Quote Originally Posted by adillenal
Oh great. Just what I need is more dust. I don't know what is worse, the blowing dust or hopping grasshoppers. I have to empty the skimmers twice a day because of the grasshoppers.
I am not real astute with economics but my husband teaches it so I have to listen to him sometimes. Since we are within 10 years of retirement, I think about money a lot more than I did years ago. Also have a teenager to get through college.
We may not have saved a lot from the poolbuilder quote we received (Only one builder in our area) but we got a lot more by building it ourselves. About twice as large and we still are able to add the things we want such as wider decking, fence, retaining wall, landscaping and now we have decided to add a waterfall outside the pool in the landscaping to include a koi pond. The basic pool ( using a pool builder) for the size we have with what we have added would have been twice what we have invested. Nothing fancy like some I see but we have what is compatible with our income. Trying to live within our means.
We started our pool the beginning of June 2005, and finished August 2005. Takes a long time when doing the labor yourself. Luckily husband is off most of the summer.
We DO NOT regret our investment and it is an investment to us in that we are enjoying our home (which we also consider an investment)and it keeps our teenager home a lot. BUT I am not sure if we would have built it if we would have had to take out a second mortgage or finanace through a finance company. Since we don't have any plans on moving, we really aren't concerned about raising or lowering the value of the home for resale purposes.
Everyone has to decide what they can afford and what their priorities are but to be aware of what could happen if employment ceased. We are in education, so are pretty secure as far as employment goes.
Good luck with your pool and hope you are swimming before long.
Hi Adillenal,

Did you mean it only took 3 months to do-it-yourself on your pool? Or did you mean June 2004 to June 2005?

If you dug your own pool in 3 months, I'm green with envy. Our PB was wonderful at first, but has gotten slower and slower and we've become more impatient. I will never hire a contruction company like this again!

In the past, I've learned to do my own subcontracting for building projects, but I didn't know any pool builder types, and I figured, "what the heck, we'll get done quicker this way."

Lol......Wrong! We're almost done at 3 months, but there's been a lot of wasted time, during which I was essentially POWERLESS to do anything about it, due to the payment schedule and seasonal rush of people trying to build pools for the summer. Ours is a little more complicated, so we naturally are at the back of the line, even though we started at the front, when they had no other pool job to start!

About your grasshoppers (and other insects) .... Have you seen this website?
http://doityourselfpestcontrol.com/

We bought some of the pyrethrin-based powder and found it to be very effective in our backyard. It eliminated grasshoppers, scorpions, tarantulas, spiders, pretty much everything. (We live in the country)

The pyrethrin-based stuff is the same as our pest control guy used on his once/3 month intervals, and costs a fraction of his visits. Plus, it's a lot better for bug "emergencies" than the stuff you buy at the store.

I have a friend who's an economist, so I'll spare you all "one-handed" "dismal science" economist jokes that he's so fond of. Nice chatting with you.