The good news is that all of the specialty tools required can cost well under $150, and you can find everything you need at any home improvement store. If you’re planning a large tile job, you might want to splurge and buy a tile wet saw, or plan to rent one for a day or two. Otherwise, you can get by with strictly manual tools for almost any tile project. The manual alternative to a wet saw is a tile snap cutter, a simple tabletop tool that you use to score the tile and snap it along the scored line. It works best with ceramic, porcelain, and glass tile. Use the float to force the grout into the joint spaces and to scrape the grout flush with the tile surfaces. There is no other tool that does this job, so a grout float is truly a must-buy tiling tool. That’s where mixing paddles come in. If you’re going to use the vastly cheaper dry thinset or grout, it’s difficult to escape purchasing a mixing paddle for your drill. Mixing heavy bags of dry mix by hand leaves voids and large dry chunks that are hard to mix out. But with a $15 to $25 mixing paddle that you add to the end of your drill, you’ll be able to smoothly mix up heavy bags of thinset and grout with ease. While it might seem acceptable to use an ordinary household sponge for this job, the sharp edges of standard sponges pull the grout from the joints, and their small size makes them largely ineffective. Always use a real grout sponge instead. While it is possible to finish a tiling job without needing tile nippers, it’s a very handy tool to have at the ready for making all sorts of custom cuts. Fill the tool with chalk powder, shake it up, and unreel the string to the desired length. Snap the string as you would with a bow and arrow, and you get a legible, though hazy, blue line on your floor or wall. A chalk line is used to define the basic tiling area before tiling begins. Ideally, you’ll actually have a couple of buckets close at hand, with at least a few of them filled with clean water. Having plenty of water available can help the grouting process go more quickly, as the water can get murky, and you want the grout sponge to stay as clean as possible.
