10 Home Improvement Blogs to Watch in 2012

When looking on-line for a good advice on home improvement, it can be easy to be overwhelmed by the choices. Whether you want top-flight professional advice or stories and helpful hints from non-pros, there are thousands of different sites, and there is no way to judge their quality without going to them. Many of these sites are worthless, just thrown up to make a quick dollar, and many of them range from unhelpful to flat-out gibbering nonsense. So here, for you, we present 10 of the best home improvement blogs we’ve been reading this year.

www.jetsongreen.com/

As the name implies, this site is about the future of sustainable building (think about it). From energy-saving construction habits to the viability of recycled building material, and hints for your house, jetsongreen helps you help the earth and feed your wallet.

www.letsblogconstruction.com/

An extremely educational site that is ostensibly for contractors and professionals, but is well-written and engaging enough to let the rest of us learn about the ins and outs of the business. This is very helpful if you want to understand why things take the time they do, the difficulty of the task you’ve conceived, or just understanding the materials you want to be using. Every page is a class in construction.

www.younghouselove.com

Sherry and John are self-described “DIY dorks” who have blogged about both of their homes, and the on-going and seemingly-constant work they put into it. A young couple, they write about the ups and downs of working on your own, and what it takes to transform any house into something uniquely yours. The site is fun and filled with style, learning, and a huge dose of self-deprecating humor.

www.itsgreattobehome.net

Liz loves houses, “big time”, and it shows in her site, about buying, flipping, selling, and improving her house and others. Obsessively detailed without losing its sense of fun and wonder, Liz’s site is a must-read. One of its unique features are Flickr albums filled with pictures of all sorts of styles for all different rooms, so you can see what you like without having to spend a day poring over the web.

http://www.moonworkshome.com/blog

Moonworks is a business in the northeast, but the blog is not one to sell you things. Instead, it is an incredibly detailed and thorough explanation of a wide variety of issues in your house, and gives you plenty of advice on how to take care of it yourself, which is admirable in a commercial site. Offers advice not seen on many home improvement blogs, such as advice on how to avoid a scam artist after a storm—something which would be very helpful to new homeowners.

http://www.reliableremodeler.com/blog/

Without wanting to sound presumptions, my guess is that you are looking to save money on your improvement projects. If that describes you, this is the site you need to be looking at. A detailed and comprehensive look at what are the most efficient procedures and products, reliableremodeler.com can also give you information on tex benefits and return on investments. Be sure to check out the weekly Tweet round-up, which can help you bounce around to even more information

http://blog.addicted2decorating.com/

This is taking on a slightly different angle of home improvement: how to enhance the aesthetics of your home without major renovations of spending a ton of money. Kristi is an interior designer and will guide you through a variety of do-it-yourself projects. These can range from fairly simple, yet beautiful, arts-and-craft projects, to lighting techniques to redesigning another room. Perfect for the upcoming holidays, if you want an inexpensive way to spice up your decorations without breaking the bank.

http://www.homeconstructionimprovement.com/

This site bills itself as “expert home improvement advice”, and if it is guilty of anything it is underselling. With extremely detailed and professional articles about virtually any subject, from preventing ice-backup to building vegetable gardens to product reviews, this blog is a great way for you to learn how the professionals think and what they use for their own projects.

http://blog.builddirect.com/

There are actually several blogs here, including a “Green Blog”. BuildDirect is a company that helps you buy construction material directly online, and finding the best stuff at the most prices. Its blog opens up a whole world of projects and products (including ones they don’t sell, so it isn’t always pushing something). It isn’t just projects, though: the site also offers tips on how to choose a contractor, something a newbie can struggle with, as they don’t know how to differentiate between a good one and a scam artist.

www.chictip.com

We’ll end with something fancier. This is a site committed to elegance, high-living and to the spotting of- and maybe creating- new trends. If you are looking to improve your home into an hip, cutting, aesthetic wonder, this is the site for you!

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