This may sound like a crazy question; however, today more and more people are turning into their own handymen and trying to do all kinds of repairs instead of calling a repair person. You may be able to accomplish a few plumbing repair problems, however, even changing a faucet you can run into problems.
You may think that you can do all the repairs yourself and you run out and purchase a faucet for the kitchen, ready to handle that leaky faucet. The problem is once you get home, you cannot find a shut-off under the sink so you must first turn off the water to the entire home. Now, you do that and remove the old faucet. You think wow, this is quite easy. You grab your new faucet and put it into place but as you are doing this an old pipe that you are trying to attach the new pipe to crumbles in your hand. Now, you must replace the old pipe. You run back to the hardware store and grab a pipe. When you get home, you realize the pipe you purchased is smaller and will not fit properly. You also notice that the faucet you purchased is not fitting correctly in the space that is there for the faucet as you purchased one with a sprayer nozzle thinking your wife would like that but you did not realize you did have a place for one.
Now, you have the water turned off, the hardware does not have the right size pipe you need for under the sink and you have to take back the faucet and get a new one. Your wife is ready to cook and you have the kitchen under repair and no water. No longer is she happy and she is certainly not worried about a leaky faucet. All she wants now is a working kitchen.
You now have to call for a professional that can provide solutions for plumbing to get your home back in order. Of course, this is the worst-case scenario but it all could have been prevented if you add consulted with an experienced plumber in the first place. Of course, if you know what you are doing and you measure you should be able to replace a faucet unless your pipes are old and need to be replaced as well. It is in your best interest to have your plumbing inspected at least once per year to ensure that there is nothing that could cause you problems such as roots breaking pipes under the house or worn pipes that may burst. The cost of having an inspection done compared to the costs of emergency plumbing issues is quite low.