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Comment by anonzzzies | Hacker News Reader

Doing up houses, doing electrics for houses in the town and making wooden doors. I do it for fun, but the latter two would make me bank; there is a massive shortage, most people suck and even when paid well they don't turn up anyway as someone pays more.

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For people still reading this (seeing by the upvotes); the way it came to be is that I always thought it was very weird for 'well off' people to do construction themselves if they can pay people for it, until we had our last house renovated; it was in a different country (we move every 6 or so years). We had the best team (everyone said) and we overpaid, but when I checked, I got more upset with how they were doing things and after a while I started helping after they left for the night. This frustrated them but I seemed to like it. So after the basics (the boring breaking + skeleton restoring) were done, we told them we wanted to break the contract. We did the rest ourselves. So now, next to writing code, I try to do some manual stuff 1-2 days every week.

I voluntarily left the corporate world in spring of 2024. I already had a part-time handyman business going so I just took it full-time. I also started developing my own software product (soon to be released).

Tell us more about the doors - hobby woodworker here that buys more tools than builds projects. Do you run into code issues (not software but municipality)? For something like a door, how do you deal with weather extremes on 2 sides of the same surface? Like 30 degrees F on one side and 72 on the other. Are there specific wood species that are better suited for door making?

I live in a subdivision with cookie cutter houses and a custom wood front door would be neat, assuming it passes wife and HOA approvals.

I mostly do indoor, but outdoor has those issues. I usually try to work within code but here the fines are low and people usually just opt to pay the fine. And yes, my own outside door scrapes across the floor now after two winters and I need to fix it, but haven't found the time. But it looks so much better than the aluminium doors most people get.

Did you need licensing / training to take on electrical work? Do you market yourself as an electrician or more just a handyman that does minor electric jobs?

I got my license in my gap year before uni a long time ago; it's not valid here, but in my country I got trained with a lot higher standards than where I live now so I can do anything besides actually hooking stuff up to mains. I helped some people out and they told others. Like said; there is a massive shortage of handy people and as this is not my day job, I have to say no a lot.

Massive shortage in the US or are you somewhere else?

In the US the laws vary considerably by state on what electrical (and plumbing) one is allowed to do without a license.

There are often exceptions for homeowners working on their own stuff. Nothing exempts anyone from any permitting requirements though.

If you live in Phoenix, I need you!

Very nice! I’d love to see your work.

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