Weighing up the overall cost of "cheap"
Lets touch upon a tender topic. There’s nothing wrong with buying things at a cheap price but the issue is, is it cheap in comparison to the high value of the item or is it cheap because of its lack of value?
High value, low price is a home owners dream especially if you want to talk renovations; it’s difficult for anyone who is not a plumbing professional to know what good value plumbing looks like.
“You just gotta go with your gut”, “I don’t need an expensive professional, its just a toilet”, “it’s just a tap”, it’s just a little leak”
What happens if your toilet installation looks like this, 2 years from now?
This is an underground leak over time that’s only now become visible.
Credit: pro handyman
Your $300 toilet + installation would not have accounted for the nesseceary underground work (extra costs), age and compatibility of your home (waste inlets/outlets).
A toilet doesn’t drip, it leaks a steady stream underground so you wont be able to see the damage until it’s too late.
What happens if your $60 tap gives you a bill that looks like this,
2 years from now?
Lets say you’re unfortunate enough to use electricity in SA. A tap drip of 120 drips per minute totals 40 to 45 litres per day. To heat 45 litres of water from 25 degrees to 65 degrees:
45x40x1.2 = 2160 watts per hour or 2.2 kWh
You might pay around $0.30/kWh of electricity your expense of the wasted water is $0.60 per day.
This is a minimum of 45 litres per day, a dripping tap can waste as much as 200 litres per day.
Fun Fact:
Replacing the washers is a quick and easy way to get repeat business. To do the job properly you have to
clean the surface
silicone grease body washers
replace O rings
copper parts
reseat the tap body
grease spindles and handles
Some plumbers deliberately leave out crucial elements because they know you’ll be calling him back in a few months because he’s cheap.
Doing the job properly should be around 2 hours and cost around $300.
“what, get out of town!”
Well, just the quality of the O’rings alone are the difference between them lasting 2 years or 10 years.
Insurance
Does your insurance cover you for any structural damages to the home should your installation not meet the minimum government requirements?
The photo shows a recent emergency GPS was called to.
The top unit had been leaking for some time before bursting, causing massive damages to the unit below.
You can see from the outside the severity of the damages.
I assure you insurance had a field day.
As seniors in Glenelg’s plumbing industry, we’ve seen it all before. Home owners choosing shoddy plumbers and shoddy plumbers taking advantage of their desperation.
To the plumbers who chose this “dirty” line of business (no pun intended) don’t expect to be operating for long.
By giving into low quality fittings and dishonest services you force the plumbing profession to shame and de-value what is a licenced industry.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics 29% of a households yearly maintenance and repairs account to plumbing, with services in such demand homeowners need to make more informative decisions that don’t end up costing tens of thousands of dollars down the track.
If there is a tip that I could give from GPS years of experience, be friends with the plumbing business that services your home, get to know why they are so reputable.
Expect a standard for your home and research the businesses that meet those standards.
