Why You Should Reconsider DIY Electrical Work & Hire An Electrician
Thanks to home improvement shows and a vast array of online tutorial videos, the “do it yourself” attitude is thriving across the United States. However, in order to make these shows and videos entertaining, they are often edited deceptively to make the projects seem much easier on screen than they are in reality. These tutorials and shows also seldom take the time to account for the individual needs every DIY project has, leaving out vital steps and instructions on the metaphorical cutting room floor. Furthermore, important information is often missing such as building code requirements, safety precautions, the proper personal protective equipment to use, and the necessary materials to complete the project. When it comes to electrical repairs, DIY instructional videos and shows are especially lacking in these areas.
All this considered, DIY homeowners who want to do their own electrical installations or repairs should rethink any plans they have to do so. Here are some reasons why:
DIY Projects Often Don’t Succeed
On average, the ordinary American homeowner has nine unfinished home maintenance projects that they want to get finished, according to a study from home improvement platform Porch.com. That study found that 55 percent of those homeowners will try to complete their unfinished projects DIY. However, only 31 percent of those DIYers actually end up finishing the projects successfully, and 69 percent will either continuously put the projects off or hire a professional. The online DIY tutorial videos can make it look very easy to finish difficult projects, but think twice before actually jumping in. If you end up trying to do it yourself, make sure to do sufficient research first and get multiple different sources that go into lots of detail. When it comes to electrical work though, it is best to leave it to the professionals for the reasons below.
“Homeowners often underestimate the investment needed just to maintain the quality of their home,” said Porch CEO Matt Ehrlichman in a release about the study. “If they are not willing to make that investment, it can lead to much larger costs down the road.”
Those expenses include the sunk costs of the nearly 70 percent of home improvement projects that never get completed, but they can also include many other costs that are covered below.
Safety is a Bigger Issue Than Many Think
Of course, the biggest issue with DIY electrical work is simply that it is extremely unsafe. It can be easy to take electricity for granted and fail to realize how intensely dangerous it can be. However, it is a major safety hazard. Electrical shocks sustained during DIY electrical work can cause severe injury, and in the worst cases cause death. According to a study published by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, there is a minimum annual average of at least 30,000 injuries caused by electrical shock in the United States. And of those 30,000 injuries each year, 1000 are fatal electrocutions. These statistics should make it very clear just how serious the danger of DIY electrical work is. Even seemingly small electrical home improvements can cause critical injuries if you are not professionally trained to work with wiring and electrical systems.
The fact is that electricians are licensed tradespeople for a reason; the profession is regulated to ensure that electricians have the necessary education and training to safely work with electricity. Electricians have to undergo around 600 hours of classroom training and usually have to perform hands-on work during apprenticeships to earn their licenses. In some states, the requirements are even more stringent. Electricians are required to learn how to read blueprints, how to manage electrical circuits, and what safety precautions are necessary to protect the home and its occupants (both in the short term when they are working, and in the long term after they leave).
Unfortunately, no online article or video DIY tutorial is a sufficient substitute for all this training. Professional electricians know all the different kinds of wires and electrical components that are required for each unique situation. If you are not trained in these matters, you will not know what safety measures to take and how to deal with each different scenario.
For example, the modern home has many diverse electrical components, and some of their connections may be out of sight behind walls or beams. Finding these connections can be extremely difficult and missing just one can cause accidental shocks. Hidden connections like the ones leading to junction boxes can be located anywhere in a house, but they are most likely in the attic. It may seem like turning off the power to complete electrical repairs is all that is necessary, but when the power comes back on the wiring may cause safety problems. This is another big reason why you should decide against carrying out a DIY electrical wiring project.
If you want to keep the electrical components in your home and the house itself safe, then focus on simple, general work every homeowner can do: use light bulbs matching the wattage of the fixture, replace frayed or broken cords when possible, and avoid overloading electrical outlets. Be aware of the symptoms of electrical problems in your house as well. Signs of an electrical problem can include the lights dimming or flickering intermittently, or the circuit breaker tripping frequently. One electrical problem that could be harmful is hearing a buzzing or sizzling sound from your electrical system, which could point to faulty wiring or a need to replace your electrical panel. And you should always contact a qualified, licensed electrician to inspect your home so that they can find and fix the problem.
Hidden Fire Hazards
Just like the risk of injury or death from shocks to DIYers doing electrical work, there is also a serious risk of causing a fire due to faulty wiring and other easy mistakes. It can be very difficult to try to solve wiring issues when there are so many different electrical components to work with and different wires. Although other complicated DIY projects often have some room for error, it only takes a single misplaced wire to end up in the wrong location to drastically increase the risk of an electrical fire to significantly increase. According to FireTrace.com, poor maintenance and failure to comply with building codes are two of the biggest causes of electrical fires.
“With the demand for electricity on the rise, it is important to stay up-to-date with safety codes,” they write in an article on the topic. “Wiring with deteriorating coating or wires can easily arc and start a fire, especially if the wire does not match the circuit amperage. The higher the amperage rating of the circuit, the larger the wires need to be in order to avoid excess heat that can melt wires and cause fires. If an arc flash does occur, it can reach temperatures up to 1,000 degrees.”
This is especially concerning because unlike electrical shocks that are immediately apparent, electrical fire hazards usually do not start wreaking havoc until long after they are created. Even relatively skilled DIYers can easily make a small mistake, like installing a type of wire that is slightly too small for the amperage of the circuit, that ends up leading to a fire long after their project is finished. These blazes-in-waiting can lay dormant for days, weeks, months, or even years, and then unexpectedly burst into an inferno. DIYers can be led into a false sense of security when they’re done with a project, only to wake up one night to the smell of smoke after the wiring shorts out or a power surge overwhelms weak electrical components.
According to the U.S. Fire Administration, electrical malfunction has remained among the top five most common causes of fires in the United States for several decades. Those malfunctions are disproportionately more likely when the electrical components weren’t installed by a qualified electrician. The statistics are disturbing:
- Electrical fires are on the rise, and some experts have suggested they will continue to spread as housing prices spike and property owners look to cut costs by skipping professional electricians and opting to do the work themselves.
- There are more than 51,000 electrical fires every year, and that number shows no signs of decreasing in future projections.
- In 2019, the U.S. Fire Administration found electrical malfunctions accounted for more fires than both intentional arson and smoking-related fires combined – the biggest reason for the huge number of electrical fires being the prevalence of amateur electrical work done by untrained homeowners, penny-pinching landlords, and unlicensed contractors.
- Of the approximately 1000 deaths each year from residential fires, nearly half are the result of electrical fires despite electrical fires accounting for less than 10 percent of all fires. The reason electrical fires are more than five times more deadly than other kinds is that they happen unexpectedly, often occur long after electrical work is completed, and usually begin out of sight in hidden junction boxes or other concealed connections (unlike cooking fires, which are visible immediately and usually start while residents are active and near the source of the blaze).
Unexpected Expenses
As mentioned above, many DIYers choose to do their own electrical work because they believe that they are saving money. However, even if you ignore both the financial and human costs of dangerous DIY electrical installations, this is a fallacy. Beside safety hazards, there are three big reasons why you will save money long-term if you hire a professional electrician:
Legality
In many jurisdictions, a permit is required to do electrical work. In Florida, all major electrical work (including any modifications or extensions) requires an official permit under Section 105.1 of the Florida Building Code unless performed by licensed electrician. Florida Statute 489.503 lists many requirements and exemptions for homeowners to obtain a permit for electrical work on their own residence, which include but are not limited to:
- The total cost of the work is under a net aggregate of $75,000.
- The property is not sold or offered for sale for at least one year after work is completed.
- Unlicensed contractors do not participate in the work in any way.
- The work follows all local building codes and regulations, which the homeowner is responsible for confirming.
Local regulations vary widely from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and there are many legal pitfalls that homeowners can miss when doing DIY work on their residence. These can result in massive legal fees and fines. A professional electrician with all the licensing and training required by the state will be aware of the regulations and capable of completing the project in a legal, safe manner – and do so much more quickly than most homeowners can.
Failed Inspections
If a home needs to be inspected, such as an electrical inspection performed before the house is sold, then DIY electrical work can cause many problems. For instance, if you did DIY electrical work on the house that required a permit, then a licensed electrical inspector must inspect the work once it’s complete to ensure it’s up to code and safe – assuming it wasn’t illegal or faulty to begin with. And if you complete electrical work without getting an inspection, then you could face heavy fines.
Electrical inspectors are responsible for ensuring the safety and functionality of all the electrical components in a home, and the standard operating procedure during the process of selling the home is to bring an inspector on site to check whether everything is up to par. Often, when DIY repairs are discovered by an inspector during a house sale, the city may require that the work be exposed. This can cost a fortune, and require additional work such as tearing down drywall. The final blow is the selling price of the home, which is almost always hurt by a failed electrical inspection. Nobody wants to live in an unsafe home, after all, and buyers also don’t want the burden of spending money to hire an electrician after they’ve just paid to buy the house that requires repairs.
Sometimes failed inspections can also result in fines or require you to pay for the cost of repairs, depending on whether the sale is still under contract and the terms of that contract. Even if faulty electrical work is discovered after the sale, the seller can still be held liable. It can even lead the buyer to take legal action if they were not informed about unlicensed electrical work, especially if it was not listed on their home disclosure.
Denied Insurance Claims
Insurance companies can deny any claims they find to be the result of negligence by the insuree. Therefore, if you do not obtain all the proper permits and get a fully qualified electrical inspector to check your work, your DIY electrical project could mean that your home insurance company deems you negligent and refuses to cover any damage that follows. If there is an electrical fire, a home insurance company has the right to deny the homeowner’s claim if they have evidence that the fire may have started because of faulty, unlicensed DIY electrical work. Even in cases where the homeowner didn’t know that faulty electrical work had been performed on their residence, insurance law considers it the homeowner’s responsibility to know, and the insurer is legally allowed to deny their claim.
Unfortunately, even if your only “negligence” was buying your home from a seller that didn’t disclose pertinent details about the house, you may still end up paying the price. Homeowners can even be held liable for fires caused by power surges, which may be completely out of their control.
“If power surges occur frequently, the device quality can be degraded over time [and] cause an electrical fire,” writes clean energy company Inspire. “In some cases, homeowners’ insurance may cover damages caused by power surges, but in most cases, the homeowner is responsible.”
This is why it is always wise to have a licensed electrician perform an inspection before you buy, and before you sell.
“Home inspectors commonly encounter problems with electrical wiring such as reverse polarity, missing junction boxes, and damaged receptacles,” writes Alexander Harris in a MyMove.com article. “Homes built between 1965 and 1973 may have inferior aluminum wiring, a concern home inspectors will also identify.”
Ultimately, a denied claim is a very big expense compared to hiring an electrician for an inspection. The least costly solution, however, is to simply hire an electrician to do all advanced electrical work.
Don’t Risk It – Hire a Professional
When it comes to choosing an electrician, you want to choose quality and experience over all else. The last thing you want is an inexperienced or unlicensed electrician that can’t do competent work on the systems that keep your lights on and power everything in your home. When you’re relying on someone to do electrical work, you and your family’s safety is on the line.
Bergau Home & Commercial Services has nearly 50 years of experience in electrical work, as well as plumbing, HVAC, and general contracting. Trust your home in the hands of a local, family-owned business with highly-trained and fully licensed electricians. today to learn how.