Aproximaciones de la teoría económica para explicar la evasión

While all projects involve physical labour, they also take time to complete and for this reason homeowners must find or set-aside time to do the work. Given that DIY projects must be carried out in one’s ‘free’ or ‘spare’ time, they must be organised around (or take precedence over) other discretionary activities or obligations, including the often spontaneous demands of everyday family life (such as tending to a child’s immediate needs). My interviewees told me that for quick, routine, tasks such as mowing the lawn or clearing out gutters, timing was not usually problematic – these short-term tasks were often carried out spontaneously when the appropriate moment of free-time and good weather, coupled with the desire to do the task, presented itself. But for large scale DIY projects carried out over one or several weekends, weeks or even months, time considerations were much more critical.

Linda told me that she and her husband John always thought very carefully about when to carry out their major home improvements, aware from past experiences that time needed to be “set aside” (Linda) to ensure these projects flowed uninterrupted to their end, especially if a deadline was in place or their spare time was limited. In one case, she recalled discussing with her husband when to paint the exterior of their house, aware that the project would likely require several weeks of uninterrupted full-time work. After much discussion, they eventually opted to complete the job over their three-week summer holiday break but in order for this to

152 be achieved, Linda said they both agreed to “push other things aside”, such as the tentative plans they had made for camping and several other social engagements.

Time considerations were especially important for projects involving significant changes to rooms which might render them uninhabitable or dysfunctional. This was especially problematic for those with young children and associated fixed routines. But even those who were without children commented on the disruptions associated with this type of DIY project. Hamish, for example, noted that he and his wife Zoe had to think very carefully about the timing and duration of their kitchen renovation, aware that this space would be dysfunctional for several days, and that alternative cooking plans would need to be arranged. In addition, they both formally organised leave from work to ensure they finished this job over a five day period, thereby minimising the disruption. With their kitchen inoperative, Hamish noted that they ate a lot of takeaways that week and used their camp cooker to boil water for cups of tea and to cook instant food, framing this as an exciting and novel part of the experience. Renovations to bathrooms (another frequently used and very functional room) often gave rise to similar challenges, with one of my interviewees (Hazel) noting that while they were conducting bathroom renovations they showered at their friend’s house. Shane went so far as to temporarily move his wife and children out of their family home to his parent’s place while he re-lined and painted the bathroom, parental support for which he was most grateful.

By necessity, some projects were seasonally timed, with many outdoor tasks (especially house and fence painting) executed during the warm and dry summer months. Shane, for example, said that he painted the exterior of his house over the Christmas holidays when the weather was dry and warm and then shifted his focus to indoor decorating over the colder winter months. The seasonal nature of DIY projects was well-recognised by my key informants from the home improvement retail sector who told me that their companies promoted and encouraged the doing of appropriate ‘winter’ or ‘summer’ projects and reminded their customers that they supplied all the necessary products for these jobs (all part of the institutional and commercial structures supporting and encouraging DIY). They were also aware that projects may take several days and, for that reason and via the marketing material they had published, encouraged homeowners carry out their projects over their holiday breaks, weekends and long-weekends (Figure 32, page 153).

153

Figure 32: Since the 1950s, DIY retailers in New Zealand have advertised heavily in the weeks

leading up to holiday breaks (top left: The Press, 1955b; top right: The Press, 1950; bottom left

& right: mailed advertising brochures published 2010 and 2007, respectively)

154 Understandably, finding time for doing DIY was not a big issue for the retirees I interviewed who all said they had ample time for their own projects and also to help younger family members out with theirs. The time predicament, however, was most evident among the working couples I spoke to, especially those who were raising children. Since having children, most of this group found that a great deal of their free time was now devoted to parenting duties (such as nurturing young infants or transporting their children to weekend sport), leaving little time (or energy!) for doing DIY. Linda, to take just one example, said that the arrival of her and her husband John’s first child brought about a considerable reduction in the amount of time they were willing and able to spend on DIY.

It’s so different now we have a child because to actually do the DIY you have to find some way for the child to be looked after … When we were child free you could get into a job and not stop to think about kids so you could focus on getting the job done. We did heaps more before we had our child. It was like the house was our child, getting all our attention. Now she gets the attention and the house gets neglected. It was a quick change in our lives … we went from full- on energetic handymen to tired parents (Linda).

That DIY had to be squeezed in around the demands of parenting and family life more generally was something the retirees I spoke to were all too familiar with, having experienced the same situation at a similar point in their own life courses. Max reflected on the change in his life:

It wasn’t really until I retired that I found myself with a lot of spare time – a lot more and you really need the time to do it [DIY]. Retirement freed me up to do a lot of tinkering around and I really enjoy that now. When we were working and had the children at home, we’d always say we’d get around to doing things, but we never really had the time. It wasn’t until the kids moved away and I retired that we were able to start doing things around the house (Max).

Interestingly, the vast majority of the first homeowners I interviewed said that they were spending ‘all’ their spare time doing DIY and while most were happy to do so, some said they were coming to terms with the sacrifices that had to be made in order to get the work done (what Hamish referred to as “the opportunity costs of doing DIY”). Sam and Sally, for example, said they were now discovering that DIY consumed a great deal of their leisure time, particularly weekends and public holidays, and therefore had put an end to their normal leisure routine. Sam noted that the recent bathroom renovation he had carried out required him to sacrifice a motor cross ride and socialising at a good friend’s flat-warming party. He

155 added, though, that the project was an enjoyable and satisfying experience and, therefore, he had few regrets.

It does take up your whole weekends, like last weekend when I spent all weekend doing the shower. I sacrificed going on a decent trail ride and going out Saturday night so I was in good form to do the work Sunday. But it was an enjoyable experience. When it’s finished, you look back with satisfaction and it is fun doing it yourself, if you really hated it that much, you wouldn’t do it. You’d just go ‘screw it’, and pay someone and not do the job at all (Sam).

Following this theme, Alan, another recent first homeowner, noted “...it’s a big real change

and reality check when your previous leisure time becomes DIY time”. For Alan, this meant saying no (for the first time) to invitations for leisure activities such as the weekend mountain bike rides with his friends that he used to enjoy before he purchased his home. At the time of interview and given these sacrifices, Alan was re-assessing the amount of time he was prepared to devote to DIY, pointing out that since he had purchased a home it was becoming increasingly difficult to find a balance between his home improvement ambitions and the leisure activities he also wanted to pursue. David, who said that he did most of his DIY in weekends, after work and also “over the Easter period,” said he had recently given up his Easter tramping weekend to finish a bathroom project and was surprised to find that he “had

just as much fun” doing the work. “It hasn’t replaced my tramping interest”, he remarked,

“there’s a lot of hard work involved, but I certainly wouldn’t do it if I hated it”. James and Anna, other first homeowners, had this to say about the opportunity costs they were discovering as being associated with DIY:

You do lose your weekends going out … (James). [Anna interrupts] Yeah, maybe the social things during the day, because you’re spending time doing this kind of thing. But if something was happening, if there was a BBQ happening somewhere or something, then you would stop doing that and we would go and join…(Anna). [James interrupts] I forget what we used to do in the weekend (James).Yeah that’s true. I mean we do spend a lot of our weekends, shopping for stuff (Anna).

The physical condition of the first-homes these interviewees had bought may help to explain the enormous amount of time they were investing in DIY. Faced with high house prices and with diminutive financial equity, all these informants spoke of being forced to buy older houses at the lower end of the property market – the colloquial ‘doer-uppers’ – houses that

156 lend themselves well to the DIY ethos. The following excerpt summarises the predicament well:

At this stage of our life we can’t afford a newer house, so we had to buy this old doer-upper … in the beginning you’ve got this dream-house in mind, but the only house you can afford, if you want to get your foot in the door, is a house that needs serious work. So you buy it and find yourself doing it [DIY] day and night, all the time (Sally).