Do-it-yourself home improvement projects sometimes have a tendency to become ruin-it-yourself projects.

To avoid turning your home into a real-life sequel to “The Money Pit” during your spring projects, follow these tips offered up by home improvement experts in northern Colorado.

Whether you’re replacing light fixtures or finishing your basement, the key to any project is preparation. Knowing what you’re doing and how to do it will save you time, money and headaches.

Jeremy Lawson, general manager at the downtown Ace Hardware in Fort Collins, said this is the time of year that many people do indoor projects before summer hits.

“The most common thing I see is people make mistakes when they rush,” he said. “They try to do the project too fast. Slow down and take your time.”

Lawson, 29 of Wellington is in the process of a home improvement project of his own. He’s remodeling his bathrooms and flooring. People should get opinions from others who have experience before starting a project, he said.

Brian Gore, a sales associate at Jax Farm & Ranch in Fort Collins, also emphasized the importance of consulting someone who knows how to do what you are planning to do.

“They’ll put you on the right materials and the right techniques,” Gore said. “There’s all kinds of books you can buy. There’s so much information out there. There’s  a lot of people who know what’s going on from sheer experience. Keep your eyes and ears open and you can learn. None of it is brain surgery. Anyone can do it with the right materials, the right tools and the right procedure.”

Still, Gore, 53, of Nunn is amazed at how many home improvement projects look like something out of the comedy sitcom, “Home Improvement.”

While he was working at another area hardware store, a customer came in wanting to pour floor leveler in his kitchen.

“The guy had gone in and finished  his basement,” Gore said. “Of course he did it without a permit,  so there weren’t any directions or inspections to make sure he was doing it right. He didn’t float the wall, so he just built a solid wall between the floor of the basement and the ceiling of the basement.”

The problem with this is bentonite, found up and down the Front Range, which when it comes in contact with moisture, swells up and pushes up the floor of the basement with tremendous force. This raised his kitchen floor an inch where the wall was and caused the tiles to snap.

“I told him the first thing he needed to do was go back into the basement and cut the bottom off that wall and float the wall properly,” Gore said.  

The man was reluctant to take Gore’s advice.

“Too often people try to save that dime and it ends up costing them thousands down the road because now you’ve got to repair all the stuff that got wrecked,” Gore said.

“It’s like the old mechanic says, ‘Pay me now or pay me later.’ Generally when you pay them later it’s gonna be a hell of a lot more expensive.”

In the event that a project becomes too much to handle, several handymen in the area will pick up where you left off. Jack Irwin, owner of Handyman Connection in Greeley, said his business gets calls like this all the time.

“Someone will start a project and realize it is over his head,” he said. “We get a lot of calls from women when their husbands are not around asking that we come in and finish the project.”

He generally recommends leaving plumbing and electrical repairs to professionals to avoid disasters.

However, there is something to be said for putting sweat and sometimes blood into manageable household projects.

“The most rewarding things in life are when you do them yourself,” Lawson said. “It’s really neat to get done with a project and have that pride to call a friend and say, ‘Hey, come look what I did.’ ”

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