The summer weather has been great this year leaving plenty of room to check off those “honey-do lists” that have stacked up over the winter. If you’re anything like me, you’ve saved some of the biggest and hardest tasks for last. If that task includes building a deck onto your home, or even if there’s a little bug in the back of your mind that is considering the potential of saving some money by doing it yourself and building your own deck I’ve got some tips for you that with save you money and more importantly time!
I got together with my friends at Highway 55 Rental this spring and worked on a deck building project and learned A TON along the way. Now I’m here to share some of that information in the form of “5 Time Saving Tips” to help your summer deck building projects go smoothly!
1. Make sure you have your paperwork in order BEFORE you start your project
We’re not talking about a ton of approvals or anything here, but every city is different and depending on the kind of deck that you plan to build you’re going to need different sorts of permits and license to do your work. Swing over to your city hall and get all of this in order to assure compliance and avoid any sorts of hangups along the way. You've heard it said before to "plan your work and work your plan", this step is often overlooked when planning a project.
2. Check out Highway 55 for all your tools and supplies…
Unless you yourself are a carpenter it’s unlikely that you have all the tools lying around that you’ll need to complete the job let alone some of the heftier power tools that will make your job a heck of a lot easier. I mean, why use a sledgehammer when you can use a jackhammer (cue the Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor manly grumble here)! I went out to Highway 55 Rental and they hooked me up with everything from hammers to Bobcats! I walked out the door that day with a Bobcat MT-55, a sod cutter, jackhammer, compactor, generators, saws and more; all of which helped cut down the time it actually took us to move materials and build this deck.
3. Look into using Diamond Pier Footings for your deck
This might be the biggest time saver of the entire project. Back in the day building a deck meant that you had to pre-plan to waste the entirety of a couple days digging out holes for your footings, dropping in concrete and then waiting for the concrete to dry. That’s no longer the case thanks to Diamond Pier Footings. These footings install in minutes rather than days and provide the same level of safety as the traditional concrete footings.
4. Consider using composite decking materials
While the use of composite decking materials can save you a little time on the front end as they aid the process of spacing during installation, the real time saver with composite materials comes in the long run. No longer will you have to stain or paint your deck facing on a regular basis. There will be no more slivers for little ones running around barefoot and the beautiful weather protective colors and caps will allow your deck to remain looking brand new for years to come.
5. Check out the step-by-step tutorial videos we’ve already put together
I mentioned that I swung by Highway 55 Rental to get some of the tools I needed for this job, but we also teamed up with their crew to put together an awesome set of step-by-step tutorial videos to take some of the guess work out of the equation for you. Guided by an experienced Deck Lead, this video series can walk you from start to finish and should help you avoid some of the common mistakes that are made along the way.
CLICK HERE to check out the full set of Tutorial Videos and click each one of the images above for specific episodes on each of these time saving tips!