OVERVIEW

Rip-outs of existing conditions can be the best part of a remodeling job. If you are harboring frustration, ripping out walls and busting up bathtubs can free you from the weight that is on your shoulders. Seriously, it can feel good to tear things up from time to time. But in reality, most rip-outs are done in a controlled, orderly fashion.

Bathroom and kitchen remodeling always involves some degree of rip-out. Other types of remodeling can also involve removing existing materials. Even if all you are doing is replacing windows in a home, you have to take out the old windows before you can install the new windows.

How hard can it be to tear things out of a building? Well, it can get tricky, and there are some ways that are smarter and more productive than others. Experience plays a big factor in making a rip-out profitable. Rookie remodelers can waste a lot of time and bust their backs on jobs where seasoned remodelers would use different methods and be done faster and without the backaches.

When you are doing an aggressive rip-out, you have to think about more than just the workspace. Consider a job where you are on the second floor of a home and are trying to remove a tile wall and a cast-iron bathtub. If you take a sledgehammer to the tub, you may crack a ceiling in a room on the first floor. When this happens, you have to fix the ceiling, and...