Tile Tips for DIY

After decorating and painting, installing tile is a very popular homeowner do-it-yourself project. Tile by its very nature is small and easier to maneuver than many building materials like a 4×8 sheet of plywood or 2×8 boards of lumber when building a deck. The biggest challenge when installing tile is cutting the tile, especially when you need round cuts. There are lots of tile tips to make the work go faster, and insure the results meet your expectations.

This post is where we'll collect the best tile tips for homeowners who want to install tile in their kitchen, bathroom or in some parts of the country, throughout the entire house. We hope you find our tips helpful and we encourage you to add your tips or questions below, as that's how we're building our online community of savvy women homeowners.

Tile Tips – Start Tile Design Where Your Eyes Will Focus

A common mistake made by homeowners on their first tiling project is starting the tile against a wall. You're a bit frightened by the prospect of cutting lots of tile so this seems like a good way to minimize the number of cuts you need to make. It might be less work but it won't give you the desired results. You want everyone to admire your work and that means lining up the tile so it's centered where your eyes first look on entering a room.

In this photo above, you can see how they've centered the hallway tile from one end of the house to the opposite end. You'll have to cut tile for both sides of the hallway but it will flow nicely into all the adjoining rooms/spaces, so you don't have to worry about mismatched tile patterns which happens more often that we care to admit.

Tile Tips – Using Tile Spacers

This is a true and embarrassing tip to share with all of you. My homeowner journey started in the 1970s and we built a house in 1984. While I diligently managed the contract and gave our builder four pages of detailed specifications, I was pregnant at the time so I didn't do a lot of work before we moved in … and sadly, without digital cameras, we don't have many photos of this project. Ryan was born in July so in August I was able to help my husband lay tile in our kitchen, family room, mud room and entry way.

M-D Building Products 1/8-Inch Tile Spacers, 200/BagMarshalltown 1/8-Inch Tavy Tile Spacer, 100-Pack

We thought we were brilliant having discovered tile spacers while visiting other houses under construction. It wasn't until we'd bought our third package of tile spacers that the kind people at the tile store told us to position the tile spacers pointing up and pull them out after the adhesive has set, so you can reuse them, duh! You can see the tile spacers in the kitchen floor above or watch Tommy's Trade Secrets – How to Tile a Wall, for step-by-step instructions including how to use tile spacers.

We thought we were brilliant having discovered tile spacers while visiting other houses under construction. It wasn't until we'd bought our third package of tile spacers that the kind people at the tile store told us to position the tile spacers pointing up and pull them out after the adhesive has set, so you can reuse them, duh! You can see the tile spacers in the kitchen floor above or watch Tommy's Trade Secrets – How to Tile a Wall, for step-by-step instructions including how to use tile spacers.

Tile Tips – Minimizing Cracks in Grout

After you've invested time and money installing tile, it's disappointing to find hairline cracks in the grout. Unfortunately they're inevitable in houses framed in wood, as the wood shifts with changing temperatures and humidity. There are several tile tips for dealing with cracking grout, some that I've used but others from trusted resources.

• Ask the Builder has a nice, detailed description of urethane grout which is fairly new. It's more flexible than traditional cement-based grout, and was the perfect solution when finishing our basement and knew the concrete slab wasn't perfectly flat given the house was more than 100 years old.
• This Old House provides details on how to secure cement backerboard to the studs to minimize the movement of the walls or flooring where you install your tile.
• With my handyman business, we often used quarter-round molding to cover up unsightly gaps between the baseboard and flooring. This is also a solution that will work for grout cracks that are more likely to appear around the perimeter of a room or where wall tile meets a bathtub and yes, you can now buy quarter-round made from composite materials that will withstand water damage better.

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