Handyman services
in Fort Thomas, KY.

Old woodwork is worth saving

The original trim, doors and built-ins in Fort Thomas houses are usually better than anything you could buy to replace them, and the fastest fix is often the wrong one. We'd rather rehang a heavy original door properly, rebuild a missing section of baseboard to match the existing profile, and repair the piece that's damaged than tear out a run of woodwork that has been in place for a hundred years. When something genuinely can't be saved, you'll get the honest version with photos rather than a shrug.

Plaster, and the ceilings that are twelve feet up

Like most pre-war neighborhoods, Fort Thomas is plaster over lath — patched properly it stays patched, and hung into real framing a TV or a heavy shelf stays put. The wrinkle here is height. Nine, ten and twelve-foot ceilings turn a light fixture swap, a ceiling fan, or a smoke detector replacement into a ladder job that most people would sensibly rather hand to someone else. Same with tall windows and the curtain rods above them.

Doors, thresholds, and a century of settling

Hillside lots and a hundred years of movement leave doors that stick, thresholds worn through, and storm doors that never sat right in the opening. Most of it is adjustment work rather than replacement — shimming hinges, resetting a strike plate, planing an edge, replacing weatherstripping that gave out. It's an hour of work that makes a house feel maintained instead of tired, and it's flat-priced like everything else.

• Original trim respected — matched and repaired rather than ripped out
• Tall-ceiling work — fixtures, fans and detectors handled off the ladder so you don't have to
• Honest limits — permit-level and structural work gets referred out, not dabbled in