You know you have too much money

[Deleted]

when you pay $500+ to have someone put Christmas lights on your house.....

I just read an article about professional christmas light installation.

[birdmom]

Most of the houses in the McMansion neighborhood behind us all have professional installation done. It looks awesome, but makes my decorations look very amateur!

[Deleted]

I really want to do this--the way my house is makes hanging exterior lights dangerous. But unfortunately I'm not that rich. I see signs for this all over my neighborhood & I'd say many of the nicest houses do hire this done. I feel lucky we swung having the yard raked/cleaned this year...totally worth the $150.

[whitepicketfence]

My DH would probably love this, LOL. Not for $500 though.

[AAM2012]

Does the $500 include the lights? Like you "rent" them for the month and it includes the installation and take down?

I see signs everywhere for cheap installation and I could totally see it being worth paying $150 to avoid arguing with my husband about the lights being crooked or whatever (happens EVERY year).

[limey]

That's the norm around here.

[fortmyersbride]

Eh, I'm seriously considering using a professional lighting company. I hate heights, so I won't climb up on the house to do it. It makes me really nervous to have DH climbing up there well. DH has a bad back and any significant physical injuries from a fall would put him out of work. So basically we hire it out or no lights.

[ijack]

It's the norm in our neighborhood too.

[Deleted]

My parents have a handyman who comes every Saturday. He does their lights.


It's not insanely uncommon. It's the same price, for them, as a weekly cleaning service which people don't roll their eyes at. But 500 is insane. That's not what they pay.

[dexteroni]

We haven't done this yet, and probably won't until we have a different house, but that's the only way we'll ever have lights on our house. I don't want DH to climbing to the top of our house, and he isn't particularly eager to try it either.

And I've long said that I would love for someone to come over with a live tree, set it up, and put the lights on it for me. Then I'll do the fun part, which is putting on the ornaments.

[Deleted]

Eh, some people pay to have them put up in our neighborhood and some people do their own. You really can't tell the difference imo.

[Deleted]

Agree. Seems like a waste of money, would rather buy a pair of shoes or give someone important to me an even more extravagant gift, or of course save it.

Keeping up with the joneses to the tune of $500 in light hanging seems silly.

[Deleted]

We pay to have lights put up every year. We do not have too much money, no such thing.

[Deleted]

Lights make me happy. Traumatic brain injury does not. If/when we ever own a SFH, I am sure we would pay for this service.

[Deleted]

Yeah, it's not always or even usually about keeping up with the Jones. Why would this, vs any other service you COULD do but chose to pay someone to do, be any different? I mean, people pay to have their lawns taken care of because they don't want to spend the time or can't physically. I see that as no different.

[readyin07]

I think someone posted on here semi-recently about paying $1,500 to have their house done. I think that is semi-insane. $500 is enh...but seriously most handymen in my area hire themselves out for a LOT cheaper than that and would do it by the hour.

[dr.girlfriend]

Being both lazy and cheap, we just put lights all along our fence and the low gutter on our porch. No roof-climbing for me, and we have so many big bushes below our roof line it's impossible to get a ladder in there.

[smiley]

We do minimal lights at our current home bc it is not the norm for the neighborhood. If we lived in a different area I would invest the time and money into the lighting for the holiday season. Also, I would be more willing to pay for the light installation if we had a child, it's part of the magic of the season!

[luvmagoldn]

I am all over this. H has promised to put up Christmas lights for 10 years. Never does it.

This year I am hiring someone.

[chessie]

haha my neighbors just leave them up year round never have to put them up again

[zitiqueen]

I know a woman who pays a decorator to put their tree up and decorate it. Her kids have never hung an ornament on a tree or had a handmade ornament hung on their tree because they didn't fit the theme.

[Deleted]

Nov 25, 2012 15:35:13 GMT -5 zitiqueen said:

I know a woman who pays a decorator to put their tree up and decorate it. Her kids have never hung an ornament on a tree or had a handmade ornament hung on their tree because they didn't fit the theme.

That's sad. My kids got impatient with me last year and decorated the tree themselves. (I had put the tree up and brought the ornaments down)

[Doggy Mommy]

IDK.... I know someone who fell off his roof while putting up Christmas lights. His kid found him unconscious and covered in blood. He was in the hospital for weeks and had several surgeries, and a long recovery after that. After seeing what he went through, we would probably hire someone if we wanted to put up a lot of lights considering we have a walkout basement and our roof is very high and steep.

[Deleted]

I used to have a co-worker who saved up his vacation to put lights on houses during the late fall. He said he made loads of money during those weeks.

I'm not sure how paying someone to install lights is "keeping up with the Joneses." Some people have enough money that they don't have to choose between shoes and professional Christmas light installation.

[CloudBee]

It's not that uncommon. Putting up lights on a 2 story home can easily take a day. Someone working full time with a family can't always devote an entire weekend day to that sort of thing. People use their handymen and contractors to do that sort of stuff all the time.

$500 sounds pretty steep, though.

[Deleted]

Nov 25, 2012 15:35:13 GMT -5 zitiqueen said:

I know a woman who pays a decorator to put their tree up and decorate it. Her kids have never hung an ornament on a tree or had a handmade ornament hung on their tree because they didn't fit the theme.

I would have totally paid for someone to decorate my tree and house this year, but only because I feel like barfing most of the time.

[pugz]

I do think $500 is steep but not for everyone. Ladders suck. Dh fell off one last fall when he was doing a church work project and dislocated his shoulder and tore something. Had to have surgery, then lots of physical therapy. Since it was near the end of the year he maxed his OOP in both years I don't want him on ladders now so we don't do lights.

I did feel really out of place at mom's group recently when all the ladies at my table were talking about who they hire to put up their lights....

[isabel]

DH and I aren't even that well off and I would seriously consider this after we buy a home. Our rental is a ranch style, so DH can stand on a chair to put lights along the roof line, but when we buy we'll have a two-story. I don't want him up on a ladder that high. Paying our insurance deductible because of a fall would cost as much as light installation (though I suppose you could argue that would be more MM since at least the deductible would be paid in full ).

[jdbyogi]

Most of my neighbors (well, the few blocks away neighbors) do this. From my understanding, the cost includes the lights themselves, put up and take down. Neighbors often get the large trees in their yards done as well. Someone was making a ton of $$ in my neighborhood this weekend! XH and I never put up lights ourselves because of the time, buying lights, extension cords, arranging power, fall risk, and I don't know how we would have even done the trees (then we got divorced before another Christmas). $500 seems like a lot, but for some of the houses around here that would make sense. They have multiple people spending multiple hours installing lights.

[stephm0188]

I don't see the big deal. It's no different to me than hiring a housekeeper or a lawn service.