Home Improvement: Are receptacles with USB built in worth the extra cost? |
- Are receptacles with USB built in worth the extra cost?
- Should I caulk between the wall and baseboard heater before I paint?
- When do you typically pay a contractor?
- I'm colorblind and the house needs new exterior paint ...
- Is it commonplace to switch out every light switch and wall outlet in a house?
- Any ideas for enclosing a partial open garage that isn’t a garage door or wall?
- Living Room Ceiling Death Hole
- Best way to get rid of house flies?
- Sharkbite is sorcery
- Just bought a home with this wood accent wall, how easy is this to remove?
- Why 6” deck boards?
- A/C Unit Replacement for $6,500 - Reasonable Price?
- Best way to fill gaps between wall & floor?
- Difference between drill/driver and Hammer drill?
- Anyone have any tips on Hydroseeding a new lawn and best watering guide ?
- Replacing bathtub faucet knobs without replacing the existing plumbing/fittings... Am I totally screwed?
- What tool / drill can I rent to help with trenching through clay?
- Trying to find the best way to get my nuts off.
- Indoor\outdoor access for animals question.
- Just looking for some advice and answers for installing laminate flooring?
- Necessary to clean air ducts/vents in home?
- Renting a home in Texas with "mini split' cooling system. Will it be enough?
- Tips for painting/reinstalling worn down gate (pics in comments)
- Ants won't stop coming
| Are receptacles with USB built in worth the extra cost? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 03:12 PM PDT We're in the process of updating our receptacles in our house and have been looking at some receptacles with USB outlets built in for next to our bedsides. Does anyone have any experience with these and are they worth the price increase than a standard receptacle? [link] [comments] |
| Should I caulk between the wall and baseboard heater before I paint? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 08:02 AM PDT |
| When do you typically pay a contractor? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 04:09 PM PDT I typically have numerous construction projects going on simultaneously and am trying to figure out when a reasonable time is to pay a contractor for their work for jobs that are only a day or two - the reason being that I will often have several jobs occurring (or completing) at several properties, and the contractors expect to get paid as soon as they are completed, but also cannot give an exact completion time. Is it reasonable to expect me to wait around at the property until they are finished? I've had a couple issues come up where I have a job being done (say, a 2 day paint job) and the contractor wants to be paid by check as soon as they are done, but (understandably) they cannot tell me they will be done "tomorrow at 7:00pm." I ask them to text me a couple hours in advance with the time they will be finishing, but frequently I get a message from a contractor at 8pm saying "We are done now" and I am at another site an hour away. Should I be dropping everything to drive there? Or is it reasonable to tell them (especially if they have finished after normal working hours) that I cannot drop everything and immediately appear to cut them their check, and will have to pay them tomorrow after I get a chance to see the work? Please note, this doesn't apply to large, costly, multi-week jobs - those I have no problem communicating with the contractors and we have payment schedules and I can send electronic payments. This applies to smaller jobs (a couple thousand or less) where I have not paid upfront, and the contractors seem to expect me to drop everything to come pay them without being able to give me a specific completion time. What's a good compromise to keep everyone happy? Electronic payments would make things very easy, but a lot of the people I work with want cash or checks, and I can't spend 2 hours sitting at a property waiting for them to finish, nor can I pay before everything is completed and hope they finish afterwards. The main issue seems to be that the contractors don't grasp (nor do I really want them to grasp) that this is not a project on my own home and is just one of many that I have going on, and thus I am not typically "on site" when they finish unless they've actually sent a completion time. Thanks! TL;DR: What's a payment arrangement that keeps everyone happy for small jobs at sites where I do not live? I've tried to get contractors to send me a completion time a couple hours in advance so I can be there, but almost always I get no notice and am blamed for not being on site to pay immediately. [link] [comments] |
| I'm colorblind and the house needs new exterior paint ... Posted: 05 Jun 2020 07:49 AM PDT https://imgur.com/gallery/5ASUTHb Buying this soon. Needs new paint. I'm colorblind, so I am open to suggestions since I won't see what everyone else sees when it's all said and done anyway. Located in a small mountain community in Northern California. Currently it's what you see: a pale, kind of dusty blue-grey with darker trim. I'm thinking something in a flat medium grey with white trim. Anyone got any suggestions? [link] [comments] |
| Is it commonplace to switch out every light switch and wall outlet in a house? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 06:42 AM PDT This is probably an odd question but I've never heard of this really being done before. The issue is that I need to move a few wall outlets due to a kitchen remodel, as well as replace a couple of switches that are no longer functional. (The house was built in 1978). Since I'm going to be doing that anyway, I thought I might as well change them all out and replace them with newer/safer models. They would also match, as I'd like to change them from the old ivory color to white. This isn't something I'd do myself so I'm wondering if it's a ridiculously expensive undertaking? Thank you for any feedback or suggestions that you may have. [link] [comments] |
| Any ideas for enclosing a partial open garage that isn’t a garage door or wall? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 04:21 PM PDT We have a garage that has two walls, a garage door, and a fully open side. At first, we loved this but soon came to the realization that we had no way to control pests from taking over it. We've been trying to come up with a solution that would enclose the space for the majority of the time but allow us to open it up, even a section, when needed. Please ignore my wife's stuff in the picture :).. she's an elementary school teacher and they forced the teachers to move their stuff out this summer. [link] [comments] |
| Living Room Ceiling Death Hole Posted: 05 Jun 2020 05:48 PM PDT We moved in a year ago to a giant hole in our ceiling that previous tenant ripped open to put a pull up bar on the studs. We have removed the bar, but this dreaded hole remains in our near-perfectly cozy living room. This is one of two final pieces to our living room renovation and i have no idea how to tackle it. Im pretty handy, but simply don't know where to start. Do we remove the entire popcorn ceiling and drywallor plaster it? Do I fill in the hole with plywood and put popcorn over it? I don't even know the materials used for the ceiling in general,, seems to be a few layers. The hole is 83x35 inches. Thank you for any help!! Pics here - http://imgur.com/gallery/OYsTydI [link] [comments] |
| Best way to get rid of house flies? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 12:21 PM PDT I've tried the sticky traps that just hang from the ceiling, but am having no luck. Any more efficient solutions? [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 05 Jun 2020 07:58 PM PDT Blood, sweat, a night without water, 8 trips to a hardware store, and sharkbites later. After I finished all of the drain plumbing under the house and how complicated it was going from 1/2" to 3" i figured the water line was easy! After all it was just two connectors. I used sharkbite to splice into an existing copper line. It was a piece of cake and no torches for me. But my mistake came on the other end of the PEX line. I only used brass insert fittings. So it leaked. I went to get clamps, they leaked. I used a proper clamping tool instead of pliers, they leaked. I double clamped each joint, they leaked. I replaced the whole thing with one braided faucet line with a shutoff valve and a sharkbite connector. It took me 2 min to install and would have saved me everything but the sweat and a trip to the store. I will from here on always use sharkbites press to connect fittings unless physical or financial unfeasible. [link] [comments] |
| Just bought a home with this wood accent wall, how easy is this to remove? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 09:52 PM PDT Would this be easy to remove? https://i.imgur.com/LzGtiYv.jpg [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 05 Jun 2020 03:13 PM PDT Looking to redo my deck surface this summer and wondering if there's a reason why 6" boards are commonly chosen. I'm not sure about PT lumber, but in regular lumber foot-boards typically have the best lumber in them. I did the math and it's cost about the same, so why should I go with 6" over 12"? [link] [comments] |
| A/C Unit Replacement for $6,500 - Reasonable Price? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 04:19 PM PDT I live on a 3rd floor condo. The guy said $6,500 to replace the A/C unit, which is an outdoor 2.5 ton unit. And replace the whole indoor unit with the fan/evaporator coil. He said he'll also have to cut out the dry wall to get to the water pipe. Is $6,500 reasonable? I live in Northern Virginia. So higher than average cost of living. I had a bit of sticker shock since I originally requested a $59 A/C tune-up and to get an estimate to fix the issue with the wet A/C filter. He didn't do the tune-up and said the entire unit had to be replaced. Something about the PSI being really low. [link] [comments] |
| Best way to fill gaps between wall & floor? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 04:29 PM PDT We recently bought a 115 year old house with original hardwood floors and baseboards, ship lap walls (under bad drywall 🥴), etc. There is no subfloor. The underside of our thin wood floors is just a 3 ft crawl space and the ground below. We have various spots around the house with gaps like these, where we can see sunlight or the ground through the gap in the floor and the wall. An old house expert we hired to repair the wood sash windows, recommended filling the gaps with caulk (applying under the house). He said we probably also need to add some quarter round all around the bottom of the baseboards on the inside of the house. That's a lot of trim to cut and stain though... We are planning to renovate in the next 3 years, so we are really just interested in making the house more airtight, less drafty and buggy. We are getting into mosquito and roach season in Houston....no thanks. Is the caulk a good idea or would you recommend something different? [link] [comments] |
| Difference between drill/driver and Hammer drill? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 08:21 AM PDT So after much debating I settled on going with the Bauer brand of power drill from Harbor Freight. Found this one plus a coupon that dropped it to $59.99 Stopped by my local Harbor Freight yesterday and they appeared to be out of stock. So I went home and ordered it along with this: https://www.harborfreight.com/titanium-drill-bit-set-29-pc-61637.html but it said the drill had an extraordinary demand and the order may be delayed. it did not give me any sort of expected arrival date or anything. So was thinking of just cancelling the order and going back to the store as they had this one: But what is the difference between the first one which was labeled as a drill/driver kit, and the second one which is labeled as a hammer drill kit? [link] [comments] |
| Anyone have any tips on Hydroseeding a new lawn and best watering guide ? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 04:14 PM PDT I am in Massachusetts and am hydroseeding this weekend. I have also planted annabelle hydrangeas, green velvet boxwoods, daylilie and pear trees. I have irrigation with a smart controller for the lawn and will be hand watering the plants. My question is this: what is the recommended watering this time of year to make everything grow. (Time of day, how many times a day, how much) that type of thing. I don't have much experience and just want to do it right. [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 05 Jun 2020 04:09 PM PDT I recently bought a house and the bathroom needed a lot of updating. I don't think anything has been replaced since it was built in 1966. I took the original knobs off and thought it would be easy to find new replacements to put on the existing plumbing/fittings that are coming out of the wall. I originally bought a kit from Menard's, and the employee said that they were universal and it would fit on the existing fittings, but it didn't work at all. Then I bought universal knobs individually that have screws in top and bottom to tighten it to the existing fittings. The problem is that they don't cover the entire exposed fitting. Even with flat flanges or trim, there is still a lot of exposed plumbing. I think I need some sort of cylindrical piece to cover that up, but I can't find anything that seems to work. Back at Menard's today, a different employee pretty much told me I was screwed, that I would need to pull down the tile to get behind the wall and change the fittings. I do NOT want to do that. So am I totally out of luck? Photos: https://imgur.com/a/kUjhNEs [link] [comments] |
| What tool / drill can I rent to help with trenching through clay? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 08:18 PM PDT I had the great idea that I could save a few dollars by trenching 80ft+ for a new water line by hand Turns out a shovel is pretty worthless around 12 inches as the soil gets hard as rock. I've managed to get 30ft of it to a full 30 inches depth required and the rest is sitting around 20 inches which is where it begins to become hell.. the last few inches are like the lowest level of hell I can do it with the pick axe but I thought I'd ask around to see if there's some type of jack hammer / bit combo I could rent from lowes or ace and just finish it in 2-3 days instead of 2 weeks thanks [link] [comments] |
| Trying to find the best way to get my nuts off. Posted: 05 Jun 2020 06:43 PM PDT So I made the cardinal error of trying to do a simple project in my 100+ year old house. A simple faucet replacement in both bathroom sinks? Sounds easy. Oh boy was I mistaken. The downstairs went fine and dandy. Easy, simple, looks great. Upstairs however. Oh boy. Cold water was a LITTLE stuck but it came off eventually and went fine. HOT WATER however was the thing of horror legend. All the lines so far have been the rubber or pvc or whatever. Except this hot water which was the metal braided which I can only assume is still there because of how rusted on it was. The thing HAS to be as old as me. So in taken it off the only was was to absolutely destroy the hose. There was no way to unscrew without it twisting and being so old twisting = cracking and splitting. BUT I got it off. I have no problem replacing the valve it's attached to. My problem then comes to a silly one. The plastic retaining nut that holds the faucet tight to the sink. I've spent HOURS. DAYS. WEEKS. SOME SAY MONTHS. My hands are bloody my spirit is broken. I've tried 3 types of basin wrenches. I've tried rust blasters of every make model and description. It has bested me. This tiny little plastic nut has bettered me more than entire projects. This is the Satan spawn HERE. Now any tool I have that "cuts" is too big to get in there. The 4 big "teeth" were so soft or brittle (either or both) have since bent or snapped from the force I had to apply to get it to that point. before I started the laborious task of moving it to as far as I got it I tried to remove as much sediment as I could. My guess is it wasn't threaded on right when installed and they forced it on (they being my father in law) and it's now stuck for good. So my question for you the lovely community that has helped me with so many projects before. How do I get my nut off. Is there a good cutting tool I can jam up my drawers to get to this? Is hack-sawing the faucet the only option? Thank you in advance for all advice or help or recomendations. TL;DR: I got a stuck nut and need a tool recommendation. [link] [comments] |
| Indoor\outdoor access for animals question. Posted: 05 Jun 2020 03:22 PM PDT My plan is to build a small room on my back patio for litter boxes to get them out of the house. I added a very crude diagram. the yellow is what i want to add. [link] [comments] |
| Just looking for some advice and answers for installing laminate flooring? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 07:50 PM PDT I did watch some youtube videos and tried to find videos that is the same as my floorplan, but I wasn't able to find any. From what I gather, it's okay to put laminate perpendicular or parallel to the longest wall ( I decided to go perpendicular ) If anyone could reccomend from which side I should start on? This is my front door area, the laminate will meet with tile. https://i.imgur.com/FQhDYQu.jpg This is my patio door and there is two vents a foot away https://i.imgur.com/qkc7g3V.jpg And I had a question about what to do with the laminate when it meets with my kitchen cabinet Do I put a quarter round of sorts that's the same color as the cabinet? https://i.imgur.com/WW9pMXX.jpg Thank you to anyone with any advice or reccomendation! [link] [comments] |
| Necessary to clean air ducts/vents in home? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 07:26 PM PDT Built this home 16 years ago. Did a basement refinish and recently a kitchen remodel. Never have had a company come in and clean out air ducts. Also have two big dogs. How many of you have cleaned your vents? Have heard it's not needed, others say it's a must-do! [link] [comments] |
| Renting a home in Texas with "mini split' cooling system. Will it be enough? Posted: 05 Jun 2020 03:38 PM PDT Title basically says it all. I'm moving to Texas in the next few months and I can't get there beforehand to view anywhere I want to lease. A home I'm very interested in apparently has 4 'mini splits' throughout the house. The house is about 850 sq ft. This will be far and away the hottest place I've ever lived, and I'm pretty unfamiliar with mini split systems. If anyone's familiar with different cooling systems, or just lives in a hot climate, what's your take on this cooling system? Sorry I know this is a dumb question, I'm just going in blind a bit and would like a little perspective! [link] [comments] |
| Tips for painting/reinstalling worn down gate (pics in comments) Posted: 05 Jun 2020 09:33 PM PDT Moved into a new place and the wooden gate on the side of our house has seen some better days. I would like to paint it and reattach the door. For the door, the wood is old and chipping. Should I use paint thinner and a scraper? Should I go right in with a sander to get rid of all the old paint? A combo of both? And when I finally have a fresh surface to paint, what type of paint is best for an outdoor/wooden gate? For reattaching, does this look fixable? Would I just need new heavy duty hinges? I know this gate is pretty old and rickety and busted, I don't expect it to last a lifetime, just trying to spruce up the place while we are here in the meantime. Thanks! [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 05 Jun 2020 07:53 AM PDT So we just moved into this house three years ago. I live in NM and we've never had a bug problem aside from when a hoarder neighbor got their house condemned and all the roaches migrated to my house (we exterminated them) and that was two years ago. I started noticing ants. My house is absolutely not dirty. There are no leaks, but the ants were coming in for water into my kitchen. Apparently, a ton of people in my neighborhood are dealing with a huge influx of ants this summer. Our house is sprayed for bugs twice a month. I have been using Terro for over a month. I found their entry point - it's a socket in the wall. I've been leaving the Terro down right next to it. I assume they're coming from under the house, but it's a very small space and very hard to get down there. We bug bombed twice. My mother's exterminator suggested we do not seal up yet and keep laying down the Terro to kill them first. Well, they started dwindling for the third time, and I thought we could seal the entry point today, but when I went in there this morning, the numbers tripled. When will it stop? I have diagnosed OCD and I'm literally on the verge of tears. During this economy, we cannot afford hundreds of dollars for a specialized extermination, and I can't find the nests outside for the life of me. Please help. We are too freaked out to even prepare food in there and have been using the dining room, and I've been cleaning thrice a week but leaving "their spot" so they aren't disturbed with the Terro. But they will not stop, however they're not in any other room in the house. Is it just time to seal up, and hope they don't find another entry point? [link] [comments] |
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