A year ago Pam ran a story asking readers to share your tales of the costly and unexpected expenses from owning your home. Your comments — there were 155 in all — painted a vivid and grab-onto-your-wallets picture of dozens of things that could — and did — go wrong in-, around- and under- your houses. Oh my. I went back through all your real-life stories and picked some of the most shocking to revisit today: A sort of “reality check” reminder that — while owning a home can be a wonderful and fulfilling adventure — it can also be fraught with peril, expense and anxiety. And, gulp, a reminder to keep the insurance policies up-to-date and the emergency fund stocked. Thanks to Anne Taintor for the humor.
The following is a sampling of some of the surprise! problems that readers reported the first time we ran this story:
Water worries
Tess shared:
OK, here’s my saga: Bought a 1955 ranch with a slab foundation. (In the process of repainting and thinking about it, found your cool website). This spring, the water heater failed, and dumped gallons of gallons of water onto the floor, which ran under walls, and ran into the infloor heating ducts. Insurance came in, ripped out the carpet, put everything I own into the garage so they could tear out the asbestos tile which covered the slab and which was popping and cracking. When they found out the only way to repair the heating ducts was to jackhammer up the floor, they simply stopped calling me back. Just stopped returning calls. It took 5 months and an attorney to get them to resolve the case. In the meantime, I’ve been living in a shell of a house, with most everything in boxes in the garage.
The good news is that they finally got started on resolving it, and repairs are proceeding. I’m putting in radiant floor heating (to the tune of $15K) and floors. All of this, of course, raises other questions, like what about the kitchen? The bathroom? While the house is gutted it seems like a good time to do other things, but the budget is limited.
I had to chip up the bathroom floor, but I’m keeping the yellow tub. Actually, I have some questions: the tub has not been treated well — it looks like someone washed out paint brushes and left lots of drips and washes–and it could use attention beyond the usual cleaning products. I’ve noticed recent posts about finding yellow sinks, so I’m thinking about that.
Thanks for this website, Pam. I’m enjoying it.
Yikes! At least Tess is enjoying RetroRenovation.com! Hopefully things are looking up at her house this year. It seems so many people have problems that involve water, like this longtime reader:
JKaye:
Water factors in many of these stories, in the form of leaking pipes, leaking roofs, overflowing toilets, busted water heaters, etc. We’ve experienced all of these things in the five different homes we’ve owned, ranging from a 1910 cottage to a 1995 mobile home, and including our current ’59 ranch. The worst thing to happen was when the crawlspace got flooded at the ’72 ranch during a giant storm, and the sump pump didn’t kick on, resulting in a ruined furnace. The funniest water experience was at the mobile home, which sat on a hillside — water ran right under it during a storm, so no flooding there!
Sewer pipe predicaments
Uncle Atom:
Oh Pam, a painful topic. We settled on a 1950s rancher in 2000, and three weeks later the sewer backed up in the basement. Plumber’s verdict – tree roots grown into the clay pipe. Not only did it set us back about $10k, but we lost a whole row of beautiful 40 year old azaleas in the process. Someone had planted a cedar tree about 8 feet from the front of the house and its roots thrived on sewage for years before we got there. We sold that place six years later and made money on it, but that experience really hurt at the time.
Nocoretro says:
Exactly what we are going through now. Minus taking down the trees. We have to replace the pipes all through our backyard and through the neighbors yard and driveway.Mary says:
We are on borrowed time with our pipes as well. Also old clay pipes. Every time I see a crew digging up the street somewhere in the neighborhood, I wonder if we should just act pre-emptively and get it done.pam kueber says:
This was the very first thing that went wrong in my very first house! Don’t we LOVE to pay for TV colonoscopies for our sewer pipes!Tami says:
We moved into our present home and FIVE DAYS LATER the septic system spectacularly backed up on us (I will never get that sight out of my head). Long story short, the inlet to the septic tank was 3? HIGHER than the outlets (yes, there are four) from our home. In other words, it had never worked and the inspector did a crappy job of testing it. $10,000 to fix it.Kat the Gypsy:
Water has been our biggest unforeseen expense in both our houses. 2 years ago we bought a 1985 concrete block house. Drains were always slow, but we didn’t know what the problem was. So last year, on Christmas vacation we got a call from our tenant that sewage was backing up. The main sewage line had to be replaced due to tree roots damage, which meant digging up the concrete and my newly laid porcelain tiles in a foot-wide line from the guest bath through the guest room, all the way to the street, to the tune of $8K.In our current home, built in 1955, we could never run the washing machine more than once or the wash water would back into the master bath (both were added to the original and shared a sewage line.) After cleaning up floods one too many times, we had the camera put down the line and discovered something shocking. When they installed a natural gas line some 12 years prior, they simply drilled through the ground – and diagonally through said sewage line. Luckily the gas company came, dug, and replaced the gas line, and with the digging out of the way it was a simple fix to cut out and replace the damage to the sewer pipe. Now we know why the house inspector noticed the washing machine wasn’t connected and therefore couldn’t be tested.
Old houses are great, but renovations are a pain. You NEVER KNOW what’s inside/behind/beneath all that charm until you open it up!
Roof problems
Gwen:
My family and I just bought a little brick colonial house (1940) in a historic neighborhood almost a year ago. The home inspector told us that the cracked and worn slates on our original roof had to be replaced. He told us we were looking at $2K in repair and then to maintain, about $500-$1000/year. About 3 months after our move in, we decided to have the roof fixed, as we were having our attic finished. Long story short, roofer came in and said the entire roof had to be replaced. Irritated by that answer, I had two other companies come in who told me exactly the same thing. A $2K problem quickly turned into one that cost us $45K! Because we are in a historic district, we had to replace the roof with the original material – no synthetic slate. Ouch! Moral to this story – make sure your home inspector knows what to look for when inspecting a slate roof. Glad we replaced the whole thing (even though I can never retire), because with all the rain in Baltimore this year, my neighbors have dealt with leaking roofs and massive flooding! Cheers!
Bad Flipper — not the friendly dolphin
Angela:
This is my 2nd year in a 1971 Split Level home in Georgia. The house, now I will call it a “flipped” home, had been updated and repaired in a few areas but us a sturdy house with good bones. But, I think it is too much for me. While my mortgage is cheaper than rent, I am scared that I won’t be able to keep up with the repairs and upkeep. I hate to admit, but I believe I just bought the wrong house. First thing, after 6 months of living in the house, the ceiling fell in my downstairs bathroom, result of a faulty install of the toilet the seller installed upstairs. Got that bathroom redone, after repairing and correcting faulty plumbing in that bathroom. A few months later, sewage started backing up in that tub. Had it snaked twice in six months. The people who snaked it muddied up and nastied up my newly updated bathroom it just made me sick! On top of a heating and air system that is old, and has not worked most of the summer months. It has gone out two summers, warranty patches it up but nothing that is long term. New deck built, not so new. Deck needs securing and sealing, kitchen countertops are bubbling up, need replacing, could use new windows, whole house fan went out after moving in, garage light doesn’t work, electrician said it’s a wiring problem, had to replace circuit box after breaker kept breaking, believe tree roots are in sewer pipes in yard, plumber coming to put camera down line, needs this, need that. A tree fell down in the back yard, and I was told I need to worry about one in my yard and another one in the neighbor’s yard. found out a whole bunch of construction crap is buried in the back yard, and I keep hearing a whistling noise when I flush the toilet.yea, I got the homebuyer tax credit but to be honest, I don’t even see where it went. As soon as I moved in, $200 here, $2300, here, $500 here, $1000 here, yadda, yadda,yadda and my income just doesn’t support these type of repairs.
My mistake. I wanted to take advantage of these affordable prices, especially in the urban area I live in … but I feel I have allowed real estate to take advantage of me.
The home is a beautiful home with a beautiful spirit and warmth to it … but it needs a family with a handyman husband and a better credit score who could just borrow $25K to $30k and just get it in shape and up to date. It was nicely updated when I bought it, but when I moved MY stuff in and started using the home, it soon revealed all its needs to me ….. and I feel overwhelmed by it all.
Woodland creatures getting comfy in the ceiling
Elaine:
I have a the same tale from a 1964 colonial, new roof that had to be redone due to bad work, tree damage thankfully mostly covered by insurance, new furnace, new water heater, new main sewer pipe, new siding, new windows. But this is different.One evening there was suddenly a huge ruckus in the ceiling. What the heck—-? It sounded like bears fighting. In the ceiling! It turned out to be raccoons. When they got done with whatever, they left via the downspout on the side of the house. Cute little things, we could see them leaning on the side of the hole they made, looking around like proud homeowners. Then down they went and away. We went out and looked at the hole they made. Six foot long and maybe two feet high, a full siding panel ripped off and a huge hole clawed or chewed into the boards right through to the attic. Wow! DH got the ladder and an old campaign sign and went up and nailed it over the hole. That kept them out, at least., but it looked like h-e-double matchsticks. Vote for XXXX for City Council.
Called the insurance company in the morning. The adjuster acted like she never heard of such a thing. She wanted to know what we did to attract them? What precautions had we taken to prevent them from doing that? Answers were Nothing and What were we supposed to do besides having a wall? She sent an inspector over who laughed and said it looked pretty typical. We got a good amount to cover the repair, I think it was around $3500.
The asphalt driveway needs resurfacing every other year, that’s another cost.
pam kueber says:
Good one. My husband had a deal with the bats in our last house: You stay up in the attic, we will stay down here. Detente was breached only twice, when bats got into the living room somehow. A tennis racket comes in handy in instances such as these…. Oh, and yes: Animal control to catch and relocate huge groundhogs that were burrowing I forget where into the foundation of the house; we had that expense, too, your Comment reminds me.
Pam’s favorite (her Kentucky shows) — Sink holes open up:
Anne-Marie Cottone relates:
A friend of mine went away for the holidays, and returned to learn that a large sinkhole had collapsed part of her backyard! Apparently it was due to an old septic tank that had been removed when the area was sewered, and the fill had decided to settle many years later.
Anything and everything goes wrong
Jill shares:
I’m still sitting with 45-year-old red carpet, a bathroom with floor tiles coming up, another one with wall tiles coming up, and a 1970’s harvest gold kitchen, because of all the surprises: new electrical panel when we moved in. Insulation. Replacing clogged galvanized pipe. 2 new water heaters. New oil burner. New gutters 3 times before they got it right. Sump pump. Generator with manual transfer switch. Chimney repairs. Driveway repairs. Now the 3 steps from my garage to the backyard sprung a HOLE and have to be replaced. My downstairs bath has 2 holes in the plaster walls from a plumbing repair. And that’s before we even get to the new siding, windows, and roof that we did.
The squirrel that fell down the chimney and died and it was 3 weeks before my cat found the corpse underneath the bar in the basement. The mouse infestation in the cupboards that had me cleaning them out with ammonia. The window caps that went and in a heavy rain water kept pouring into the house. Getting the front steps repaired because my DH decided it would be a good idea to break up some ice with a metal shovel…
Despite all the cautionary tales, there is one that puts it all into perspective, summing up the biggest payoff to this life investment:
sTiLL LoVE iT hErE:
After living in our home for years we have had a full gambit of repairs – some have been completed and some remain, well, incomplete. As an example – our bathrooms have both been “in progress” for about six or seven years. No, I am not exaggerating. Repairs have been both expected and unexpected. The normal things have seemingly all gone wrong, i.e. air conditioning, siding, roof, toilets, and the list goes on for miles – no real surprises.For the most part the house is a dependable one…with lots of memories both good and sad. It’s your basic 3 bedroom ranch style home with a fireplace – nothing fancy or elaborate. Just a little house with a fenced back yard that separates us from our neighbors’ illegal free roaming city chickens, a couple of barking dogs (including mine) and a little garden in front. We’ve raised our family in this house, nursed my mom after cancer surgery, welcomed new grandchildren and cried over the passing of dear friends and family. We’ve experienced a mixture of happiness and sadness as my son prepared for his wedding here; watched our daughter’s prom come and go and her relationship begin and end in this house. My husband and I have had garage sales, delicious meals, disagreements, made up (yay!) and talked about our future together. We’ve also tried to plan our funeral around our dining room table…without too much success. I know, we will have to complete that task one day. However, the home repairs must be addressed and are almost too many to count using my fingers AND toes. We just don’t have the money… who ever does… there is no convenient time for pay for everything… but that’s okay. It’s our house, and we know that we’ll get it all done… some how. It may not be right away, but we’ll get through. So, it isn’t just a house, it’s a home. It’s a memory spot. A place to hang our hats…a soft place to land. Just a few thoughts about our little house.
Me? I’m on my second house. I bought my first house when I was single — in an up-and-coming neighborhood in Milwaukee, which basically meant very old houses that needed work… but were affordable… in an area with a mid-level crime rate. I fell in love with a tiny (800 sq ft) cape cod style house built in 1890 with a tiny yard and a detached garage. I immediately knew that I would need to put lots of money into the house and that I would be doing a lot of the work myself. Fortunately, I come from a long line of handy folk. Even so, I had to hire out some of the larger jobs in my new old house — such as replumbing the entire house before I could even move in (there was no water pressure and the drain pipes were all hopelessly clogged). This huge job also necessitated the gut remodeling of the only bathroom — which had been poorly remodeled over the years. Next came slowly replacing all 11 windows in the house because not a single one could be opened due to shifting and settling over time. Other work I completed over the next few years:
- new A/C unit
- new furnace
- new water heater
- new fuse box and service riser (apparently there had been a fire in the old fuse box).
- gut-job kitchen remodel (it is great to make toast with the lights on!), including new appliance appliances
- removed 2 layers of press and stick vinyl floor tiles from all the original hardwood floors in the entire house and then refinishing the hardwood floors
- having the main drain line from the house cleaned out (the previous owner decided to dump cooking grease down the drain for 25 years)
- new garage door
- new garage roof
- new garage side entry door
- replace the front porch (the old one was mostly rotten and was held to the house with 2 nails)
- painting the entire house inside and out, and countless other small projects here and there.
I stopped just short of finishing the upstairs (to gain another 500 square feet of living space) and replacing the roof and gutters — I’ll let the new owners take care of those changes. When all was said and done, I was able to sell my house in one week (in a bum housing market) so that Jim and I could buy our new mid century ranch house where we currently live. Did I make any money on my first house? Heck no. Luckily, I didn’t lose much, though — and I learned a whole lot about being a homeowner, as well as what kinds of repairs I feel comfortable doing myself versus the ones I need to hire out.
Thus far, most of the repairs that I’ve had to make here at our new (1962) ranch house have been things I’d known would need attention from the day I signed on the dotted line. So far, so good. But I’ve read all the comments — and am aiming to keep the emergency fund stocked.
Yes, the headline promised 140+ stories — see them all in comments here.
And, want another downer Reality Check? Read Pam’s post, Remodel and watch your *investment* plunge in value.
KM says
Once we ripped out the carpet in our 1903 fixer, we discovered that the years of cat pee had not only ruined it,(which we knew) but soaked into the wood- in some places the floor was absolutely black. I tried everything- at the end of two weeks I was nearly hysterical that our house would forever reek of urine.
The happy news is, I finally found a solution to get the old odors out and my floors are now fine. But of all the many projects, including full foundation replacement and years of paint stripping (including scraping the entire exterior, by hand) that was, by far, the most traumatic.
Jamie T says
I feel so much better about my money pit after reading all these comments (thanks all!). My first/only house was a wreck, but we had already known that. The 1955 “house with charm” been in the family for forty years. We prepared for a major gutting; moved into one room and began the grueling restoration room by room, starting with the roof. Not only was the original cedar roof still affixed, so were two other composite roofs as well. All the weight had broken the joists on a portion of the roof. I have a picture of my husband (my contractor) hammering. From the waist down he is in the master bedroom while his chest hits the top of our open room…then came the rain. I knew what I was getting into to an extent, however, when PG&E shuts off your only source of heat (after you only asked them to relight the pilot light) you start to gain some insight as to how deep you will be in the trenches. Since, we have redone every room, leaving only the original framework, and it was worth it, but if my husband hadn’t done the majority of the work (or I hadn’t suckered his electrician, plumbing, drywall, etc. friends into helping at minimal costs while carrying our son) then it would’ve broken us. We couldn’t afford to restore it to it’s original charm, but I’m proud of it.
Lori says
Hmm, let’s see. My husband and I moved into our cool mid mod ranch house about a year ago. We knew that the master bathroom shower needed replacing. Our inspector pointed out that the original terrazo pan probably failed and that was causing baseboard rot on the bedroom side of the wall-never would have caught that but he was right. The job snowballed into a much larger one, of course. Before we moved in we had to cut down 4 trees that that were growing right up against the slab of our house. We have the original radiant floor heat (love it!) and were worried about cracking in the slab. We’ve painted and bought light fixtures, I did a mid mod paint job on the black tile kitchen backsplash. I’m just keeping my fingers crossed about the heating system, the large pines that are very close to our house, the sewer lines. Oh, we have squirrels in the roof…I love our house,though!
Jennifer K. says
Not as bad as a flood, but started saving the beautiful pine cabinets in the kitchen. After starting to take them apart, I found that they had been put together in one piece. Making one segment shorter and one longer has been a learning experience. I had to order custom sized doors, and then went through a testing process to match the aged pine look: on bare sanded pine, apply a thin coat of dark cherry stain; then apply one coat of amber varnish, follow with a final two coats (lightly sand in between) semi gloss polymer. Then I added a pantry to one corner of the kitchen. Still looking for the perfect paint color to compliment the golden pine cabinets. Any ideas??
pam kueber says
I’m a fan of greens with pine. You can submit this as a Retro Design Dilemma if you like! Use search to find instructions.
Melinda says
We had your usual leaks and things falling apart during our new homeowner “break in” period… Add “what could have been a disaster” to your list: when we got our home inspection, we learned the jacuzzi tub in the master bath was not grounded. A bathtub, with electrical components, with no GFI.
I wonder if the former owner ever even used the tub (we soon learned that even filling the thing up uses the entirety of our hot water tank, so I’d guess not often… but still.).
Christa says
There are a lot of scary stories on here! Our house needed a lot of repairs but we knew about them going in – no surprises. I think your best bet to avoid surprises is to have trusted, experienced people look over the place before you buy. I’m lucky my parents have bought and repaired quite a few houses, so they were a great resource for me.
I think the rule of thumb is to plan for about 1% of the home’s value per year in maintenance, for example, if your house is worth $250k, expect to have $2500 in expenses per year.
pam kueber says
I think the rule of thumb is a short of shocking 3%, actually! I need to write about this some time!
lisa says
Wow, these stories are making me feel lucky. We moved out of our 1947 cute Cape Cod into a 1909 Arts and Crafts bungalow. We’ve had many surprises: big leak in the basement, really shoddy electrical “upgrades,” structural support lacking in the basement, a dryer plugged in via extension cord (!). At least the inspector caught that last one.
We also had raccoons in the attic. I wish I had thought of filing a homeowners claim on that one. Instead, we re-roofed. We had planned to do a roof tear-off in a year anyhow. It wasn’t that fun to have it done in November, especially when we got an early cold snap during the period when all the insulation in the attic had been removed. I’ve slept warmer camping than in my own bed during that period!
Janet in CT says
Raccoons in attics and basements are very common. A friend of mine had them under her walled deck and they were driving her crazy. Someone told her a story about them getting in their attic. They were told to throw mothballs up there and the raccoons would abandon the attic, so they proceeded to throw them in the attic window. The smart critters picked them up and threw them back out! I can’t swear this is true but I thought it was pretty funny. She tried it and it didn’t work for her either. I guess when they find a comfy home, they don’t want to leave.
Just another Pam says
I’ve heard blasting rock and roll music and leaving the lights on in the attic can work but it’s all anecdotal from when I lived in the country..
Diane in CO says
I asked a professional once the best way I could get rid of raccoons and he said “Got a 22?” 🙂
Lissie says
You people are seriously scaring me! My husband and I just bought our California ranch house (1958) three months ago and we are NOT handy people. Eeeek! This post has convinced me to start setting aside some $$$, but in the mean time I’ll knock on wood that we don’t have to face any major repairs any time soon.
Josh LaPorte says
Oh wow, is this ever timely! We bought our house 3 years ago, and I’ve just recently realized (while spending entire weekends working on complicated maintenance projects) that I’m totally fed up with this. Before this house, we owned two different condominium apartments; we loved them both. Our first was in a 1919 tudor building, had a fireplace and great woodwork and casement windows and needed all cosmetics but was otherwise in good shape: We painted and refinished the floors and renovated the badly beaten up kitchen. We put our china in the original built in cabinet with leaded glass in the doors and lit fires in our working fireplace and watched others shovel the snow outside and fix the roof. Our next place, quite different, was on the top floor of a 1965 highrise, with original Geneva kitchen and original bathrooms. We had 5 large rooms with sliders to a 24 foot long terrace with amazing views. We filled it with good mid-century furniture, papered the living room in grasscloth, and watched sunsets from the terrace and cooked amazing meals in that lovely kitchen. As before, others got to worry about a lot of the major issues; a heating pipe broke in the wall, someone came and fixed it and someone else came and patched the wall. The roof leaked, was fixed. The snow was shoveled, the pool was cleaned, the leaves were raked. We spent the weekends visiting friends and throwing cocktail parties…
And then this house. Roof leaks. Yankee gutters are devastated and must be completely rebuilt or stripped off and new regular gutters hung. Plumbing leaks, destroying living room ceiling. Boiler is undersized and second floor heating zone is too long, so house is hard to heat in winter. Huge lawn (for a city house) takes AGES to cut. Snow needs shoveling. Constant chores and responsibilities. No one to help.
I seriously wonder what were we THINKING? We could have stuck with our lovely penthouse and not worried about this. Was it expensive, Heck yeah! But totally worth it. Spent days off swimming in the pool or reading on the terrace. Now I spend days off painting and caulking and cleaning and cutting and trying to schedule contractors and trades-people to fix all the stuff that breaks. I love the house, really I do, and think I just need to stick with it and let it stabilize. But I never realized it would be so much work! I know, naive!
Just another Pam says
At a party a couple of weeks ago at least a dozen of us admitted to starting to wonder if apartment/condo living might not be the answer. Your last place sounds amazing but I’m sure this one will be a dazzler when you’re done….well, done-ish, it’s never really all done ;o)
Chad D says
My grandmother lives in a condo, and the association’s strict rules made it really hard to make repairs to her apartment. We had to take vacation time just to bring materials in. Of course some condo boards will be more lenient than others, but I’m pretty turned off to high rises after my experience there. There is no “answer;” you just have to pick which inconveniences work best for you.
Charlotte says
Yes, very true. You are also at the mercy of the board when it comes to repairs in common areas. We have 85-year-old plumbing and the board was considering replacing it when our boiler went on the fritz — so now plumbing’s on indefinite hold since we have an unrelated special assessment. Now I’m in limbo because I have sewer gas and other big issues in my bathroom, but I don’t want to invest in a renovation when I’d be hooking up a new toilet, tub, and sink to 85-year-old, corroding pipes.
Just another Pam says
I hear you Chad and Charlotte!
Most of us were talking renting, condo’s can be just another version of reno pain and as you said, you are at the mercy of a frequently crazed power mad board. le sigh.
Diane in CO says
For any considering a condo, just get on the TOP floor. I have owned two and your greatest risk are the plumbing issues from those above you! Something is always leaking: ice makers, toilets and washing machines are the biggest threat because they run and run.
In our condo complex of only 36 2-story units, I know of at least 5 or 6 first floor units being damaged by leaks from above in just the past few years….one to the tune of $30,000.
When we owned my mother’s FL condo for 2.5 years, we had two incidents of water from above doing damage to our place. And, under FL law (!) WE were the ones responsible to make repairs and to pay for it! Even though negligence (like not turning off water when owner is absent) is a factor, makes no difference. Whew, glad we’re rid of that place.
Anyway, it’s a consideration with a condo.
Ann WesleyHardin says
First time commenter here, lurker 4-eva 😉 In my 1965 Condo (which I’m restoring and reshaping) I’m on the second floor of a two-story. My neighbor, also on the second floor, complains of drips in his bathroom ceiling. Where do they come from? The attic? No, my mid-century loving amigos. The drips come from the woman downstairs, who takes loooong showers. The steam rises through her ventilation fan, into the attic, then settles on his ceiling, and thence atop his head. My contractor said the attic doesn’t have enough insulation to prevent it. So, living on the top floor can present issues too. But I LOVE my condo, despite the black mold behind my original, fugly tan 1965 bathroom tiles, and the not-to-code electrical panel. Did I mention the scotch tape holding the console sink piping together (which the inspector missed ;).
pam kueber says
Hi Ann, and welcome out of lurkdom! Hmmm, surely the exhaust is not vented INTO the attic? I always thought that was a real no-no. THROUGH the attic to the outside — that’s okay. Although as I always say: Consult with a pro.
UGH.
WELCOME!
Ann WesleyHardin says
Hi Pam, thanks for the warm welcome! Yes, ALL the bathroom fans are currently vented into the attic. But the HOA is going to take care of that. So the good part is, as other condo owners have said, it’s not MY problem.
Thanks so much for being here on the www. Your site is a perfect example of what makes the Interwebz so great. My sister is a devotee too!
Just another Pam says
It’s nice not to be alone though I still feel awful so many people get taken.
Tiled over hole in foundation floor, unbelievable dryer vent run….not the one right over the dryer but the one across the room fed by a z pattern hose….black mold behind the walls because of that hose being full of lint and leaking moisture…..the lady who’d owned it before thought she’d paid to have the old panelling removed and proper insulation done and new drywall….nope, the contractor put it over top and added no insulation at all though there was pieces of packing Styrofoam here and there (I know this to be true as she was telling me about the strange panelling with plastic wood grain over drywall she’d had removed….or so she thought).
Hot wires from old light fixtures left dangling inside the walls and ceilings….improperly installed pot lights from the 60’s insulated with super flammable packing Styrofoam….duct tape used instead of insulation around the windows….leaking shower downstairs but at least it had the hole in the floor to leak through….Improperly done roof where they shingled over disintegrating plywood which is still OK so it is waiting for me to save that kind of money.
And so on and so on and so on.
She’d spent almost 80 thousand most of it, seemingly, given to the ethically challenged and another 80 thousand was needed. Tiny house but great view and location so it’s worth it once you recover from the repeated shocks and the sad fact most of the spent money disappeared behind walls, ceilings and the basement floor.