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Here s another great tip from BobVila.com. Drywall has been the wall finishing material of choice for most of a century because it s so easy to install and finish. Another of its virtues is that when it s damaged, it s easy to repair. For scratches or small dents, a quick swipe of joint compound with a 3- or 4-inch putty knife and a bit of sanding before priming and painting will do fine. For small holes up to 3 inches, self-adhesive plastic mesh tape and then a coat or two of patching compound will work. For medium-sized holes between 4 and 6 inches, try a drywall bandage. Check to make sure there s no electrical wiring in the area first, then use a keyhole saw to cut the hole into a neat square or rectangle. Transfer that shape onto a piece of new drywall, add 2-inch margins and cut out the larger patch piece. Trim off the back and gypsum in the 2-inch margin but leave the face paper uncut. Spread patching compound around the outside edges of the hole and press the bandage into it, feathering the edges. Let it dry. Then sand and re-coat with compound. Finally, sand again, prime and paint. For really big holes, you can use the tie and twist bracing method. Cut a piece of drywall or a length of 2x4 a few inches larger than the hole. Drill two small holes in the center and loop a 2-foot string through it like a button. Tie the ends around the middle of a stick. Apply adhesive to the back edges of the hole inside the wall. Adhere the patch piece and twist the stick from your side of the wall until it holds tight. Then, fill the remaining space with drywall patch pieces and mesh tape. Finish with compound as usual, cutting the string and pulling it out just before it dries. For super-large holes bigger than a foot wide, cut the drywall back to the two nearest studs and expose them halfway. Cut a new panel of drywall to fit and attach it as you normally would with drywall screws, joint compound and tape. Find out more at BobVila.com: the ultimate home improvement web site! 2008 BobVila.com

Here's another great tip from BobVila.com. You can literally cut corners on jobs like installing crown molding with the ingenious coped joint. Instead of calculating miter and bevel for all the angles in a room, save that for the outside corners, which you see most. For inside corners, you can cope the joint. First, install two parallel walls of crown without calculating any angles; just cut them square to the adjoining walls. Ensure a great fit by cutting those first pieces just slightly too long and springing them into place. After you ve cut the adjoining pieces at a 45-degree angle, coping the joint simply means removing the meat behind the leading edge so it will fit perfectly against the profile of the first piece. First, you mark the leading edge with the side of a pencil so you don t lose it as you re cutting. While a coping saw is the traditional tool to use, if you re having trouble, check that the blade is tight or try reversing it so the teeth face the wrong way. Or, here s a hot tip: Use a 4 1/2-inch handheld grinding tool with a flexible sanding attachment to quickly grind away the back of the joint. To clear any remaining imperfections, attach sandpaper with spray adhesive to a short section of molding, following its contours. Run this along the coped edge to clear any remaining obstacles to the perfect joint. Find out more at BobVila.com: The ultimate home improvement web site! BobVila.com 2008

Bob meets with Brian Kallmeyer from Unilock to talk about the Unilock tumbled concrete pavers. The product starts out as a high density (minimum 8,500 PSI mix) concrete paver. The density is achieve by taking a pretty dry mix with good aggregates like local granite that's put in a 3-story machine that presses it to a very high compaction and compression. They use a standard portland - no more than a typical wet concrete. Originally to tumble the create the antiqued pavers, they would just throw the fresh, shiny, square pavers into an old cement mixer and roll it around. The process has since become more elaborate to meet the growing demand. The resulting product is easy to work with. Unlike the natural stone that it duplicates, these pavers have been made in a mold so they are very dimensionally stable. They can be cleanly cut using a lever action on a guillotine cutter.

Bob visits with John Druley of Quaker Homes in Falmouth, Massachusetts. Druley is developing a parcel of land in Falmouth that will have eight homes, two of them affordable for families earing a modest income. Bob and Druley discuss the reality of housing in Falmouth, where one-acre building lots are required for new housing. A lot, Druley explains, will sell for around $300,000 with no construction. For this development, Druley has invoked Massachusetts' Act 40B to gain relief from zoning restrictions such as the one-acre minimum lot size. In return, Druley must make 20 percent of the homes available as affordable homes, for those earning up to 80 percent of the area's median income. The lots are 10,000 sqaure feet with a 40-foot setback from the road, 10-foot sidelines, and a 45 to 50-foot backyard. The homes are 1,800-square-foot Capes with attached garages, clad in white cedar shingles, with skylights, architectural-style roof shingles, and no-maintenance, energy-efficient vinyl windows. Druley explains that the affordable and market-priced homes must be indistinguisable in design, materials, and layout. The state assigns a 40B auditor to monitor the project and assure that no corners are cut on the affordable homes, and that the developer earns no more than 20 percent profit from the development. Druley explains that the market-priced homes in the neighborhood will sell for between $375,000 and $400,000, which will help offset the $119,900 selling price for the affordable homes.