Are you pressed for time? Do you want to make your home look (or rather feel) neater, cleaner, and all-around more elegant than before? You probably do. But home improvements don’t go hand in hand with haste – which is why the first part can pose a problem for impatient readers. Then again, you might just be looking for quick and easy yet innovative improvements that can change your household’s ‘vibe’ without much hard work.
Regardless of the reason, we’re here to clarify that – yes – you can, in fact, make considerable changes to your house or apartment just by changing or adjusting a few things here and there. People can be quite surprised by the differences some of these minor improvements make.
From better cable management to toning down those annoying furniture squeaks – we’re here to offer some novel, fresh ideas you can implement in no time!
Handle Those Cables & Outlets
What can be more unsightly than a tangle of random, dusty cables strewn about in your living room or office area? Well…, many things, truthfully, but that is beside the point of this rhetorical question.
Aside from messy, entwined knots of cords, there’s also the dreaded “outlet overload” to watch out for, along with frayed wires. Said exposed wire ends can pose a considerable danger to you and your family – besides looking fairly ugly.
For outlet overloads, invest a few bucks into power strips. Try to look for ones that feature surge protection in case of spontaneous voltage spikes caused by storms.
As for the cable management problem we mentioned at the start – there are cable management boxes and “raceways” that do the job for relatively low prices. It is all super easy and quick to set up, to boot.
Enhance With the Right Light
Whether it is due to LED or fluorescent bulbs, your home lighting is probably on the white or blue side, is it not? While white or blue light can be efficient for workspaces, such as the kitchen, the cozy, snug feeling that some households have can only be achieved through the proper warm yellow tint.
Assuming you still want to have energy efficiency at the forefront of your lighting setup, there are CFL lightbulbs with warmer yellowish or orange tones. You can get color filters or special temperature-changing bulbs with LEDs (which may cost you a bit more). Whatever the option, you should give your home an illuminative makeover with this small change!
Dampen Some of the Creaks
Laminate, hardwood, parquet – what might be the common element between these? Well, for most people, it boils down to their noises. While more advanced floor-squeaking complications may require the installation of shims, bolstering of joists, or application of adhesives, some of these following minor adjustments are worth a shot.
For one, you could try sprinkling some asbestos-free talcum powder between the spaces of the boards. This will reduce most of the friction that causes the squeaks and creaks. Tap and create vibrations, so the powder gets right in there, then wipe it off with a warm, damp towel.
Note that this method is far from “permanent,” as you’ll need to reapply it a couple more times for maximum effect.
For carpeted surfaces, you’ll want to grab a stud finder (also known as a stud sensor or detector) and locate the joists. Then you just fasten some trim-head screws until you hear the awful squeaking no more.
Out of Sight, Out of Mind
Perhaps your carpet has these small yet annoying divots, or your flooring or ceilings have stains. Whatever the case, concealment tends to be the more optimal, budget and time-friendly option to outright remodeling and renovating everything.
For cement stains, you can use (obviously unused…) clay kitty litter and let the substance soak up the stain particles. Wash away as many times as needed until you notice substantial fading.
In the case of (general) wall stains, diluted bleach usually does the job – both in terms of fading the spot and killing any microbial developments.
With this common DIY method, carpet dents and asymmetrical patterns can be fixed in a jiffy – put some ice cubes on the divots or sunken spots and let them melt, then simply ‘brush’ the area, and make it look fluffy and complete as before.
Deal With the Waterworks
We can safely assume that most of our readers here have had this problem – you leave your bathroom only to notice that the water keeps running. That, or you’ve just finished washing the dishes after an annoying session of slow trickling.
A worn-out flapper mechanism is the most common culprit when your toilet water runs empty. Flapper replacements take minutes, luckily. If you want to ensure that the flapper is the problem, you can add safe food coloring to the tank and see if it oozes into the bowl.
Meanwhile, trickling faucets can even be more straightforward than the toilet problem – frequently, the dirty, clogged aerator screen ends up being the offender in such cases. Just pluck it out with tweezers, clean it up, or get a new one. Either way, it takes zero time to do.