Used Building Materials Versus New Building Materials
There are some pros and cons to using older building
materials as compared to purchasing new ones. It wouldn't be a big
problem, if you simply need to clean up the older building materials,
but if there in dire need of some serious cleanup or refinishing, you
could find yourself putting a lot of hours in, during the process.
This would be my biggest concern, however, I would also like to point
something out here. Some of these older building products, seemed to be
built better and often seem to hold up longer than some of the newer
products.
Some of the newer products seem to use cheaper parts, poor building
adhesives and newer growth lumber. Something like a cabinet for
instance, built 70 years ago, probably can't even compare to the quality
of something built today.
Cabinets along time ago used older growth wood, which came from larger
trees, which is a superior building product, the wood that is used
today, for most cabinets, coming from smaller trees.
Some of the bathtubs and sinks that were built along time ago, contain
more metal and sometimes a thicker porcelain, than those of today. I
could go on and on about the older versus the newer, but the bottom line
is, some things that were built along time ago, were built a lot better,
than the same things built today.
If you're simply looking for cost difference, versus value or better
products, you will need to think about the costs involved in refinishing
these older products. Bathtubs might be easier and cheaper to refinish,
than a decorative wood cabinet.
If the bottom line is price, make sure that you do the math.