Show Notes
- Garbage Disposal Problems: Letting seasonal leftovers go down the drain causes clog chaos.
- Carpet Deodorizer: Mix up an easy DIY deodorizing recipe to take your carpets from funky to fresh.
- Fire Prevention: Get tips on fire hazards you may be overlooking and how to prevent them.
Table of Contents[Hide][Show]
Plus, answers to your home improvement questions about:
- Painting Brick: Cathy wants to brighten up the dark brick wall around her fireplace. Painting is one option but she may also consider other creative alternatives.
- Smoke Odors: How can James get rid of smoke odors in his new home? We have advice on what he needs to discard, clean, and seal to remove the smell.
- Basement Floor Moisture: Dampness is affecting a cracked basement floor. Holly gets information on how to keep moisture away from the foundation of her home.
- Electrical Wiring: We’re completely shocked after Bob’s electrician never checked the power after rewiring the entire house and expects to be paid for fixing his mistake.
- Bathroom Grout: Does Janiese need to seal epoxy grout around the bathroom tile? It’s not necessary unless you’re using sand-based grout.
- Window Condensation: Condensation is forming inside single-pane windows in a historic home. James needs to install a whole-house dehumidifier, improve outside drainage, and use exhaust fans in the kitchen and bathrooms to reduce indoor moisture.
- Gutters and Downspouts: There are always puddles between two neighboring homes. Allison must manage the water with the right gutters, downspouts, and a French drain.
- Installing a Safe: Richard wants to dig into his slab foundation to install a safe. Existing plumbing and wiring are unknown risks and we recommend securely bolting the safe to the floor instead.
Podcast Transcript
Read Transcript
| 0:00:31 | TOM: Coast to coast and floorboards to shingles. This is the Money Pit Home Improvement show. I’m Tom Kraeutler. |
| 0:00:36 | LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete. |
| 0:00:38 | TOM: Here to help you take on the projects you want to get done around your house. It’s a busy week across America. Almost Halloween. Halloween is like the one half of the year that people spend more money in decorating than I think even Christmas. Right. Leslie. Let me exclude your house from it, okay? Because, you know, you’re the brightest decorations on the block when it comes to Christmas holiday. But certainly Halloween. Folks really go crazy for that. I mean, we certainly didn’t. We had kids. And then as gifts, as the kids get older, it becomes like I’ll put out the pumpkin and maybe the corn, but that’s about it. |
| 0:00:53 | LESLIE: I’m going to say the same. |
| 0:00:54 | TOM: Let me exclude your house from it, okay? Because, you know, you’re the brightest decorations on the block when it comes to Christmas holiday. But certainly Halloween. Folks really go crazy for that. I mean, we certainly didn’t. We had kids. And then as gifts, as the kids get older, it becomes like I’ll put out the pumpkin and maybe the corn, but that’s about it. |
| 0:01:13 | LESLIE: No scarier, more scary when the kids are gone. I don’t know if you saw this party city, you know, like last year, it was that big 12 foot tall skeleton from the Home Depot Party City put out here that’s like seven feet tall by 12 feet wide. That looks like it’s only from, like the rib cage up and it looks like it’s crawling out of your ground. And there’s like all kinds of posts on social media where people have like in the pool or in the like, it’s awesome. And I won it, but I couldn’t figure out where to store it, so I got it. |
| 0:01:42 | TOM: Well, we got a great show planned for you folks. As the weather gets colder, we all spend a lot more time indoors. And when it comes to carpets, they get funky faster. Right. So we’re going to share a recipe for a do it yourself carpet cleaner that can refresh your rugs. And the best part is you probably have everything you need to get it done right now. |
| 0:02:00 | LESLIE: All right. Love that. Nobody likes the funky carpet. Also, head fall is an amazing season for all those beautiful colors and lots of just fun seasonal activities. But it’s also the start of fire season. So we’re going to highlight fire prevention risks that you haven’t thought of and give you some tips to eliminate them today. |
| 0:02:18 | TOM: And fall’s also the start of the busy season for plumbers. Yeah, that’s right. With all that holiday cooking and clean up, your pipes suffer the consequences. So we’re going to share some tips on how you can avoid a very costly emergency call to a plumber a little later in the show. |
| 0:02:32 | LESLIE: But first, we want to know what you want to know. So are you dreaming about a project that you’d like to tackle? Well, if you can dream it, you can do it and we can help. So give us a call. Let us know what you were working on. |
| 0:02:43 | TOM: The number here is one eight at eight Money Pit or better yet, just go to Money Pit, .COM, slash, ask and click the blue Microphone button. Let’s get to it. Leslie, who’s first? |
| 0:02:54 | LESLIE: In California, you’ve got the Money Pit. How can we help you today. |
| 0:02:56 | CALLER: In our rental, we have a big wall of bricks in the fireplaces and it’s a dark corner. And I was wondering if we would be able to paint that bricks without a whole lot of trouble to brighten it up in that corner. |
| 0:03:08 | TOM: You can’t paint it, but you better be sure it’s what you want to do. |
| 0:03:11 | LESLIE: Yeah, I mean, painting brick is, it’s kind of irreversible. Once you put the paint on because the brick is so porous, it’s just going to get sucked into, like, every little interior nook and cranny of that brick. So should you ever decide that you would like it to be brick again? It’s a lot of stripping and sandblasting. It’s a big to do. So you want to make sure that that’s something you really want to do. I mean, if it’s like just the ugliest brick ever, I get it. |
| 0:03:35 | CALLER: Well, that’s the only way to lighten up the area that I can think of. |
| 0:03:39 | LESLIE: It’s like a corner. |
| 0:03:40 | CALLER: It’s like a corner of the living room. But it’s one wall of the living room. It’s a whole wall right up next to the sliding glass door. So all the way over there, the sliding glass doors, all brick from floor to ceiling. |
| 0:03:50 | LESLIE: We thought about putting mirrors like an assorted group of mirrors or adding a different light fixture. I mean, there are ways that you can brighten the space with decoration. |
| 0:04:00 | CALLER: And bother the mirrors. That might be a good idea. |
| 0:04:03 | LESLIE: I mean, if you do like a cute cluster, almost like a little gallery grouping of different size and shape mirrors and mixing metals, and they’re doing something really purposeful and fun and creating a moment like, that’s a great way to do it. |
| 0:04:15 | CALLER: There’s no electrical in the ceiling. |
| 0:04:17 | LESLIE: You don’t need electrical on the ceiling. There are plenty of pendant lamps that plug into an outlet that you can use a swag that that so it’s called swags. Yeah, but this way. |
| 0:04:28 | TOM: Yeah, I think so. |
| 0:04:30 | LESLIE: You can do something like that. And there are I mean, there are really great ways to do that. The plug in a light fixture and then suddenly have a beautiful like mini chandelier or something. There are so many, if you look online for decorative light fixture with a plug in, like with a plug, you’ll find so many. Okay. And then make sure you can get one of those things that looks like a scrunchie that you wrap over the electrical cord itself. So it hides just the wiring. And I mean, it’s really easy to do. |
| 0:04:55 | CALLER: All right. I think I’ll move onto visuals and trinkets. |
| 0:04:58 | LESLIE: There’s even sconces that are plug in so you can create like a whole little gallery thing with mirrors and plug in sconces and really brighten up that space. |
| 0:05:06 | CALLER: Okay. Thank you, guys. |
| 0:05:08 | TOM: All right. Good luck with that project. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-Money-Pit. |
| 0:05:12 | LESLIE: James in Georgia is on the line with a new home that’s come in with a stinky scent. Tell us what’s going on. |
| 0:05:17 | CALLER: Just got a home that had obviously been smoked in not only cigarettes, but cigars from the previous owner. |
| 0:05:23 | TOM: Yeah. |
| 0:05:24 | CALLER: And yeah, and it is it is horrible, you know, and you know, my teenager just kind of sick even being in there. So, you know, we’re going to do a slight remodel before we moved in. Anyway, I mean, I mean I knew maybe pulled the carpet out, but other than that, I’m kind of at a loss. I didn’t know what painting help. Should I clean the ductwork or I’m just kind of really at a loss on maybe what I could do to get rid of the smell. |
| 0:05:48 | TOM: The problem is that that smoke, it’s in everything. So we’re talking about the entire house here. Or is it just one room? |
| 0:05:54 | CALLER: Oh, no, no. It’s the entire. |
| 0:05:55 | TOM: House. So in order to really clean out that smell, you would have to pull the carpet. I mean, you could have it clean, but I suspect that, you know, you’re still going to be some residual. And then once you pull the carpet, then you have to paint the subfloor underneath the carpet. |
| 0:06:09 | LESLIE: Because you get a lot of odor in. |
| 0:06:11 | TOM: Soaks in. Yes. So you need to use like a primer quality paint to seal in that smoke odor. You do the same thing with the walls and ceilings. They have to be washed and then re primed. And of course, you got to get rid of any drapes or any other fabrics that are even wallpaper. Yeah, that’s a good point. Even wallpaper can soak it in. |
| 0:06:29 | CALLER: Yeah, I noticed there was wallpaper in a couple of the rooms. |
| 0:06:32 | TOM: Now and that all so I think you’re going to have to tackle it, you know, one step at a time. But basically the smoke gets into everything and you have to pull out those materials and seal underneath them in order to try to clear it. |
| 0:06:45 | CALLER: Okay. And do you guys have any recommendations? Is there any way, like to clean the ductwork or anything? I just spend a bunch of money on all the rest and it just. |
| 0:06:52 | TOM: It may just be dusty. I don’t know that that’s going to be the biggest problem. I think you’re going to find that most of this odor is not so much the ductwork. The ductwork is metal, You know, it doesn’t always soak in stuff. So I think that if find most of this is going to be in the drywall and in the subfloor and in the carpet and in those surfaces, and that’s why they have to be cleaned and primed and then repainted. |
| 0:07:12 | CALLER: Something like with a seal, a sealer primer. |
| 0:07:15 | TOM: Yeah, I would recommend that using an oil based primer for this, because it really does a good job of sealing in whatever’s underneath it. And that will be all you need at the subfloor. You carpet back over there and put whatever flooring down you want over that, but for the walls you can go ahead and prime them in and then you could do a top layer of paint over that. But you’ve got to do that first. I would use a solvent based oil based primer for it. |
| 0:07:36 | CALLER: Okay, awesome. Thank you, guys. I greatly appreciate your time. |
| 0:07:38 | TOM: Very welcome. Sorry that happened to you. Good luck with that project. |
| 0:07:41 | LESLIE: Hey, Money Pit podcast fans, you want to help us out, we’ll go ahead and leave us a five star review on Apple Podcasts, and we’re going to give you a virtual high five. Plus, you’ll be helping us spread the word about our show. Just go to Money Pit dot com slash review. Now we’ve got Holly in Ohio on the line who’s got a question about a cracked floor? What’s going on? |
| 0:08:01 | CALLER: Yes, our basement has some cracks in it. And when we get a heavy rain, the floor seems to change color. Now we have a dehumidifier down there and we if we leave it running, it’ll go away, you know, eventually. But wondering, does that mean that there’s moisture coming up from the ground? Is there any way we can stop that? |
| 0:08:22 | TOM: So if your floor is changing, color is getting damp and concrete is very hydrocarbon, which means it’s it absorbs moisture very, very easily. And the fact that this is happening, though, after heavy rains is good news because that means it’s an easy fix. The moisture, even though it may appear to be sort of coming up from the ground, as you say, is really not coming up as much as it is collecting at the foundation perimeter and then pressing down and under that slab and through the wall. So the solution here is to keep moisture away from the outside walls that make up the basement. And the way you do that is twofold. Number one, the easiest and clean, clearly the most effective way to stop water infiltration is to make sure you have a properly installed gutter system. And that means the gutters have to be there, a have to be clean, be and see the downspouts must be extended at least 4 to 6 feet away from the house if you have a condition like this, because most of the time when installers put in downspouts, they turn them out a few inches at the bottom, put in a concrete block and call it a day and all that water that shoots off the roof. And even if the gutters are clean, it’s going to collect in that corner and then it’ll just soak in along the foundation. So you need to manage the exterior water and make sure it’s moved away from your house. And the second thing is, if the gutter system is clean, perfect as I’ve just described, then what you can do is you can regrade the foundation perimeter to make sure that the soil around it slopes away. You want to avoid, you know, any type of border that holds water against the house. And if you manage the outside water in that way, you will find a dramatic reduction or complete elimination of the stains that you’re seeing now on that floor. |
| 0:10:04 | CALLER: Oh, great. How would we know how far the gutter goes out? They have to dig it up, you know, to find that. Well, no. |
| 0:10:10 | TOM: It should be visible. The downspouts should come down and you should see it churn out an elbow at the bottom. And usually it’s put on something called a splash block. But that only means. |
| 0:10:19 | LESLIE: That they are buried in the ground right next to the foundation. You’ll see the downspouts sort of disappear into the dirt. And then usually there’s a place where it exits. |
| 0:10:27 | TOM: Yeah, or not, which is trouble either way. So yeah, I’d like to see that water coming out. And I’ll tell you what, if you just kind of want to prove, like, sort of prove the concept, what you could do is just go to a home center, buy, you know, a bunch of six or eight foot pieces of leader material attached to the end of those downspouts. Let it lay on your grass, you know, throw a stone over the end of it so it doesn’t move around and watch it. And if you find it all of a sudden you’ve got a dry basement where you’ve just figured out what’s going on. Now you can think about ways to make it a little bit more attractive, you know what I mean? But you can just try it by attaching those downspouts to the end of that elbow and moving that water completely away from the foundation and seeing what the result is. It’s a really simple and effective experiment that I’m confident will show you what’s going on with this moisture problem. |
| 0:11:14 | CALLER: All right, great. That sounds good. |
| 0:11:17 | TOM: All right, Holly, good luck with that project. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-Money-Pit. |
| 0:11:21 | CALLER: Appreciate your help. Bye bye. |
| 0:11:23 | LESLIE: Well, as the weather gets colder, we’re spending a lot more time indoors. And when it comes to carpets that can create its own cleaning challenges, you know, they get funky pretty fast. And once in a while, wouldn’t it be nice if you could freshen up without the hassle of a full carpet cleaning while using baking soda, salt, dried mint leaves and lavender? You can make a quick natural carpet deodorizer to refresh the scent of your home. Here’s a step by step guide. |
| 0:11:50 | TOM: Now. First, you want to gather the ingredients, the baking soda, the salt, and either the dried mint leaves or lavender buds, and then mix them up. You want to combine about two cups of baking soda with a half cup of salt. The baking soda will help neutralize the odors. While the salt helps to enhance the deodorizing effect, you mix the two ingredients together thoroughly and then add those dried mint leaves or the lavender buds and mix and stir the whole concoction. You’re going to need about a quarter to a half cup of the herbs. You can adjust that to your preference. They both add a very pleasant sense, but they also enhance the deodorizing effect. |
| 0:12:23 | LESLIE: All right. Now, once that mix is ready, you want a vacuum your carpet to remove most of the dirt, then sprinkle the mixture evenly across the carpet. You can use a fine mesh strainer or sifter that’s going to help you distribute it more evenly and avoid some clumps. And you want to pay special attention to the areas with strong odors or those high traffic areas. Now, once you put it on, you want to let it sit, leave that baking soda, salt and dried herb mixture on the carpet for about 20 to 30 minutes. At least you could do it more if you want. This gives it the time to absorb the odors and then freshen up the carpet fibers. Then you simply just vacuum your carpet thoroughly and you want to make sure to go over the entire area to remove all the baking soda. The salt is dried herbs. And with that, that funk is going to be gone and replaced with a beautiful, fresh, pleasant scent. |
| 0:13:08 | TOM: I love this recipe because if you’re having company or something like that, it’s a really easy way to give carpet a fresh scent. A refresh is natural without the hassles of furniture and all this other stuff. |
| 0:13:21 | LESLIE: Bob in Rhode Island’s On the Line is having some mystery electrical issues at their house. What’s going. |
| 0:13:26 | CALLER: On? I gather the whole household and Rewire and I had an electrician come and rewire the whole house since he finished up. And I’m putting the plug covers on my plug. Something like it didn’t work. So I plugged another plug. It didn’t work, so another one didn’t work. So I called them back. He come over and he said, there must be a plug buried somewhere. There’s got to be an outlet buried underneath a new plaster. My question is, how can I find it? |
| 0:13:52 | TOM: So this guy did all this wiring work and he missed the fact that he put in a whole bunch of outlets that had no power. Yeah. |
| 0:13:59 | CALLER: Can you imagine? Just to test the power? And he. |
| 0:14:01 | TOM: Was. Oh, it’s ridiculous. Is ridiculous. This guy did not do his job and he should be able to track this down for you. |
| 0:14:07 | CALLER: Oh yeah. He why he started tracking would be want to be paid the tracking. |
| 0:14:11 | TOM: So he wanted it made for missing. |
| 0:14:13 | LESLIE: Me more for my. |
| 0:14:13 | CALLER: Mistake. Yeah. He wanted more money than you. |
| 0:14:16 | TOM: Paid him for the rest of the work already. |
| 0:14:18 | CALLER: Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Thank you for everything now. |
| 0:14:20 | TOM: Well, it’s not right. I mean, it’s going to be difficult for you to track this down without specialized tools. I’ll tell you that. It’s kind of a matter of just taking the circuit and starting at the panel and then following the wires up to see where they go and trying to figure out where the disconnect is. |
| 0:14:35 | CALLER: Yeah, I think it’s a little more complicated than that because as I looked when he was explaining to me how he why I think it’s pretty body y like a t come up with the life. And he went from one box and then went left and then also went right from the same power. So I mean, that’s kind of weird. I would even be in a medium which I wouldn’t do that. |
| 0:14:56 | TOM: Yeah, you might want to try tracking it from the sockets back. You may have better luck trying to figure out where the disconnect is. It sounds like he didn’t look something up, though. If he rewired these outlets and didn’t figure out that they weren’t hot to begin with, that’s a real problem. |
| 0:15:11 | CALLER: Well, no, he didn’t re wire. We rewind the whole house. We didn’t. I took out all the wire in the house. |
| 0:15:18 | TOM: You took all the wire in the house out? |
| 0:15:20 | CALLER: Oh, yeah. He started from scratch. It’s all in the wire. |
| 0:15:23 | TOM: Well, how is it possible he missed this? I That’s what I’m not getting. Also, when he went in to do the wiring, were the walls open? Did you pull the drywall out or what was the case? |
| 0:15:31 | CALLER: Yeah, got it. I totally, totally ripped everything out. Picture. Just imagine an old house without any wood. |
| 0:15:40 | TOM: So this guy goes in, he wires the whole house, you put the drywall in, he comes back in to hook everything up, and he’s got a bunch of outlets that are not that have no power. This is his problem. Okay. Yeah. So you shouldn’t use his problem. You shouldn’t be paying him twice. He screwed this up and he needs to come back and fix it. Or you can have to sue him or file a complaint against his license. |
| 0:15:56 | LESLIE: Or all he abused. |
| 0:15:58 | TOM: His problem. This guy is incompetent. And you should be paying him to fix his blunders. You paid him to wire the whole house. He obviously blew. |
| 0:16:07 | LESLIE: It. And an electrician is the last one you want doing, like shortcuts and not great work. |
| 0:16:11 | CALLER: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I was shocked when he expected to be paid the day he spent troubleshooting it. |
| 0:16:19 | TOM: And he spent two days troubleshooting it. Still hasn’t figured it out. |
| 0:16:21 | CALLER: Correct it? Well, yes. You know, he had his hands out. What do you. What do you kidding me? I got to pay you for not doing it, right. |
| 0:16:27 | TOM: Yeah, exactly. I think that’s your option. Now, if you don’t want him to come back, then the other thing you could do is hire a different electrician. But then you’re going to have to go after him for the. |
| 0:16:35 | CALLER: Cost, right? Yeah. |
| 0:16:36 | TOM: All right. Well, I’m sorry that happened to you, but that’s what. That’s where you are. Okay. |
| 0:16:39 | CALLER: All right. |
| 0:16:40 | TOM: Thank you. All right. Good luck. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-Money-Pit. That’s nuts. |
| 0:16:44 | LESLIE: I know I’m messed up, but. |
| 0:16:46 | TOM: But I’d like to be paid for my mistakes. That okay? |
| 0:16:51 | LESLIE: Now we’ve got Janice in Kansas on the line. Who’s got a question about grout. What can we do for you today? |
| 0:16:55 | CALLER: I had installed a porcelain tile. It’s a heavy duty tile, so I used epoxy grout on the floor. And all throughout the shower, the floor is the ceiling, the walls. And what I’m wondering is, do I need to seal it? If I need to seal it, what kind of sealer should I use on an epoxy ground? |
| 0:17:17 | TOM: I don’t think you need to seal epoxy grout because the epoxy is going to prevent things from soaking into it. It’s really the sand grafts that we want to seal. |
| 0:17:25 | CALLER: Well, I’ve really notice some discoloration and it was White Grout and it’s a sort of a brownish tint. |
| 0:17:31 | TOM: Oh, is that right? That’s probably water stains. |
| 0:17:33 | CALLER: Oh, okay. |
| 0:17:34 | TOM: Yeah. That usually it’s mineral salts that that dry out. So try to wipe it down with a white vinegar solution. White vinegar and water that might clear it up. |
| 0:17:42 | CALLER: Was that a good choice to use epoxy, you think. |
| 0:17:44 | TOM: I think so, yeah, absolutely. For a bathroom. Perfect location. |
| 0:17:47 | CALLER: For that. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. You have a good day. Now. |
| 0:17:52 | LESLIE: James in Texas is on the line and having some issues with a window. What’s going on? |
| 0:17:56 | CALLER: Well, I have a 1928 Britain veneer home in Texas. It’s on the Register of Historic Properties in Texas. So the exterior of the house is dedicated to the public. I have problems with condensation from the interior windowpane. It’s a single pane and I’m looking for some kind of an option to reduce the condensation and not alter the window casing. |
| 0:18:28 | TOM: Okay. So you have you have single pane windows, is that what you’re saying? |
| 0:18:32 | CALLER: Correct. |
| 0:18:32 | TOM: Yes. And you have condensation inside those windows because they’re not very efficient. So there’s no insulation in the windows at all. |
| 0:18:39 | CALLER: Incorrect. So when we have a change in temperature, that’s when the condensation occurs, Of course. |
| 0:18:45 | TOM: Yeah. Because if it gets cold outside and you have warm, moist air inside, it strikes the windows and condenses and that’s why you get the condensation. So the only way to change that scenario is to either insulate the window, which you don’t want to do, or to potentially reduce the amount of condensation and humidity inside your house. What kind of heating system do you have? Is it forced hot air? |
| 0:19:07 | CALLER: It’s a central air and heat. Okay. |
| 0:19:10 | TOM: So you could consider installing what’s called a whole house dehumidifier. This is an appliance that’s installed into that duct run. And when it’s activated, it actually takes out quite a bit of humidity and moisture out of the air. Some of the ones that I’ve seen can take out like 50, 60 pints of water a day. So a lot of water can come out of that. And it’s not inexpensive, but it is a solution. Other things that you could do would be to take some steps to try to reduce the amount of moisture that forms in the house by improving the grading and the drainage of the foundation perimeter, because as water sits around the house. So some of the foundation and that ends up converting to water vapor and as the humidity inside the house and of course making sure you’re always using exhaust fans in the bathrooms and exhaust ends in the kitchen that actually vent outside. So that’s really it really comes down to that you got to reduce humidity or you have to increase the insulation. |
| 0:20:02 | CALLER: Okay. I appreciate your help. |
| 0:20:05 | TOM: Well, October is fire safety month. It’s the perfect time to make sure your family is safe from fire, which actually causes 3000 deaths every year. Now, fire safety is not as simple as just changing out your smoke detector batteries in the kitchen. As a former home inspector who’s been through thousands of homes, there are lots of obvious and some not so obvious sources of house fires that you might be missing. |
| 0:20:29 | LESLIE: All right. First, let’s talk about your heating equipment. Keeps your house and your family warm, but it can be the source of fires from a variety of causes. So you want to make sure to service the furnace, the water heater, the boiler, keep everything safe. Gas, oil or propane burning appliances get especially dirty. And they do have to be professionally cleaned every year. |
| 0:20:49 | TOM: Now, the same goes for your fireplace chimney. Combustion deposits can build up and they can cause serious chimney fires. So have your chimney cleaned and inspected by a certified chimney sweep before the season gets underway. And when you use your fireplace, always burn hardwood logs. Soft woods like pine or cedar can clog your chimney and steer clear of burning paper or branches, which can release embers that could ignite your roof. |
| 0:21:16 | LESLIE: All right. Now, portable heaters, they are very popular for keeping rooms warm, but they themselves pose serious fire risks before you use a heater, you want to read and study the manufacturer’s instructions. You want to be very careful not to place the heater where it can be knocked over. And you want to keep it away from clothing paper for winter draperies, all of that. Keep it away from any combustibles. Super important. |
| 0:21:42 | TOM: Now, finally, when you put more fuel in those heaters, make sure you let them cool down completely and never, ever mix or substitute fuels like gas and kerosene. Big mistake. Portable heaters designed for a single fuel. And if you mix it up with something else, can cause a major fire or even an explosion. Now, if you want more tips on how to stay safe with the heating systems in your house, just go to Money Pit dotcom. That’s Money Pit dot.com. |
| 0:22:07 | LESLIE: Allison, Illinois, Illinois is on the line. Has a question about some gutters. What’s going on at your Money Pit? |
| 0:22:13 | CALLER: Hi. So we just bought our first home and it’s in the city, so it’s very close to the house next to us. They’re smaller and so we’re probably five feet from our neighbors on the south side, and we’re hoping to finish our basement. So we’re looking into waterproofing that. But we also just have this enormous puddle that happens every time it rains in between the two houses. Okay. Which is not news. But anyway, so don’t pedal. I don’t actually know. A French train is okay in Chicago, but yeah, just wondering what we can do about that. It’s pretty unlevel ground. |
| 0:22:47 | TOM: So first of all, you mentioned that you’re planning to waterproof your basement. If you do this right, you probably won’t have to do any further waterproofing of your basement because when your basements get dampened wet as a result of rainfall and puddles forming around the foundation, that is the source of the leak. So we control, you know, the basement to stay dry. Now, when you have two houses that are close together and there’s no place for the water to run, you need to try to do everything you can to kind of manage it. Now, did the rooves on these houses both sort of dump into the space between it? Do they have gutters that are working? What kind of water management is there now? |
| 0:23:20 | CALLER: Sure, yeah. I’m gutters do work. We have a lot of trees to clean them up frequently, but we’ve done them already. Our neighbors is not. Who’s going to go into the ground and even see there’s a little hole in the side of one of them and it’s just packed with dirt and leave. Okay. |
| 0:23:34 | TOM: Yeah. So that’s going to be a problem because your neighbor’s going to dump a lot of water your way and you chat with your neighbor about fixing this. |
| 0:23:41 | LESLIE: Or diverting it. |
| 0:23:43 | CALLER: I don’t even know how to clear out a gutter like that that goes into the ground. |
| 0:23:46 | TOM: Well, what you do is you basically it’s kind of like Roto-Rooter. You know, you hire a drain–. |
| 0:23:49 | CALLER: Okay. |
| 0:23:51 | TOM: And an essential to what has to happen here is you got to manage this water any way you can. So I would tell you this, that we put oversize gutters on both houses. So instead of a four inch gutter, I would put a six inch because they clog a lot less frequently. I would try to have the downspouts discharge to the lowest part of the property and I would extend the downspouts as the water does not collect around the foundation either over grade or underground. You extend them and get them out. If I were still collecting water in the space between the two homes, what I would do is I would put a French drain and basically that’s a trench that’s, you know, roughly 12 to 18 inches square. And then you put some stone in the bottom of it. You lay a perforated pipe in the stone and then you put more dirt and stone around it. And essentially what happens is that the water collects in that area. It goes into the pipe and it runs out. There’s a type of French drain that’s actually pre-made these days where you don’t have to do the whole stone thing. And then you find that at home centers where it’s it looks like a plastic perforated paper. It’s wrapped in a cloth that has what looks like packing peanuts in between the cloth and the and the and the pipe itself. And that’s sort of the aggregate. And that can go in one piece. But however you do this, you’ve got to put that drain in. It’s got a pitch so at least about a quarter inch a foot so that the water that’s collecting there could go somewhere. And that’s the key. You got to find out where that somewhere is. You know, if it’s the backyard, great. If it’s the front yard, you might be able to drop it into the street of the town, let you do that. But you got to manage that water. If you don’t manage the water, it’s going to have no place to go but down saturate those foundation walls and it will show up as a leak in both basements potentially. But you can fix this, you know, if you manage the water, if you search on our Web site, if you search on our website, the money become about leaky basements. You’ll find if you look at how to solve a leaky basement and stop basements, once, you’ll find some really good post that we’ve done over the years on some of the basement content on the site is some of the most popular in that we have now. Actually walk you through this step by step and to show you all the ways that that this causes the floods. |
| 0:25:57 | CALLER: Okay. Okay, great. And there’s room for that in between the two houses like. Precisely. |
| 0:26:01 | TOM: Oh, that’s plenty of room for it. Done it with less. |
| 0:26:05 | CALLER: Okay. All right. |
| 0:26:06 | TOM: Okay, Allison, good luck with that project. |
| 0:26:07 | CALLER: Thank you. |
| 0:26:09 | TOM: Well, Halloween is the busiest time of the year for one tree in particular, and you might be surprised to know which one. It’s plumbers. Yep. Halloween kicks off the season. That money starts rolling in for those guys, mainly because of what people are putting in their garbage disposal in the fall. |
| 0:26:25 | LESLIE: Yep. And with all the celebrating and cooking going on, lots of stuff being shoved down there can really clog up the works. For example, one of the most common is pumpkin guts. They’re gooey, they’re fibrous, they’re full of seeds. And guess what? They’re going to clog a garbage disposal faster than you can say Boo. The same goes for your toilet. If you think I’ll flush them. That seems like a good answer. No, no, no, no. This true with any stringy or fibrous vegetable? Think about things like celery, potato peels. And here’s a weird one. Shrimp shells. These can all wreak havoc on the disposal and the toilet. So don’t do either. |
| 0:26:59 | TOM: Now, it might seem obvious to you, but plumbers also get a lot of calls after someone dumps grease or oil or fat down the drain. Just because it goes down the drain doesn’t mean it gets much further than that. So just don’t do it. |
| 0:27:10 | LESLIE: So if you don’t want to pay for your plumbers kids to go to college, which is what you’re going to pay during the holiday season or on a weekend, you can start composting all of those leftover veggies and then dump that grease in the garbage. |
| 0:27:23 | TOM: Good point. If you’ve got questions about keeping the plumbing clear in your house, reach out to us right now at 1888-Money-Pit or go to Money Pit .COM slash ask. |
| 0:27:32 | LESLIE: All right. Now we’re headed to Florida, where we’ve got Richard on the line, who’s got a question about a safe. What’s going on? |
| 0:27:36 | CALLER: Yes, I’d like to put a hole in the foundation of the house to put it safe. And how do I break up the foundation? It’s very hard. |
| 0:27:46 | TOM: Yeah, for good reason, too. So when you say foundation, you mean the outside wall, or are you talking about, like, a concrete floor? |
| 0:27:52 | CALLER: A concrete floor. |
| 0:27:54 | TOM: Okay. And you’re in Florida, so this is a slab house. |
| 0:27:57 | CALLER: Yes. |
| 0:27:58 | TOM: Okay. Do you know if there is any plumbing running through that floor? Because I would imagine certainly the bathroom pipes, the kitchen pipes, all that kind of stuff is running through that floor. And there certainly is a risk that you could break something if you happened to do this in the wrong location. |
| 0:28:14 | CALLER: Well, not that I know. This is a closet. |
| 0:28:16 | TOM: A closet. Okay. Well, what we’re concerned. It’s like an outside wall. |
| 0:28:20 | CALLER: No, it’s behind the door. |
| 0:28:21 | TOM: So it’s sort of towards the middle of the slab is what I’m asking about. It doesn’t matter what room it is. I’m trying to figure out what the risks are of you running into some plumbing in that slab, for example. |
| 0:28:31 | CALLER: I don’t think there’s any plumbing. What the. What I was told is there might be some rebar or some metal screening. Yeah. Hmm. Okay. I’m worried about electrical. Electrical wiring. I don’t think there’s anything in that area. |
| 0:28:41 | TOM: Yeah, I mean, that’s the thing we really don’t know. I mean, the answer to your question is it used concrete saw to get into that. Concrete saw a lot of backbreaking labor. But, you know, while it might seem like a good idea, it’s not necessarily the only way for you to secure a safe, you know, you could bolted to the concrete. |
| 0:28:59 | CALLER: Well, I could do that, right. But I just thought the other way would be a better option. But if it’s too hard to do, I will. I will tackle it. |
| 0:29:06 | TOM: It’s a big, big job. And it does have some risks associated with Richard, because we just don’t know what’s under there. So I think if it was me, I would offer for bolting this thing into the floor. And I know they have a lot of kits for you to do that. And the bolts basically are inside the safes. So it’s not like anybody can like reach the leak, reach the top and unscrew it. |
| 0:29:23 | CALLER: Right. I was supposed to do this when I built the house. I understand that. Yeah. |
| 0:29:27 | TOM: And by the way, when you look into this, there’s a product called a security bolt, which is virtually impossible to break. I see. So you want to use those kinds of bolts. |
| 0:29:34 | CALLER: Okay. Thank you very much for your help. |
| 0:29:35 | TOM: Good luck on that project. |
| 0:29:37 | LESLIE: George in Mississippi reached out saying he just bought a house and the floor in the bedroom and living room seems to be buckled just a little bit. He says, I’d like to level the floor from the basement below, but I don’t want to create problems with the walls and ceiling overhead. What’s the best way to level a floor without impacting what’s above it? |
| 0:29:55 | TOM: You know, that actually is a very good point and one that most people don’t consider, George, when they’re doing this kind of work. Because if you were to try to level a floor and you do that from below, say, the crawl space of the basement, everything above that floor goes up with it. And if it took, you know, months or years or decades for those upper floors to settle, you know, you’re basement and try to push it back to where it was. That’s not a good thing because you can break plumbing, joints, you can cause leaks, you can stress out electrical wires. A lot of bad stuff can happen. You’re going to end up with more cracks to fix than you know what to do with. So you’re better off leaving that floor alone. The only time I would try to do any work to a floor sagged is if I was convinced that it was active and still going down with that case, I would try to stabilize it, but I would not try to raise everything back up. Now, if you do have a floor that’s at a level and you need a solution for that, leveling compound is a good option and you could actually use some leveling compound to ten inches, you have to a floor on one end if it’s at a level and it will look normal, like I’m going to do that when I read you my kitchen because I’ve got a long sort of kitchen or L-shaped kitchen in one side because my house is so old, actually drops down about inch two quarters, normally use a leveling compound when I get to that project to address it. So you don’t really have to jack up the whole floor again, because if you do, you might end up with more problems than you really counted on. |
| 0:31:19 | LESLIE: All right. Now we’ve got one from Robert who writes that he has a dual showerhead where one has amount that sticks to the shower walls. I can’t get it to stay. I’ve tried several glues. I’ve let them dry and they fall off right away. Is there any good glue out there that I can buy? |
| 0:31:34 | TOM: You know, I had this exact problem, Leslie, with my mom’s house down in Florida. She had one of those aftermarket shower extenders where you had, you know, the shower. That was a normal position. Then you had the wand and you had another head that was down low. And the bottom of that sort of bracket was adhered by like a double stick tape. I’ll call it to the wall and it would never stay. So my solution was to pick up from an auto body supplier some cheap it’s called mounting or attachment tape. It’s what you use to attach like molding to the outside of a car. So it’s completely weatherproof. It’s two sided and it’s designed to stand up to water, to stand at the side standard of salt and ice and the like of stuff. Now 3 a.m. makes a regular and a super strange version. And because this is a shower wall, I would be really careful, Robert, to make sure I cleaned it very thoroughly, wipe that surface down with alcohol to make sure you got no soaps.com or anything else that’s going to interrupt that seal. Now, what I would do is it’s two sided tape. You peel off the both sides to it to release the adhesive, but peel off the side that you’re going to attach to the shower break itself. Get that exactly where you want. You can trim it to fit and then you can peel off the other pieces and attach it to the wall and I just pushed it in there really, really well. And last I checked, it was still there. So I think the key is to use the auto body mounting tape and not anything else because anything else just not strong enough to make that work. |
| 0:33:04 | LESLIE: All right. That is a good tip. Hopefully that works out for you, Robert, because nothing is worse than trying and trying and not getting that project to completion. So get in there and get an awesome shower. |
| 0:33:14 | TOM: You are listening to the Money Pit Home Improvement show on a beautiful fall, almost Halloween weekend. We hope that your house is decorated and cheery for the holidays ahead. If you’ve got questions about projects you’d like to get done this time of year, as we slide quickly into winter, reach out to us 24 seven at money Twitter.com slash ask. |
| 0:33:36 | TOM: Until then, I’m Tom Kraeutler. |
| 0:33:38 | LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete. |
| 0:33:39 | TOM: Remember, you can do it yourself. |
| 0:33:41 | LESLIE: But you don’t have to do it alone. |
| (Note: The above referenced transcript is AI-Generated, Unedited and Unproofed and as such may not accurately reflect the recorded audio. Copyright 2023 Squeaky Door Productions, Inc. No portion of this transcript or audio file may be reproduced in any format without the express written permission of Squeaky Door Productions, Inc.) |
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