I fixed my leaking toilet for £9 and in less time than it would take to get a plumber round

While I'm normally on top of my home maintenance in the hopes of staving off more serious issues down the line, I will admit that my leaky loo had been on the to do list for an embarrassing amount of time.

Rather than a serious leak or weird bathroom smells (which I definitely would have called out a professional to resolve much sooner), my issue was more of an occasional drip, stemming from a very old bolt and a failed washer. After doing a little bit of research, it seemed like an easy DIY project for me to fix it myself, and save a bit of money at the same time.

If you have a similar problem and want to fix it yourself, it's definitely something even a novice DIYer could tackle. This is what you will need and exactly how I did it.

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You will need:

• Flat head screwdriver
• Toilet repair kit, like this universal toilet repair kit from Amazon (£8.99)
• Sponge
• Washing up bowl (or similar container)
• Old towel/cloth
• You may also need a socket wrench, like this one from B&Q

1. Remove the water from the cistern

As the failed bolt essentially connects the cistern to bowl, I needed to drain the water from the cistern so that I could access the old bolt and replace it without flooding my bathroom.

First up that meant turning off the water supply to the toilet. If you're not sure how to do this, look for a flexible pipe at the back of your toilet. The isolation valve will be on that flexible pipe, and it'll have a straight slot that follows the line of the pipe. I used a flat head screwdriver in the slot to turn the isolation valve 90° clockwise (so the straight slot should be horizontal across the pipe rather than in line with it).

Then I flushed the toilet, which emptied about 80% of the water from the cistern, removed the cistern lid, and used a sponge to soak up the last of the water, squeezing it out into my collapsible washing up bowl. You could use an old cloth or towel for this part, but in my experience, the sponge is much easier to wring out.

Just make sure to wet the sponge first — it soaks up much more water that way.

2. Remove the old bolt

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Once the cistern was empty of water, I started to remove the old bolt by unscrewing the nuts and removing the metal and rubber washers from underneath the cistern. This part took me quite a long time, not because it was difficult, but because there was a nut hiding from sight. But once I managed to remove that final nut, I could pull the bolt straight out.

For this part, I didn't need any tools, but you may need a socket wrench to remove the nuts if they are on too tight to be removed by hand.

The cistern will be attached to the bowl by two bolts, one on each side. There are two replacement bolts in the kit I bought, as well as a foam gasket that is designed to sit where the cistern meets the bowl. My existing gasket was still working fine, so I didn't need replace this part.

Once I'd removed the old bolt, there was a bit of debris from the old one left in the cistern so I used an old cloth to remove as much of this as I could.

3. Fit the new bolt

There were no instructions included with my toilet repair kit, so I'd paid attention to how the old bolt was fitted and it was simply a matter of doing the same in reverse when fitting the new one.

The repair kit included corrosion-resistance M6 bolts, nuts and washers, with each part already threaded in the right order, which was an extra reassurance on how to fit it properly.

I was sure to apply enough pressure to be certain of a watertight fit, but was cautious not to be too heavy handed in case I cause damage to the porcelain.

4. Check the seal with a bit of water

I like to err on the side of caution, so before turning the water back on and while the washing up bowl was around to catch any drips, I poured a couple of cups of water back in the cistern, right over the replaced bolt and waited to see if there were any leaks.

Fortunately, there weren't so I felt confident enough to turn the water back on, by turning the isolation valve 90° anticlockwise. The cistern refilled, and I gave it a couple of flushes to check again for any leaks. And there were none, so I consider this a success!

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