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Recent Blog Posts
3 Simple Ways to Secure Your Garage from Home Burglaries
While you might think that the recent stay-at-home orders would translate to a decrease in home burglaries, you would be surprised at how often the police are reporting house break-ins lately. In fact, many of these burglars had the nerve to break into houses even while homeowners were home and asleep in bed, which is a frightening thought. Although taking the usual safety precautions to protect your home against break-ins will help, there might be one vulnerability that is easy to neglect: access from your garage into your home. In those cases, there are a variety of garage services that can help secure your garage from intruders. These options include: custom garage building, garage hardware replacement, secure steel entry door system installation, garage door upgrades like electric garage door openers, even high-quality window construction. Even if you are not ready to invest in a major garage renovation or garage remodeling, there are still a few easy things you can do to secure your garage that are not too expensive or involved.
6 Ways to Protect Your Garage from Flooding
As hurricane season fast approaches, and with prior months this past spring already having shown heavy downpours, you might be concerned about your garage and its safety from flooding. You may have already seen some damage in recent months due to heavy rainfall. Whatever the case may be, here are some inventive ways to protect your garage from flooding:
How to Prevent Flooding in Your Garage
When first building yourcustom garage, you may need to take steps to keep the floodwaters away. You may also need to protect against flooding in the garage that came with your home. Whichever situation you face, here are some helpful methods for dealing with flooding in your garage:
- Repair or Replacement of Garage Door and Floor Seals-If your garage door is not properly sealed at the ground when closed, you will need to fix or replace your seals. The good news is this is not a difficult process, and it will also keep insects and other pests out of your garage once completed. You should be sure to monitor the seals regularly and fix or replace them when necessary.
How Do I Know When My Garage Door Needs to Be Replaced?
Whether you are having trouble opening your garage door or simply want to update your garage with an electric garage door opener or some other exciting modern upgrades, there are many reasons you may decide to replace your garage doors. Sometimes, though, garage door replacement is a requirement borne out of necessity. In those cases, you may want to hire a professional to guide you through the process. In case you are not entirely sure whether you need to replace your garage door or your garage door opener, consider some of these definitive signs that your garage door and opener have seen their last days.
3 Telltale Signs You Need to Replace Your Garage Door
Overall, there are three main areas to focus on when determining whether you may need a new garage door or opener. The top two most critical areas to look at are the overall function and structure. Secondarily, you may also want to review aesthetics, special features, and other ways to improve your garage door or opener. While these issues may not necessarily affect your day-to-day functions and safety, they could still make your life a whole lot easier or your home a whole lot more attractive. Within each area, there are some significant things to consider. Here is a closer look:
4 Great Ways to Get Your Garage Organized
When thinking of all the different ways you could update your garage, you might easily forget the primary purpose for garages in the first place: to provide storage for your car and other items. Unlike most parts of your house, the garage lends itself particularly well to clever organization and storage systems, especially when you are dealing with a diverse cornucopia of things that need a home. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to get your garage organized while also saving space.
Ideas for Garage Storage That Work Well
The primary goal when it comes to organizing your garage is to figure out ways to optimize storage capacity. Most garages are small, and space can be limited, particularly if you intend to keep your car in the garage. Due to this, you need to determine how best to store things without taking up too much space. Some possible ideas to achieve this goal include:
- Using the Walls-You would be surprised at how many different tools and other items you can fit on a wall. By placing these things flush against a wall, including even fairly large tools, it can seem like making them flat, since they no longer take up space on the floor. To enable effective use of the walls for storage, you might want to consider some of these handy options:
- Pegboards and Other Paneling-Pegboards are simple ways to place small tools and other items on the wall with continued easy access while using very little real estate. In fact, pegboards can be used to secure not just small tools, but also rakes, brooms, shovels, and other larger pieces of equipment to the wall.
8 Features to Consider When Converting Your Garage Into a Bedroom
Even though the Illinois Stay-at-Home Order may be coming to an end soon, many people have grown accustomed to sharing space in their home with others, and in some cases, large, multigenerational families have found themselves living together for both safety and company. Some family members may be considering long-term living arrangements, or families may be looking to make more room in their homes. Whatever your reasons might be, it is worthwhile to consider customizing your garage and converting it into a bedroom.
8 "Nice Touches" to Add to Your Garage Bedroom
There are two seemingly contrary questions you need to answer about garage bedrooms:
- What can I do to make my garage more like an actual, livable bedroom?
- What aspects unique to my garage can I use to improve my garage bedroom?
In consideration of these two questions, here are some great features you may want to consider adding to your garage bedroom during a renovation project:
How You Can Use Your Garage to Operate a Small Business
Unemployment rates have increased significantly during the coronavirus pandemic, and many Illinois residents are trying to figure out ways to weather this difficult economic situation and keep food on the table. While using your garage as a living space during this time can provide some benefits for your family, there are also some productive-and lucrative-ways to use that space as well. During the Illinois Stay-at-Home Order, acustom garage built for your small business could be just the thing you need to get back on your feet.
Types of Businesses You Can Run Out of Your Garage
Just about any business can begin in a garage, and major companies such as Apple, Amazon, and Disney all started from this unique part of the house. During these challenging times, it is especially important to put careful thought into what types of businesses you can run out of this space. What is essential? What do people need or want right now? There are two main categories of businesses that may be uniquely situated for success:
What Are the Benefits of Converting My Garage Into a Home Gym?
Now that Governor Pritzker has extended the Illinois Stay-at-Home Order through the end of May, you may want to give some thought into ways of making your garage more livable. One of the many ways to do this is to convert your garage into a home gym. You could be creative and resourceful, putting together a makeshift workout room with what you already have, or you could look to create a custom garage that includes a functional, fully-featured gym. Whichever you decide, here are some of the best features you could add to a home gym in your garage:
3 Best Features of a Home Gym in Your Garage
In California, early in the state's Shelter-in-Place policies, a Costa Mesa gym decided to bring the gym to its members-and even its non-members. They brought their equipment to people's garages, and they even commandeered equipment from other gyms or rec centers to help their patrons. Then, they used Zoom to coach and train people on using the equipment in their new garage gyms. Soon, the gym had expanded its business into manufacturing. The point of all this is, if your regular gym is closed due to the Stay-at-Home Order, you can use some ingenuity to figure out ways to keep working out in a gym-like setting. Here are some of the best features that you might want to consider including in your garage gym:
4 Benefits of Remodeling Your Garage to Create Extra Living Space
Recently, Governor Pritzker announced that the Stay-at-Home Order in Illinois will continue through May 31. As COVID-19 cases continue to create problems across Illinois and the nation-and with a vaccine possibly more than a year away-residents throughout the state are having to adjust to a "new normal" that will require them to stay closer to home more often than they have before, and possibly for a much longer period of time than they ever anticipated. The need to be at home so often necessitates a re-evaluation of your garage space. Could you use it for more than parking? Are there parts that you could build out into extra living spaces that could help you during this trying era of "COVID quarantining?" The good news is, if you do decide to remodel your garage to create extra living space, the benefits will not only serve you now during this crisis, but they will also benefit you well into the future.
Why You Need to Build Out Your Garage Into Something Greater
Still “Staying-at-Home” in Illinois? Make Your Garage More Livable
Officially, Governor Pritzker has extended Illinois' Stay-at-Home Order through the end of April; however, early reports suggest that Illinois has not yet reached its peak of COVID-19 cases, and this might not happen until mid-May. This means that you and your family could be staying inside your house even longer than originally planned. To make sure you do not get cabin fever, here are some ideas to help you make your garage into a more livable space and keep you occupied.
10 Ideas to Help Make Your Garage More Livable
If you have been stuck at home for the last few months like many Illinois residents, you are realizing quickly that there is only so much you can do in your house to keep you and your family occupied. That is why you might want to consider making your garage more livable by transforming it into any of the following:
- Guest Bedroom/Quarantine Room-Use your garage to space out your family's living and sleeping quarters. If you suspect that one family member is sick, then you can make the garage comfortable enough for self-quarantine from the rest of the family, or you could simply make it into an extra bedroom for any guests you invite over during a long weekend.
Why You Should Consider Installing Plumbing in Your Garage
Whenrenovating your garage, there are many things to consider, including aesthetics, function, and safety. These renovations can get even more complicated if you plan on using your garage for more than just a place to park your car or store your tools. In those cases, it is a good idea to consider adding plumbing to your garage.
6 Ways Plumbing Could Enhance Your Garage
If you would like to add additional functions to your garage, or if you are thinking of converting it to a different type of living space, plumbing might be critical to the development of yourcustom garage. By installing plumbing in your garage, you will be able to add useful features and functions, such as:
- Floor Drains-Especially during the wintertime or after rainstorms, simply having a sloped garage floor that allows gravity to pull melted ice and rainwater toward your garage door might not be enough. This method of drainage can get sloppy, which is particularly bad for you if you want to use your garage for more than a place to keep your car. Installing floor drains with pipelines in your garage could work wonders in terms of eliminating puddles and limiting moisture. The best part? These types of drains are not very complicated to install.
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