The New, Improved Home Improvement Thread

[Doohicksie]

What would you do? Pick the tile that's neutral, colorwize? Or go with the blue?

(see previous post)

Edited July 12, 2023 by Doohickie

[Brawndo]

28 minutes ago, Doohickie said:

What would you do? 

Let Your Wife make the final decision 

[JohnC]

On 5/16/2023 at 5:06 PM, shrader said:

I had a fence put in back in March.  It was the typical deal where I paid half up front and they would take the rest upon completion.  They initially put in some temporary gates until the proper ones could be delivered.  They put the regular ones in maybe 2 weeks later, but it turned out that they weren't the right ones.  Their head design guy came out maybe a week later to remeasure and make sure everything was ok.  This guy didn't seem to be all that interested in the job, but told me he'd order the stuff and they'd let me know when it is in.  The company said I could pay the balance if I wanted to, but were fine if I waited for the gates.

So fast-forward 2 months and I haven't heard a single word from them since.  I'm convinced that guy didn't actually order anything as it was clear he didn't care one bit.  It was not so little things like the company telling me that guy was on the way to my house but then he never showed up until 3 days later.  But anyway, I have completely functional gates, it's just a minor cosmetic issue.  But meanwhile, no one has ever asked me for that remaining balance.  Am I crazy to just sit back and wait until I hear from them?  I have all the paperwork and communications from them showing that the job is not yet done.

Wait it out. I had a contractor do a complete remodel on my kitchen and bathroom. I mistakenly paid in full before the job was complete. After he was paid he refused numerous requests to do some minor calk work to completely finish the job. After a number of futile calls I got madder and madder. So I wrote a letter to the state consumer agency in the state that dealt with contractors. The person in the state office called him and told him that if he didn't finish the job by the next day, he was going to pull his bond, which would have prevented him from doing any work. He sent someone to complete the caulking job the next day. It took less than 15 minutes.

Again, I recommend that you not complete the payment until the job is complete. If it doesn't get completed, you saved some money off of their unprofessionalism. 

[shrader]

1 hour ago, JohnC said:

Wait it out. I had a contractor do a complete remodel on my kitchen and bathroom. I mistakenly paid in full before the job was complete. After he was paid he refused numerous requests to do some minor calk work to completely finish the job. After a number of futile calls I got madder and madder. So I wrote a letter to the state consumer agency in the state that dealt with contractors. The person in the state office called him and told him that if he didn't finish the job by the next day, he was going to pull his bond, which would have prevented him from doing any work. He sent someone to complete the caulking job the next day. It took less than 15 minutes.

Again, I recommend that you not complete the payment until the job is complete. If it doesn't get completed, you saved some money off of their unprofessionalism. 

Strangely enough they called a day after I posted this. 

[Doohicksie]

[Doohicksie]

4 hours ago, Brawndo said:

Let Your Wife make the final decision 

Actually shes' leaning the same way I am so I think we have a solution.

We were inspired to pick the tile we did based on a display at IKEA.  We looked at a tile store's website and found something similar and said, "That's it!"  And we stopped looking.

Today I plugged that tile into a picture of the kitchen.  The tile website has a utiility to do that so you can see how things will look in your room.  But then I started looking at others.  I showed the others to my wife and she said either stick with what we had or go to "the first blue one".  I told her why I preferred that one and she totally agreed, so I think this is the one.

Edited July 13, 2023 by Doohickie

[JohnC]

9 hours ago, shrader said:

Strangely enough they called a day after I posted this. 

I suspect that a poster here works for the contractor. You were ratted out. ☠️

[Zamboni]

For those that are not aware or haven’t thought about it in quite some time … it is good to flush your hot water tank every other year. 
 

It is also good to clean your central air conditioner every few years. 
 

Keeps those high price items running well for years 👍🏼

[Wyldnwoody44]

The new home has a terrible dog smell, I have carpet installers coming next week some carpet, some vinyl plank. By ripping out the old stuff and removing the molding, it will save about 2k overall. 

So I'm doing it and the carpet is NASTY, the people before me never once cleaned up after their dogs. The dryer is full of hair, hair on the walls I'm painting, hair all over/stuck in the trim. 

I just don't know how someone would purchase such a nice home and then let it just get destroyed. I'm hoping the subfloor is safe once I rip the pad up or else I'll need to clean it with enzymes and paint with kilz, etc. 

[Zamboni]

1 minute ago, Wyldnwoody44 said:

The new home has a terrible dog smell, I have carpet installers coming next week some carpet, some vinyl plank. By ripping out the old stuff and removing the molding, it will save about 2k overall. 

So I'm doing it and the carpet is NASTY, the people before me never once cleaned up after their dogs. The dryer is full of hair, hair on the walls I'm painting, hair all over/stuck in the trim. 

I just don't know how someone would purchase such a nice home and then let it just get destroyed. I'm hoping the subfloor is safe once I rip the pad up or else I'll need to clean it with enzymes and paint with kilz, etc. 

regardless of how the floor looks underneath… I would definitely hit it with some enzyme neutralizers. And maybe even some Pine-Sol before the new pad and carpet go down. That smell is not just in the carpet. I’m sure it permeated into the wood a little bit even if it is dry. you know it won’t take long to take that extra step 👍🏼

[Weave]

32 minutes ago, Wyldnwoody44 said:

The new home has a terrible dog smell, I have carpet installers coming next week some carpet, some vinyl plank. By ripping out the old stuff and removing the molding, it will save about 2k overall. 

So I'm doing it and the carpet is NASTY, the people before me never once cleaned up after their dogs. The dryer is full of hair, hair on the walls I'm painting, hair all over/stuck in the trim. 

I just don't know how someone would purchase such a nice home and then let it just get destroyed. I'm hoping the subfloor is safe once I rip the pad up or else I'll need to clean it with enzymes and paint with kilz, etc. 

if there is evidence of urine in the flooring, don’t bother with the enzymes and stuff.  Go straight to painting with Kilz.  You never get that smell out of soaked and dried wood.  The only option is to cover it and seal it up.  Kilz is fantastic for that.

*has experience here

[Scottysabres]

A bit off topic but property ownership related....

A close family friend of ours has been dealing real-estate down in the Southerntier for 41 years now. We spoke over the 4th, he comes up for my annual bash. He was telling me in 20-21 Canadians who owned acreage down there were selling heavy at near 2k an acre, now, he was telling me in the past 7 months or so average acre cost have dropped to 11 to 14 hundred an acre, many with cabins/cottages/homes on them. He said the market isn't just adjusting, it's in a collapse. The wife and I started looking.

[Weave]

13 minutes ago, Scottysabres said:

A bit off topic but property ownership related....

A close family friend of ours has been dealing real-estate down in the Southerntier for 41 years now. We spoke over the 4th, he comes up for my annual bash. He was telling me in 20-21 Canadians who owned acreage down there were selling heavy at near 2k an acre, now, he was telling me in the past 7 months or so average acre cost have dropped to 11 to 14 hundred an acre, many with cabins/cottages/homes on them. He said the market isn't just adjusting, it's in a collapse. The wife and I started looking.

Interesting.  That is prices from 20 years ago.  Tempting…

[Scottysabres]

27 minutes ago, Weave said:

Interesting.  That is prices from 20 years ago.  Tempting…

Just bare in mind, he did say there were less on the market available. He did say a couple just listed 40+ acres just north of Cuba Lake for a steal, but those type of sales are situational, he said he thought they were getting divorced. But other than that, people that had listed he said were pulling off the market due to the deflating pricing. Not necessarily slim pickings right now, but not as robust as the high market value days. Just an fyi.

[Doohicksie]

Operation Backsplash is well under way.  I spend a good chunk of Sunday putting up the tile, probably about halfway done.

[Zamboni]

Over the weekend, Pulled out the chain link fence from the backyard of my rental. Looks sooo much better now.

 

 

[Doohicksie]

55 minutes ago, Zamboni said:

Over the weekend, Pulled out the chain link fence from the backyard of my rental. Looks sooo much better now.

 

 

Did you just cut the pipes off at the ground or did you remove the poles all the way down?

[Zamboni]

4 hours ago, Doohickie said:

Did you just cut the pipes off at the ground or did you remove the poles all the way down?

I had three posts in total. First two from left to right of that first picture… I pulled out with a 2x4 and a ratchet strap. The third one on the right, I dug down all the way to the concrete and used a saws all and cut it off as low as I could get it. And then used a sledgehammer to bang it as flat as I could. Then the wife buried it in six or 7 inches of soil.

[Doohicksie]

On 7/16/2023 at 10:07 PM, Doohickie said:

Operation Backsplash is well under way.  I spend a good chunk of Sunday putting up the tile, probably about halfway done.

We have grout

[Wyldnwoody44]

Getting my driveway paved this week.... 11k sq ft of asphalt is not cheap 😭😭

[Doohicksie]

1 hour ago, Wyldnwoody44 said:

Getting my driveway paved this week.... 11k sq ft of asphalt is not cheap 😭😭

Yeah, driveways are freakin' expensive.

For a rank amateur (first time doing wall tile) I'm pretty happy with the way the tile came out, especially the grout and caulk lines.

[Doohicksie]

[Wyldnwoody44]

@Doohickie

 

Looking nice! I am thinking about doing some tile work myself, but I also worry about the grout lines. I'll stick to painting walls for now 😂

[Doohicksie]

1 hour ago, Wyldnwoody44 said:

@Doohickie

 

Looking nice! I am thinking about doing some tile work myself, but I also worry about the grout lines. I'll stick to painting walls for now 😂

Just get your first row straight and use spacers between tiles and... don't sweat it if they're off just a bit; you'll be the only one to notice.

[shrader]

I'll borrow this thread for this purpose.  I sure do love the company that built my house.  Installing showers with no shutoff valves for the water?  Absolutely brilliant.  Actually I'm willing to bet there are shutoff valves, they just didn't put in any way to access them, even though each shower is directly in front of a closet, where an access panel can be easily hidden.

So anyway, in an attempted home improvement, the cartridge in the handle just snapped in half as I was trying to remove it.  I don't think they lubricated that thing at all when it was installed.  So now I get to play the waiting game on an emergency plumber (luckily only a half an hour) because, thanks to said wonderful design of shutoff valves, I have no water in the entire house.

I think this may inspire another project, cutting some holes in those closet walls.