Good, Fast, And Cheap – You Can Only Pick Two

The third combination is the one in which I live the most as a DIYer. If you want something done well, and you want it cheap, it’s going to take a lot longer. This is the world of DIY in a nutshell. Ask any DIYer to tell you their number one motivating factor for doing projects themselves, and it will most assuredly be “to save money”.

That’s not to say that saving money is the only reason I DIY. I also do it because I love it. I thrive on building things, making things with my own hands, being able to get a completely customized look that’s unique to our house, and having that satisfaction of looking at a completed project or room and being able to say, “I did that with my own two hands.”

But in the end, it comes down to money. I could very easily get a totally customized house, one that is completely unique to me and doesn’t look like anyone else’s house, and I could get that without ever having to pick up a power tool or break a sweat if I’m willing to pay through the nose for someone else to do it for me. But I’m not. Because I’m cheap. I want the completely customized look at the lowest price possible, so I DIY. And because I DIY everything I possibly can, it takes a lot longer. You can’t have good, fast, and cheap. You can only pick two.

So why am I bringing this up? Well, I started thinking about this last night as I was reading your comments on yesterday’s post about my upcoming storage room project. Many people recommended the Elfa system from The Container Store. There were other similar suggestions, but after looking at the other systems and comparing them, the Elfa system seemed to be the highest quality with the most options. For example, I really like the option of having solid shelves rather than wire shelves. I also really love the wire mesh drawers that easily integrate into the system.

But many of you warned, “It’s expensive!” I started out looking at the individual components (which happen to be on sale right now for 25% off), and they didn’t seem too terribly expensive. The top track from which the whole system hangs is just under $30. The rails that hang from that top track are just under $40 each. The largest mesh drawers are $60 each. Those are all current sale prices, and they seemed pretty reasonable to me, so I started planning out what I would need for my storage room.

Then I noticed that they have complete, pre-arranged systems that you can purchase in different configurations. So I clicked on the one that I thought might work for one of the walls of my storage room, and the price shocked me. Yeah, all of those little components that you have to purchase to make up a whole wall (or in my case, not quite a whole wall, so I’d need to add to it) add up really quickly!!

For example, this six-foot-wide pantry option, which would come roughly 18 inches short of covering one wall in my storage room, comes to $3120.75. And that’s the current sale price. The regular price is $4160.00.

Yeah, y’all weren’t kidding when you said it’s expensive. It’s very nice! And if I were to purchase a wall system, that’s exactly how I would want it to look. But again, that one pre-designed package wouldn’t even cover one whole wall in my storage room. While the second wall in my storage room would be arranged differently, I’d still need roughly double that amount for the two walls, plus extra components to cover the additional width of each wall.

So at the bare minimum, I’d be looking at about $7000 just for the storage components of a room that us just under 8 feet square. (I think the room is about 7.5 feet by 8 feet, if I remember correctly.)

Just for comparison, my entire walk-in closet, taking a room from this…

…and turning it into this…

…cost me a grand total of $10,698.88. And that price includes everything — new flooring, all of the cabinets, the center dresser island, the new lighting, the wallpaper, all of the hardware. Everything. And that room is about 11′ x 15′. (I’m going from memory, so that may not be the exact size, but it’s close.) The plywood, lumber, and trim for the wall cabinets and center island came to $3141.80.

I got exactly what I wanted in that room. I got the custom look that I wanted, and I got it as inexpensively as possible, but it took a long time to get from start to finish. That trio of good, cheap, and fast wasn’t an option. I had to sacrifice one of those things to get the other two, so “fast” had to go. And in hindsight, I’m so glad I went that route. I love walking into my closet and seeing the results of my hard work. I love knowing that I have a pretty and unique walk-in closet that is customized just for me. And the cherry on top is that the other day, Matt said to me, “Every time I go by that room, I’m amazed at what you did in there.”

All of that to say that I have a feeling that “fast” is always going to be the option that I choose to sacrifice. And that will probably be true when I tackle the storage room as well. Sometimes I’d love to live in a world where I could always choose the good + fast option, but for someone like me who is not only a true DIYer at heart, but who also has to live with a very real budget and always think of the bottom line when it comes to the many projects I want to do, I’ll probably never get to live in that world of good + fast. It’s fun to follow people on social media who have that option. I sometimes find myself getting a little bit jealous of them. But at the end of the day, I’m perfectly happy and content in my world of good + cheap, even if it takes a little (or a lot) longer to get to that end result.