Dealing with damage done to a skylight can be tricky. The main reasons for this are that rain, and anything else landing on the roof of your house can fall through your skylight, and reaching the damage in the first place is a difficult task. If you can see that there is simply a hole in the glass, you are relatively in luck. Replacing only the glass won't cost more than a couple of hundred dollars, and a specialist company can do it in less than a couple of hours. It is naturally an inconvenience, but not as much as it would be if the frame was damaged. If this was the case, the frame, also, would have to be replaced, costing somewhere around $1000. This is a much greater hassle, and whilst a specialist company shouldn't take too long with it, the cost is the biggest problem. While you will now have a good idea of how much a repair will cost, and how long it will take, there are some measures you should take to prevent water getting into your house. Most people will simply place a bowl below the damaged skylight, and think that is all that needs to be done. Not so. If the rain coming through the skylight is moving to to the side, not simply falling straight, it may completely miss the bowl. Luckily, there is a simple way to stop this. Just place a towel over the hole in the skylight. The water will drip or flow from the bottom of the towel, directly into the bowl. I hope this helps you to understand how you can prevent water from getting into your house if your skylight happens to be damaged.

Skylights are often indented into the roof a building, and I have found that occasionally, birds such as pigeons may decide to nest on a skylight. This you may not immediately consider to be an inconvenience, but I assure you, the sight of bird droppings on your skylight is not a pleasant one, and not being able to open your skylight for fear of birds and their droppings is not a pleasant experience either. So, how can birds nesting on your skylight be prevented? The first thing I would like to note here is that this is a rather rare problem so I would not worry about it too much. If, however, you do notice birds nesting on your skylight, you may wish to attempt the techniques below. Firstly, remove the nest, then proceed with installing the countermeasures. The first one most people would suggest is a net, stopping birds from walking on that area, and making it uncomfortable for them. This usually fails as the birds simply place twigs on the net until they can walk on it. In the case of skylights, the net may work, as it prevents there from being an indentation in the roof, so reducing the popularity of the site for birds. In the one time birds have nested on a skylight of mine, I used the net and it worked perfectly well. If the net fails, perhaps spikes would work. If not, you may be in need of a specialist.

Skylights have an interesting capability of controlling the climate inside the building in which they are installed. If you plan to use your skylights for this purpose, I would greatly recommend large skylights, as they enable much faster change, although if your home already has a good climate, you can do this with smaller skylights. The key thing to understand about climate control with skylights is how it works. When the skylight is closed, the air inside is trapped, and is warmed up by the light coming through the skylight, thus increasing the temperature and removing circulation of the air in the building. During the winter, this gives a warm feel, with less drafts. When the skylight is open, however, the air is still heated up, but rises out of the skylight, generating low pressure below it, and producing circulation. This gives the effect of a cooling breeze in the summer. Those are the two positions which you should use with your skylight, and when it is winter or autumn, you should consider alternating between the two, as and when necessary. There is no particular method to controlling a building's climate with skylights, but I hope this gives you an overview of how you can try to do it. It requires a bit of practice, but it soon becomes easy.

Skylights can be bought and installed for about the same price as windows, with buying one costing around $500, give or take a hundred dollars, and the total cost of installation and purchase of top class skylights will not go above $2000. The benefits of skylights are quite a bit different from those of standard windows, so the prices cannot be realistically compared for value. A key choice you should make is whether you will buy a high quality skylight or one of a low quality. I would certainly recommend the purchase of high quality skylights. It's a long term investment, and it's best to get the highest quality you can to reduce the repair and maintenance costs later on. It is very difficult to fix a hole in the frame of a skylight, whereas in normal windows it's much easier to repair. Whilst it is possible to hire professional companies which will fix your skylights, it's always better to buy high quality and not have any hassle later on. As for the size of the skylight you may decide to buy, I will recommend going for the largest one you can get. In theory, these can be damaged more easily, but I believe that getting the most light and ventilation into the house is more important than a marginally higher chance of damage. I hope that this helps you in choosing what skylight you should purchase, and what prices you should expect when installing them, if you do decide on skylights in your home.

An interesting feature that skylights can provide, which most people are not aware of is mood lighting. Mood lighting is simply a way of using tinted skylights to cause the room in which the skylight is installed to be of a certain color, thus inducing a particular mood. It is quite simple to get a tinted skylight, however, choosing the correct color is key. The first colors we will consider are yellow and orange. These colors can give a happy feeling to a room, as well as making it look particularly cosy. These colors are also particularly useful as they can be installed in almost any room, with the exception of a bathroom, and give the room a better feel. Another color which you may wish to consider using is red. I would recommend using light shades of red, however you can go for a darker shade in bedrooms, giving a very romantic feeling, and also making the room in question seem rather luxurious. Blue is an interesting color, it is just about the only color which may be used in bathrooms, although I personally do not use it. Green can be used in living rooms, although I would recommend using it in areas such as corners, where it is not particularly intrusive. As a general rule, tinted skylights should be of a light shade, and be positioned in such a way that the colour is distributed throughout the room. If you're thinking of incorporating mood lighting into your house, I hope this gives you a good idea of how to do it with skylights.