- My wife is under the impression that all home improvements, as well as expensive repairs/fixes, should be paid for in 'cash'. I can't fathom this being the case for most average working homeowners. So...what is you method for paying/financing big home improvement projects or expensive repairs/fixes?
- found frog (3 inch long) in 2nd floor toilet, twice this week. should I concern? and how they get in?
- Mouse floods my basement
- Share your worst HVAC stories! Here's mine:
- Coffee grounds turned into cement-like substance in garbage disposal? (cross-post!)
- Question about Silica Dust
- Give me your quickest growing, nicest looking pokiest shrubs/bushes.
- Wiring house with cat 6a, never touched anything network related
- Question about blinds and windows
- Gutters - am I being taken advantage of?
- [QUESTION] Screws and Vinyl Siding
- How to make these chairs look better?
- Should I pay to have floors ripped up?
- I'm looking for an alternative to blinds for my back door.
- Pegboard in a rental?
- STUCK!! LVP flooring installation.
- Composite vs. cedar decking.
- Opinion on aeroseal for unsealed duct work
- Do ceilings need to be skim coated?
- Spray foaming stud space from exterior?
- Butt splicing home wiring?
- Anyone have experience stripping paint from brick?
- Eye sore 5 arm lamp DIY ?!? help
- Running gas line behind cabinets
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 02:12 PM PDT Long story short - We've been in our home for about 5 years now. We have paid for everything we've done in cash/check and cash/check only. Fence, tree removal, water heater, flooring (diy). etc. This has been somewhat manageable while keeping a steady ~$15k 'cash' blanket in-case something bad were to happen. That being said, there are a few areas of concern creeping up that i'd like to get ahead of the ball on... like the roof (~$15k quotes)... which is ~4 years away from the end of it's 'useful life'. There's also patio steps/masonry which is ready to be replaced (~$8k quotes). Now, my wife is dead set on saving to do these types of things in 'cash'. She bases this off friends and family who talk about doing 'this' and 'that' to their home all the time like it's no big deal (no mention of loans)... but, as an average middle class working family, i just cannot fathom ever being able to save $15k for the roof for example or simply dropping $8k on masonry work. So reddit - do you all really have the extra $15k+ sitting in the bank account to handle this type of thing? Do you take out loans? Home equity lines of credit? Low interest CC's? As an edit/side note - i'm not saying my wife's mindset is wrong. If paying cash is possible, then i'm all for it. I just don't personally think it's realistic for all projects/repairs. Thanks in advance. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 08:54 AM PDT | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 10:57 AM PDT Found water in my basement this morning. Thought it may be the condensate pump failing.. but then noticed it was coming out from around the drain for the AC in the furnace. Thought maybe it was freezing in there (heat wave here recently AC has been on non stop) ... When I removed the drain from the furnace, I found a mouse had somehow gotten stuck in the pipe and it was backing up into the furnace (!) ... that's a new one for me. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Share your worst HVAC stories! Here's mine: Posted: 28 Jul 2020 10:00 AM PDT We bought and moved into our house a little over a month ago, and we absolutely love it. It's perfect for us and in a great neighborhood and everything was great. Except the basement was always incredibly cold. No matter! I'm handy! I can fix it! Onto YouTube University to learn about ducts. First thing I learned is that there's no return in the basement. So the AC blows cold air down there and there's no way for it to cycle back through the system. Installing a return should warm it up right? Well it did, but only 1-2 degrees. Still too cold. I started exploring the HVAC system around the house and learning more and more about how shoddily it was done. Nothing was sealed. Air was leaking everywhere. The upstairs returns were not even pulling air because the return channel was open to the basement ceiling cavity! I know it's common for a return channel to run between joists, but this was just wide open, nothing sealed off at all, air pulled from the wall and ceiling cavities 🤦♂️. Got an HVAC to seal those up as best he could while minimizing wall and ceiling damage, and now the returns are pulling air a little bit. Let's keep exploring and plug up the rest of the air leaks! In the process of doing other renovations, I nicked a cable in the wall, so I had to open the wall to fix the electrical (the electrical is a whole other story 🙄) and when I opened the wall, it happened to be near a supply duct, and cold air was blowing in my face out of the hole in the wall I just made. The supply register was not even connected to the supply duct! There was a half inch gap between them! So I started opening other supply registers to investigate. Another one was an 8 inch duct that ran in a ceiling channel a few feet away from the ceiling register, then just ended. It wasn't attached to anything. The blower was blowing AC air into a ceiling channel and the duct pipe was picking up some of that and sending it to the register, but the rest of the conditioned air was just blowing into the ceiling. The same ceiling that was open to the return channel! I'm paying money to cool cavities in my walls and ceiling! And that air is being recirculated in those same cavities! 🤦♂️ So it's time to open walls and ceilings and make it right. I love doing the work and troubleshooting the problems and I still love this house. But my God. Who does this kind of stuff?! [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Coffee grounds turned into cement-like substance in garbage disposal? (cross-post!) Posted: 28 Jul 2020 08:51 PM PDT HELP! I foolishly disposed of my French Press coffee grounds down the kitchen sink. Within a couple days, my garbage disposal stopped working and was just humming when I flipped it on. Today, I cleared it out of everything else that I had washed down before realizing it was clogged. Once I shined a light down the sink, I realized it seems that the coffee grounds have turned into a cement-like substance. How can I fix this? I've tried pouring boiling water, some Drano, but am not sure if there is anything I can do to fix this. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 04:19 PM PDT So basically in our backyards, one of the houses nearby is cutting some sort of brick for the interlocking. I see some of this dust/smoke fading to my backyard a bit, also to the other houses nearby. I just want to know if this type of stuff stays in the air for a long time? It's quite concerning to see some of it fading in my backyard? The smoke went high up and went towards my house. I'm confused about how this stuff goes into the air and stays there especially in an outdoor setting. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Give me your quickest growing, nicest looking pokiest shrubs/bushes. Posted: 28 Jul 2020 12:20 PM PDT I got an consistent, every day amount of traffic tearing down my apple tree limbs/fruit. Asking nicely ain't working. I'd like to not escalate this. Natural barriers it is! And after barking out "Please leave the trees alone!" from the window, I look like the Ultimate Asshole. (Nice entreaties before, this was the first grumpy one. Aaaaand of course my new neighbors were outside to see/hear it.) One tree overhangs the fence and is staked back to revert course, but overhangs the fence at waist length. It's slowly getting more and more bedraggled from consistent abuse. (Thanks previous owners who planted trees right at the property line by a low fence.) PS: If there's a better sub to post this, let me know. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wiring house with cat 6a, never touched anything network related Posted: 28 Jul 2020 04:08 PM PDT Hey all, So my parents are about to renovate the house that was just purchased and we are redoing everything (DIY except high voltage electrical). This would be a great time to wire up the house with some network cabling. I have some questions about the setup that I have proposed:
I live in the East Coast of USA. Here is the diagram of the house
[link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Question about blinds and windows Posted: 28 Jul 2020 09:04 PM PDT I have a hopper window in my basement (it swings inwards). Is it possible to get inside mount blinds (or will the window crash into the top of the blinds when opened)? Here is a picture: https://imgur.com/a/ijHOtOj Because the window is very close to the ceiling, I don't have enough room to install outside mount blinds. What options do I have? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gutters - am I being taken advantage of? Posted: 28 Jul 2020 11:51 AM PDT We are having our roof replaced due to wind damage and the contractor is telling us they need to remove our gutters and reinstall them because they were never installed properly. They then provided these images to show proof of not being installed properly. Can anyone explain to me what is actually wrong in these photos? Looks like a normal gutter installation to me. Albeit, I admit to not really knowing much about roofing and gutters. If not allowed, please delete, however I didn't see anything in the sticky saying this type of post is not allowed. Thanks! [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| [QUESTION] Screws and Vinyl Siding Posted: 28 Jul 2020 10:21 PM PDT So I bought some metal house numbers for our new home, then drilled them into the siding without realizing the bottom of the numbers couldn't be screwed in; since the numbers are larger than the sidings width. So now the numbers are kind wonky up close because they are angled with the siding. If i removed the screws and the numbers, to replace with say a number plaque with siding brackets that aren't screwed in, should I fill the holes I left with foam or sealant? If so is there a recommended brand or would any foam sealer be ok? My aim would be to have the plaque hide the holes i drilled as it would go over the sames spot [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| How to make these chairs look better? Posted: 28 Jul 2020 01:49 PM PDT We bought 8 of these chairs for $150. What can we do to make them look better? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Should I pay to have floors ripped up? Posted: 28 Jul 2020 09:55 PM PDT So I am renovating a house and one of the first big projects is the floors. Its a 1950s house with tile, over cement board over what I'm assuming is wood subfloor. The middle is stick on laminate, over plywood, over what I'm assuming is wood subfloor. I have about 580sf of this. Company wants $1800 to rip it all up and get it down to wood. If I rent a tile hammer from say home depot, could I do it myself with some other tools as well? I seems labor intensive, but not a lot to it. What would you do? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I'm looking for an alternative to blinds for my back door. Posted: 28 Jul 2020 10:58 AM PDT Whenever I open and close it the blinds bang against the door. It's very noisy and the blinds themselves are falling apart. Any ideas as to what I can replace them with? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 07:14 PM PDT Hi all! I'm thinking about putting up a pegboard in my kitchen to hold pots, pans, and the like. However, I rent my apartment and I don't think I can put screws in the drywall. Any ideas how I could put it up on the wall? The pegboard will probably be about 4x4. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| STUCK!! LVP flooring installation. Posted: 28 Jul 2020 05:26 PM PDT I'm installing new lvp flooring and am currently stuck at a point where the loop around the flooring loop meets. The point where the living room meets the kitchen. The living room is shifted by about 0.25 inches which makes it impossible to connect the next row plank. Any advice on making this work? Pictures in comments. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 04:12 PM PDT I am having my deck redone. I know some of the basics as far as being relatively maintenance free etc. What are some other pros/cons to composite decking? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Opinion on aeroseal for unsealed duct work Posted: 28 Jul 2020 06:48 PM PDT I've been reading up on aeroseal and I am interested in others opinions. I read some old threads on here about it and the r/HVAC page. I have a 2 story 2000 SQ ft colonial with a 600 SQ ft finished basement in Buffalo NY with a brand new HVAC system we just put in (details of the HVAC system are in other posts I made if you look at my profile). I know for certain our ducts are not sealed as our unfinished utility room where the HVAC system is has no sealing of any kind (except for the new work from the new furnace and AC system). Our 2nd floor has piss poor air flow on the side furthest from the furnace which happens to be our master bedroom and our sons room. We have manual dampers in the basement but they don't seem to do much to help improve airflow to the rooms in question and they are behind our drop ceiling which is nearly impossible to move as they are so tight to the drop ceiling tracks. I've read you can't aeroseal if you have dampers but I'm not sure if that's true or not or why...anyone know?. Do people out there find it is worth the roughly $2k investment for this? We get extremely cold winter's and fairly warm summers and this is our forever house so we plan to live here a long time and don't mind making an investment that will keep the home comfortable year round. Thanks! [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Do ceilings need to be skim coated? Posted: 28 Jul 2020 11:59 AM PDT Photos here: https://imgur.com/a/SWotHa3 I decided to scrape the popcorn off of my ceilings and assumed it would be a relatively basic scrape/sand/paint operation. However, once I got the ceiling a bit wet the popcorn just peeled off in big sheets, revealing drywall that hadn't been skim coated. The ceilings look like this in the entire house. I have zero drywall skills and am hoping I won't have to hire someone to mud the ceilings in the whole place. Is it possible to just patch/sand/prime/paint and achieve a workable ceiling? Or would that be a terrible idea? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Spray foaming stud space from exterior? Posted: 28 Jul 2020 03:12 PM PDT I recently cut in a single gang in a exterior wall of my home and to my luck it was filled with the pellet like insulation and the whole stud space emptied out through the hole. I would like to re insulate the space before winter comes. I know homes can have a hole cored and foam sprayed from the outside and that requires having the proper equipment, I was wondering if there's a diy way to foam the cavity. Thanks [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted: 28 Jul 2020 04:09 PM PDT Was browsing at the reno store and found this: Can this be used to extend 14 AWG single conductor home wiring within an outlet box without issue? Last home owner left the wires a bit too short for reno work inside the box. I also hate twisting wire nuts; I can never seem to get that picture perfect 15° angle on my wires. Any Electrical Code issues I should know or worry about when using this? I'm in the Alberta, Canada jurisdiction. [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Anyone have experience stripping paint from brick? Posted: 28 Jul 2020 05:17 PM PDT We have this small patch of brick in the front that is painted white, the rest of the house is original brick. I want to bring this section back to match the rest of the house? I've read a few things online (chemicals, power washer, scrubs) but everything came with a warning. Anyone have experience or recommendations? [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Eye sore 5 arm lamp DIY ?!? help Posted: 28 Jul 2020 07:20 PM PDT Hey everyone! I'm trying to upcycle my 5-arm lamp. You know the one with the bendy arms and multicolor plastic lamp shades found in every teen or college dorm from the mid-2010s. I was thinking about spray painting it matte black or brass. But I need some ideas for replacement lamp shades 😅 Any feedback or creative ideas welcome!! [link] [comments] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Running gas line behind cabinets Posted: 28 Jul 2020 07:18 PM PDT We are moving our gas stove from one wall to another. It's currently against a wal and there no space to work. We are moving it to another wall and installing a cabinet on both sides. Had a company come out today to give us a quote. They were going to: Hook up csst piping and run it along the wall where the floor meets. Secure it in place. Cut a notch in the cabinets to make them fit Install valve at new spot. They wanted almost 1800 to do that. Which seems high. The total feet for the gas line to go is around 15. So my question is this. Could I run the black piping behind the cabinets along the base of the wall to the new location? Maybe have a plumber come in and hook everything up and double check it? [link] [comments] |
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