To Buy or DIY? Here's How to Know the Difference

A hand-me-down coffee table that I DIY-ed. © 2022 | Shreya Teresita

DIY, or do-it-yourself, can entail making your own furniture, doing small home renovations, or stitching your own dress. Hmm, sounds like a quite mammoth task, doesn’t it? Especially when we live in an age where apps do our shopping and AIs do our taxes, why would you not can just ‘call a guy’ or buy the darn thing?

Well, you sure can. DIY, like monogamy, is not for everyone.

But even though I love creating, there are times when I hang up my apron and just buy the thing, or let the professionals handle it.

So, you may ask, where do I draw the line? How do I decide when to pull out the tool box and when to pull out the purse? Well, for me, it comes down a few basic factors.

Let me elaborate.

DIY if you enjoy crafting

My DIY journey started when we couldn’t get a carpenter to build a shelf due to the pandemic and the circumstances demanded that I do something about it. Then, what started as one-off home improvement project quickly transpired into a full-blown side hustle for the weekends and before/after my 9-5 working hours.

This happened because I fell in love with DIY. Not just for home improvement and home decor, but for other reasons as well, like making gifts for special occasions, or learning a new skill, etc. Now, I find the reason to jump out of bed in crafting.

Yes, it’s a bit of a hard work – sawing, sewing, drilling, sanding, painting, buffing, and much more. But halfway through, when you get to stand back and look at the work you’ve done, the joy is irreplaceable.

When you’re making something by yourself, you transformed a mere picture in your head into a tangible object – that’s ought to count for something. I mean, you may not be able to manifest the perfect partner or conjure a docile boss, but you can still recreate a cabinet that’s too expensive or a dress you can’t stop thinking about.

DIY to save money

Even if you’re not looking for side hustle or a hobby you love, DIY art can still be a pragmatic practice to save a buck or two.

I’m not saying that buying luxury items or hiring professionals is a bad practice. But in the off chance that you’re looking for ways to save a few bucks, DIY can help you do that down pat.

I DIY-ed a simple TV console for a little over Rs 500 when a brand new one of similar stature and design wouldn’t have cost me less than Rs 3,000 at the very least.

I DIY-ed a simple TV console for a little over Rs 500. © 2022 | Shreya Teresita

Also, DIY lets you save money indirectly by accommodating recycling. I’ll give you one example.

When we were moving out of our previous apartment, one of my ex-roommates left behind a slightly dented folding table. I brought it along with me to use it as a makeshift dressing table. But as I got better at woodworking, I was looking into making a nicer, more appropriate home for my skincare products.

But, instead of buying first-hand wood, I just took apart the tossed and dented table and upscaled it into a sleek dresser. This not only save me the cost of buying a new dresser, but also that of buying raw material.

I took apart my tossed and dented table and upscaled it into a sleek dresser. © 2022 | Shreya Teresita

DIY if you want to personalise

I’ve been on the hunt for a glass cabinet (or 'showcase' as we locally call it) for a while now, but the ones I liked were way out of my budget and the ones that were did not fit my expectations.

I needed a glass cabinet to keep safe an ornate, Belgium glass Nativity set, which was a very special gift that I wanted to show off but at the same time protect from dust and accidents. Hence, the size of the cabinet shelves needed to be in proportion to the set.

However, most cabinets that I came across were either too small for it or so big that my piece would get lost in it.

This is where DIY comes in handy. You can personalise and customise your project to your needs, tastes and expectations. In fact, you can even upscale something you already have or just purchased with a personal touch using DIY techniques. Like, sanding a boring wooden furniture to paint it a fun colour.

Speaking of sanding, keep in mind that DIY, if done right, can even be a stamina-building activity. Woodworking has done that for me for sure.

But as much as I love DIY, even I cannot advocate it for all the times, so:

Buy if it doesn’t make sense money-wise

If the cost of making a décor or utility item is going to cost you nearly as much as buying it in brand-new condition, or even more, it makes little sense to DIY.

Oftentimes, tutorials will tell you that making this particular item will cost you less than 100 bucks, but what they are not clarifying is that this budget includes only the raw materials.

In other words, DIY-ing this piece will only cost a hundred if you already own a drill machine (that’s Rs 1,200-2,500 on an average) or a sew machine (any good one is north of Rs 8,000).

Unless you are committed to using this tools in the future, it makes no sense to buy them for a one-off project on a whim.

Buy if there’s safety reasons involved

I cannot stress this strongly enough. Saving money is a prudent practice only as long as it doesn’t risk your and other people’s lives. It is not at all smart to DIY something like electrical objects or heavy furniture pieces unless you have the depth of knowledge required to maintain its safe usage.

Personally, I do believe in the concept ‘learn as you go’ with my whole heart. But as a journalist, I have seen one too many stories about home-improvement-gone-wrong to take safety requirements lightly.

Buy if the project is beyond your skillset

It is always best to take up projects based on your skill and experience levels. Perhaps start with a glue gun first and then graduate to a nail once you've been around DIY town a while.

DIY is something you master with time, through trial and error. With confidence and practice, there’s very little you cannot learn in this regard. But even when you are pro at it, there will be times when you have to let pragmatism take precedence.

Where I'm at now, I'm confident that I can hammer out a breakfast table. But chairs are a whole different ballgame. So, if and when I build a table, I will, for sure, be buying the chairs that go with it, because I don't want to risk the wellbeing of anyone's hipbones.

That said, if you are interested in learning this art and build things based on your comfort level and budget, sign up for my monthly newsletters for some nifty and easy tutorials!