, you may want to consider making it one that will reduce your long-term energy costs. Sure, we all like home improvement projects that result in making a home more beautiful and attractive, but not all home improvement projects are as glorious as the ones that you may see on television.

Choose a Project

There are multiple home improvement projects that can dramatically reduce the costs of your heating and cooling bills year-after-year. With the rising costs of energy, these types of energy saving projects are more important than ever. Some of these energy saving projects will create a great return on investment over a period of time. If it costs you $50 to complete the project, it is reasonable that you could save $50 on energy bills within the first six months of completing the project, if not sooner.

There are many different types of energy saving projects that can help you to save energy on your heating and cooling bills. Let's take a look at just a few examples of projects that you can take on yourself.

One project that can reduce energy costs is to seal cracks and find those pesky drafts that plague your home. You may not feel them as much in the summer time, but in the winter you certainly notice all of those drafts and air leaks when a cold breeze hits you.

Exterior Doors

One area where you will frequently find air leaks is around the exterior doors of your home. Here, there are a few things that you can do to eliminate those leaks.

One is to make sure that your door seals at the bottom against the weather stripping. Replacing the weather stripping is a much better long-term solution instead of buying one of those stuffed animal looking things that lay against the bottom of the door. You could spend a couple of dollars on one of those things, but this is not a permanent solution and most people don't think to use them in the summer time. Replacing the weather stripping is generally a simple project and is quite affordable.

Sealing your exterior doors may also mean replacing, or putting in, a storm door. Storm doors come in all types of materials and prices. A good storm door can go for about $200 and will yield you the energy savings that you are looking for. It is not necessary to go with the really outlandish and expensive storm doors with a foam core, when you are looking for ways to save on you heating bills.

Sealing Cracks and Holes

Another way to save money on your energy bills is to seal the cracks in your home. These cracks can be found around window seals, the homes foundation, attics, and basements. A quick and easy fix for these air leaks is to simply buy some caulk and a caulk gun and fill these holes. The cost of doing this will be about $10 and will pay for itself in no time at all. This is by far the easiest and cheapest thing that you can do to reduce your homes energy bill.

Adding Insulation

Adding insulation is another way that you can save a bunch of money on your homes' energy bills. Many people think of insulation as something that helps keep your home warm in the winter, but it also helps to keep the cool air in your home during the summer as well.

Some insulation projects are do-it-yourself projects that are rather painless to undertake. For example, if your attics' floor is not insulated, you may want to consider roll out insulation. All that is required to install this is measuring the appropriate length and width and unrolling the insulation.

Another insulation option is to hire a professional insulation installer to put in blow-in insulation. This is a great option for those impossible to get to spots. You may have excess space between interior and exterior walls of your home. If you do not want to tear out the walls of your home, blow-in insulation is an easy solution. Blow-in insulation can also be used in attics and basements. Of course hiring a professional to put in blow-in insulation is not exactly cheap, but in the long run it will eventually pay for itself with the money that you are saving on your home energy bills.

Now get to work on finding the best way that you can seal your home up. You will certainly notice the difference when you heating and cooling bills come each month. And, as you count your savings, you will be glad that you spent the time and money on these simple home improvement projects.

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