College students living on their own for the first time might be overwhelmed by the everyday challenges of maintaining their own space. Unfortunately, common appliances fall apart over time, and can be costly to have repaired by a professional. While college students who are renting might find that their landlord will take responsibility for common repairs, that isn’t always the case. Eventually it will be important to compile life skills to save headache and money throughout life. Furthermore, making repairs will help renters and homeowners build confidence. Make sure you know how to do these simple repairs and gain confidence in your growing skill set.
Leaky Faucet
A leaky faucet is a very common issue in homes and apartments. The process to fix them is fairly simple. Start by shutting off water to the faucet. If the shutoff valve isn’t nearby the sink, it’s likely in the basement or laundry room. You likely only need to replace the washer. Use a wrench to loosen and remove the retaining bolts and headgear. In older sinks this will reveal the washer. Replace it with the same size and model washer and put the sink parts back together in reverse order. Newer sinks will have a cartridge to replace instead.
Unclogging a Toilet or Sink
If pouring a bucket of water in doesn’t provide enough pressure to dislodge the blockage, using a flanged plunger often does the trick. It is important that the plunger is below the water line. Snaking the drain can take out most issues that a plunger can’t. Drain snakes are affordable, and can be run with a drill.
Electric Stoves
If your burners have caked on food that causes smoke and won’t scrub off, it is very easy to replace the drip pads and burners. Home appliance stores or online stores should have replacement drip pads and burners. Once you have the replacements all you need to do is pull out the old ones and replace them. It’ll make your stove look much better without replacing the whole appliance.
Coffee Maker
Every now and again it is important to clean out your coffee pot. This is especially true if it is running slower or isn’t pumping all the water through. Cleaning it is simple. Fill the coffee maker’s water chamber with equal part white vinegar and water. Brew like normal with an empty paper filter in the basket, but turn the machine off when it is half finished. Allow it to sit for 30 minutes before finishing brewing. Dump out the vinegar solution before brewing another pot of clean water to rinse the vinegar out. This should clean your coffee maker as well as removing calcium deposits that clog it.
Tripped Circuits
When you overload your electrical circuits, the power can go out in a room or section of your home. This is an easy fix. Unplug some appliances so you won’t repeat the problem. Then find the circuit panel, and flip the switch that corresponds to the room that lost power. The panel should be labeled correctly. If not, you can go through and try multiple switches until you find the power is back on.
Home Alarm System
If you have a home alarm system that’s acting up or failing to notify you, call your monitoring service to inform them you are testing your alarm. Once you’ve done that, arm it on away mode. Once the delay time has expired, open a door to set it off. Once it’s been activated wait 45 seconds before disarming the system. Call the monitoring service to confirm the signals were received. Be sure to ask them to take it out of test mode after you’ve confirmed it is working correctly. You can also ask your alarm service if they offer things like floor sensors or window monitoring. ADT flood detectors provide peace of mind against leaky appliances and can be a great backup when you are learning the ropes.
While these are just a few of the common issues you might encounter in your first apartment, being able to solve these issues yourself can save you a lot of money. These repairs will also build your confidence so that you can tackle more complicated repairs.
