How I Found My Perfect Garage Door

Argh!!! The garage door won't open all the way and now it won't go down. It's stuck halfway open. This is not good. I have to be at work in 20 minutes, drop off the kids in about 10 minutes, and I can't even get the car out of the garage. Fortunately my wife had just left the house and was able to drop us all off. But I still had to figure out what I was going to do with the garage door.

My house was built in 1989 and we're still using the original garage door. We haven't done any maintenance on the door, so I knew this day would come eventually, but never the morning I have to go to work. Anyway, I called a repair person and they pretty much sad I would be better off buying a new garage door system than trying to repair my current, old garage.

So I started searching online and found a wide range of styles and prices to choose from: standard doors, weather resistant doors, custom built doors, wood doors, steel doors, etc. I found pretty flimsy looking doors for about $250 and doors that looked like they could protect Fort Knox going for about $5,000. I just wanted something that fit into the overall design of my house, was durable, and was affordable. Didn't have much use for a garage door with all the latest bells and whistles.

After hours of shopping around the internet and going to the local Home Depot to see the door selection in person, I bought a nice sectional garage door and a Genie garage opener. It was all pretty affordable. I paid about $1,100 for the hardware and paid for the installation. If you're looking to save money, you can round up some buddies and install the door and opener yourself. The directions are really detailed, but I'm terrible when it comes to putting things together.

External Resources:
Garage Door Prices - It's Better to Shop Around
Garage Door Pricing Guide