#2519 – Dirty Secrets: Hidden Germs in Your Home | Easy-Care Shrubs

[Producer Jim]

The Money Pit is presented by Daich Coatings. Now here’s Leslie Segrete.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Coast to coast and floorboards to shingles, this is The Money Pit. I am Leslie Segrete, and thank you so much for joining us here on The Money Pit. You know, we love chatting about all things home improvement.

 

What you are working on, what we think is important for you to know this time of year. So we’ve got a lot of great home improvement advice to share with you guys. Plus, we want to hear what you are working on.

 

Coming up this hour, spring cleaning leaves your house feeling great. But just how clean is it, really? Like, are those surfaces that you just tidied up, but, you know, did you actually get all the yuck from the outside world off of those surfaces?

 

We’re going to share where to find the germs that are hiding in plain sight. And believe me, they are hiding, coming up. And if you’ve been sprucing up your landscaping, it’s really no fun dealing with those high-maintenance plants that require constant pruning, or suffer from pest problems, or just so super temperamental with watering.

 

We have tips on how you can select reliable, trouble-free shrubs that will spruce up your outdoor living spaces and shorten your to-do list. You know, Team Money Pit is standing by to answer all of your home improvement how-to questions. So call us at 888-MONEY-PIT so we can lend you a hand.

 

Jim, who’s up first?

 

[Producer Jim]

Out in Washington, Leslie, we have Pauline. And she has a decking question for you, us, them. How can we help you out, Pauline?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Thanks for going over all of your pronouns, Jim.

 

[Producer Jim]

Mm-hmm.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, Pauline, tell us a little bit about the deck.

 

[Pauline in Washington]

Three years ago, I treated it and put a stain on it, and it’s gone back to the same worn look that it had when I first started working on it. And so I wanted to find out what to do to make it presentable all year round where it doesn’t go back to a worn state.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

What kind of wood is it?

 

 

 

[Pauline in Washington]

It’s not treated wood, so it’s just wood, and it is covered. It’s a covered deck, so it doesn’t get a lot of rain. The rain doesn’t really hit it, but it gets a lot of footwork and dog prints.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

That’s interesting that it doesn’t see a lot of sunlight, it tends to be covered. I think that maybe you just didn’t prime it, perhaps. So what you really want to do is apply a solid color stain, but even though it’s the word stain, it kind of goes on more like a very thick stain, kind of like a paint.

 

So you do want to prime it, and the primer you can, if you can get your hands on some oil-based primer, is going to be the best. So the primer would be oil-based, the stain would be water-based, but that primer is going to do the job of making sure that that color sticks really, really well. And then I would suggest using a solid color stain, just simply because there’s more pigment to it, especially with all of the foot traffic and the dog footprints and everybody just kind of walking across the space.

 

This will do a great job of maintaining that color and protecting the surface of that deck. And if you do the prep work correct, and you do the top coat correct, it should last you about five to seven years before you have to do it again.

 

[Pauline in Washington]

Oh, okay, because I used a transparent stain.

 

 

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Oh, you used a transparent stain. Well, that’s probably why, because a transparent generally has no pigment in it. I mean, a semi-transparent means it has a little bit of color, but you can still see all of the grain.

 

A transparent could just be a clear coat. It could be very, very, very lightly tinted. And unless it has a really good, like, ultraviolet inhibitor, it’s going to wash out very quickly.

 

So you probably did everything correct, and it probably lasted just as long as it was supposed to.

 

[Pauline in Washington]

Okay, so after I put it on, is there something I can treat, put over top of it so it wears well?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Yeah, I mean, solid stains really aren’t designed to have another coating put on top of it. That top coat with the solid stain is the layer that you want to have the wear and tear. So it’s definitely going to be something that will stand up to the fact it won’t show the footprints, well, depending on the color.

 

You might see the footprints, but it’s not going to wear through to the wood itself. And it will just stay well and last for a long time, especially if you prime it. Okay, thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.

 

[Producer Jim]

All right, Leslie. Heading north to Canada, we have Dave in Ontario who needs help with a garage door. How can we help you out there, Dave?

 

[Dave in Canada]

I’ve got the old wooden garage door, and over top of it’s the wooden framework. And the paint was all bulging, so we kind of tapped at it. It looks like the whole thing’s dry rotted.

 

So I’m not sure if I’m opening a whole Pandora’s box, I’m not going to be able to have to tear the whole garage down. But it looks like I’ve got to replace the header in it. Now, it’s a cement block garage, so I don’t know how involved this is going to be.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

So it’s just a header above your garage door? Do you know, was there a leak above it?

 

[Dave in Canada]

The roof was done a year and a half ago, and again, it’s not an attached, it’s a detached garage. So if it was leaking, I’m not really sure whether it was long-term.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, but it’s definitely not leaking now?

 

[Dave in Canada]

No, everything’s dry in there now.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

And the roof rafters are resting on the header?

 

[Dave in Canada]

Yes, it’s a four-sided, so I guess they call that a cottage.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Well, what you’re probably going to have to do is you’re probably going to have to build a temporary wall to hold up those roof rafters while you disassemble that header. And you do that sort of right inside of the garage door. You basically build kind of a fake wall right up to the underside of those rafters so that you’re supporting them between the garage floor and the underside of the rafters while you disassemble and replace that header, because that’s really what’s holding it up.

 

Then once you’ve got it all back together, you can disassemble that temporary wall, and that weight becomes transferred to that new header. It really is a bit of a process, but it’s not that difficult.

 

[Dave in Canada]

Would I be jacking that up, taking a little bit of pressure off?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

No, I don’t think you have to jack anything up to make it snug. I mean, it’s probably not going to move that much.

 

[Dave in Canada]

Okay, so this is something I could probably handle myself?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Well, if you’re pretty experienced, then for sure you can do this yourself, but it’s also the kind of thing that you might need to have a pro help you with if you’ve never done it before. I mean, the pros do this project every single day, so they know what’s up, they know the problems, the challenges they could face, and if something goes wrong, they know how to fix that, and it’s a structural situation here. So it’s pretty concerning.

 

So unless you have experience in this area, I wouldn’t say tackle it yourself, but it is a do-it-yourself project if you’ve got the experience.

 

[Dave in Canada]

Yep, very good. That gets me pointed in the right direction.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Oh, you’re so welcome. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEYPIT. Hey, Money Pit podcast fans, you want to help us out?

 

Well, 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 moneypit.com slash review. We are thrilled to announce that we’ve partnered with Daich Coatings to bring you the ultimate porch and patio makeover, sweepstakes. Now through June 9th, you can enter to win amazing, easy-to-use DIY products from Daich Coatings that will transform your porch, your patio, or any concrete surface into an attractive surface that will last for years. Just visit moneypit.com slash sweepstakes right now through June 9th. Two grand prize winners will each receive about $1,000 in Daich Coatings products. You can choose a decorative surface of spread rock granite stone coating, track-safe anti-slip color coat, or roller rock rollable stone coating, and you’re also going to get a final coating of track-safe anti-slip sealer to create a gorgeous new space at home. There’s also going to be 20 runner-up winners who will each receive their track-safe anti-slip color kit, and that is a prize valued at $150.

 

You can enter every day at moneypit.com slash sweepstakes. Good luck, everybody. All right, Jim, let’s get back to the phones.

 

[Producer Jim]

All right, Leslie, we’re going to take a steamy call from Diane in Minnesota.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I don’t think she means it that way.

 

[Producer Jim]

I read that wrong. Yeah, I think I meant to say Diane in Minnesota has a steamy bathroom. Ah, there we go.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Sorry, Diane.

 

[Producer Jim]

Diane, what’s going on?

 

[Diane in Minnesota]

Yeah, it’s an exhaust fan. It just does not seem to take the steam out of the bathroom at all. It just doesn’t work.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, well, the good news is you have an exhaust fan, so let’s talk about it. Where is that fan mounted? Is it on the ceiling?

 

Does it go into the attic?

 

[Diane in Minnesota]

Yeah, it’s in the ceiling. I just live in an apartment, so I’m not exactly sure where it goes.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, well, see, you would want to know exactly where that fan is exhausting to, so that’s a good place to start. You want to know that you turn on the fan and you actually see it exhaust somewhere, and generally that’s going to be a vent on the outside of the building. You can kind of turn on that exhaust fan and then see that vent open, so you need to figure out if it’s an apartment.

 

You have to have your super figure out or tell you, because maybe they know where exactly it exhausts to, because that exhaust way could be obstructed. Maybe it got crushed. Perhaps it’s blocked.

 

Perhaps it just could go nowhere. I mean, there could be a lot of other things wrong with it, and I think that you may want to think about that, because it’s an apartment and not a condo, but it’s still your home, so you want to make sure that this is exhausting in the best way possible to keep that moisture low in that bathroom space. Now, there’s a different type of exhaust fan.

 

I think Brown and Newtone make it. It’s called Ultra, and what’s cool about it is that it has a moisture-sensing switch that’s built right into it, so it will run whenever the room has too much moisture, and you can kind of set it and forget it so that when you take a shower, it just stays on until all the moisture is removed from the room, and then it goes off again. But again, because this is an apartment, you might not have the ability to change out the device that removes the moisture from the area.

 

So I would definitely talk with your super or the building owner and find out where this fan exhausts to and sort of do a little investigative work to make sure that that’s actually functioning correctly. And then if it’s not, we can see what other options are out there for you, okay? Okay, well, thank you so much.

 

All right, thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEYPIT. Well, spring cleaning makes your house feel great, and it can give your mood a lift too, but could your house still be dirtier than you think? You know, there are actually a lot of places that most homeowners don’t even think to clean, and if you overlook them for too long, they can become health hazards.

 

So I’m looking at you, ceiling fan. You know, the top of those blades not only get dirty, it sends that dust, dirt, germs flying all around your space every time you turn it on. So be sure to clean the top of those fan blades with each seasonal cleaning.

 

Now, another germ magnet are the stair banisters, the doorknobs. You want to keep your home healthy by giving them a quick wipe every week or two with a cleaning spray or even a hot soapy water mixture. Do you remember, I can remember with COVID, I literally wiped down those handrails and doorknobs five, six times a day.

 

[Producer Jim]

And you weren’t alone.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Everybody did. So I try to keep this in my routine. I mean, it’s not five, six times a day.

 

Maybe it’s once or twice a week. But definitely handle those spots. I also add light switches and things like that to the mix because it’s just something everybody’s touching.

 

And with kids at the home, I just can’t always guarantee everybody’s washing their hands when they come in from the outside or the bathroom or whatnot. So just wipe down those high-touch spots.

 

[Producer Jim]

But, Leslie, it takes two seconds to do that.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Which, wash your hands or wipe the spots down?

 

[Producer Jim]

Yes, exactly.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Either way, let’s do both, Jim. All right?

 

[Producer Jim]

All right.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

So what are other spots? Don’t forget about the top of your fridge. Kitchen grease, dirt, grime all gathers up there, which can lead to germs and even fungus.

 

And you also want to keep the top of your fridge clean because it’s really important if you store food up there. I mean, that’s kind of the go-to spot for bread and chips in my house. That all gets shoved up there.

 

Now, speaking of the grocery shopping, reusable grocery bags, great for the environment, great to have in the car, but they could potentially be bad for your health if you’re not cleaning those bags. I mean, think about it. They’re touching everything.

 

The shopping cart, the fruit, the raw meat, everything you’re picking up in there. So they do also need a good wash after each use. Unless that bag says otherwise, all you really need to do is wash them with hot water.

 

Some of them you can shove right in the washing machine. Some of them I just give a rinse in the sink. But that’s a lot of stuff to handle, you know?

 

So now that we’ve thoroughly given you the shivers or the blah, whatever you want to call that, about all the gross stuff that’s in your house, let’s change the subject and get on to some other home improvement stuffs. Jim, who’s up next?

 

[Producer Jim]

I’m thinking about not cleaning the ceiling fan and just putting a broom handle up there, knocks everything to the ground, and eventually the furnace filter will catch it. Okay, next caller.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

That is the lazy way of cleaning. You making another device do the job for you. All right, good one, Jim.

 

[Producer Jim]

Gross. Pete is in Pennsylvania. He’s on the line with a siding question.

 

Tell us what’s going on, Pete, and what we can do to help out.

 

[Pete in Pennsylvania]

Well, it appears that the wind blew a piece of siding off the house. I was able to snap it into place and nail that piece of siding in a different place, but I find that the rest of the siding in that area, oh, maybe 25, 30 foot square, it all flops, and it’s not really locked together. How do I get that back together?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, was it originally together and now it’s all disconnected?

 

[Pete in Pennsylvania]

Yeah, we moved in in October, and I mean, everything looked fine.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I mean, here’s the thing with vinyl siding. Generally, it’s put on very loose. It’s not nailed solid, and the reason for that is because it’s vinyl, it kind of expands in the summertime and contracts, you know, with the weather and the sunlight, and if it’s not loose, then you’re going to see buckling, and that’s going to look terrible.

 

So when you say it’s kind of floppy, I mean, if the pieces are disconnected from one another, that’s one thing, but if it’s just loose where you can kind of grab the piece and slide it back and forth on the wall, that’s normal. Now, there’s also a tool called a zip tool. It’s made specifically for vinyl siding, and it kind of helps you reconnect pieces that may have become disconnected, and that generally is what happens here.

 

So remember, the siding’s supposed to be loose. Otherwise, it looks very wavy in the summer when it gets too hot on that side of the house, and the zip tool, if you need to reconnect, you can pick that up at any home center.

 

[Pete in Pennsylvania]

All right, thanks.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, Pete. Thanks so much for calling.

 

[Producer Jim]

Now we’re heading back my way, Leslie, to Ohio, and we’ve got Norma, who’s dealing with some roof leaks. Ugg, what’s going on, Norma?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I know I’m going to age myself here, Jim, but when you said Ugg, it made me think of Kathy from the cartoons where she would go, I’m old. It’s all right, I get it.

 

[Producer Jim]

Yeah, yeah, real old.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, Norma, tell us what’s going on.

 

[Norma in Ohio]

In the back of the house, near my glass sliding doors, I could see the ceiling. There was water coming in around the doors and leaking down into the track of the door, and that happened right after we had a really deep freeze here, and I believe the ice froze up, melted some, and then froze back up again, and I looked it up, and I think it’s called ice jam.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I think you’re talking about an ice jam. I know you said ice jam, but I think it’s an ice jam.

 

[Norma in Ohio]

So I called a roofing company, and actually they came out, and they told me I need a whole new roof, which is going to cost me about $20,000.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Yeah, of course a roofing company is going to tell you, oh, no, we can’t fix it. It’s going to be around $20,000, because that’s what they’re doing. They want to replace that roof.

 

Do you have homeowner’s insurance? Yeah. Well, that’s great, because ice damming is generally covered by your homeowner’s insurance.

 

So I would start by calling the insurance company, maybe even a public adjuster, and tell them that you’ve had ice damage, and that you need to have it fixed, because to fix the ice dam, you have to remove the roof. Guess what? You’re going to get a new roof, potentially paid for in full by the insurance company.

 

[Norma in Ohio]

Oh, even if it’s just in one spot?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Yeah, even if it is just in one spot, because what’s happening is, when you get ice damming, you have this sort of bottom three feet or so of your roof, where it’s close to the upper level, you know, the ceiling of the second floor, or whatever that top level of your home is, where that roof is meeting it. So it’s met with warmer temperatures. So when you get snow on the roof, and you don’t have any sort of underlayment there, under the shingles, and what happens is, it’s very cold on the remainder of the roof area, because it’s not so close to that heated floor, so it builds up there.

 

But what happens is, the lower area sort of starts to melt underneath, and because the ice is sort of maybe sat, you know, along that bottom edge, and stayed frozen, but it’s melting a little bit underneath, the water’s gonna kind of run underneath it, and then find a way in. So what this sort of underlayment is, there’s one called ice and water shield. It goes on the lower three feet or so of your roof, and what it is, it’s sort of a rubberized underlayment, so when the shingles go in, they sort of nail into this underlayment, and it kind of forms a seal.

 

And so that water, as it melts, is not going to find its way into the house. So it really does a great job of protecting the sheathing, protecting the interior of your home, and just protecting the roof and you in general. So I would start with this.

 

Don’t go to a roofing company, because they’re gonna tell you a tale, and they’re gonna try to get you to just replace it on your dime. I would start first with the insurance company, tell them you have an ice dam, and see where this goes. And if the insurance company is kind of a dead end, you can go with a public adjuster, who basically works with your insurance company on your behalf, and then see where it goes, because I think you’d be surprised, you’d probably get a lot of help here in replacing that roof, and having the underlayment installed.

 

Oh, okay. Okay, thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEYPIT. I am tackling a project I hadn’t planned on tackling.

 

We had this beautiful wisteria that kind of took over the next-door neighbor’s everything. Like literally everything. All of the stuff had overgrown so much.

 

Sadly, she was a wonderful woman, and she passed away in the fall, and we have new neighbors, and they are very nice, but they took out literally every bit of all of this overgrown stuff, which I know in the long run is going to be great. But for the moment, all I see is their house, and I see just everything. So I’m about to tackle some projects.

 

I don’t know if I’m putting up a new fence, I don’t know if I’m trying to figure out some new landscaping, but it is a big to-do, and I’m kind of looking forward to what those changes are going to be, because I don’t want to look at their house anymore, Jimmy. It’s been a week. It’s been a week, I’m getting antsy.

 

So let’s talk to some people. Let’s figure out what they’ve got to do. Maybe they also have some neighbors who took down some trees.

 

Let’s figure it out. What’s going on, everybody?

 

[Producer Jim]

No, when you said Wisteria, the first thing I thought of was, you know, desperate housewives.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I love them. I love Wisteria, Jim.

 

[Producer Jim]

Okay, let’s actually work, Leslie.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right.

 

[Producer Jim]

We’ve got Peter. You’re on The Money Pit with Leslie Segrete. How can we help you?

 

[Peter]

I had a house built 13 years ago, and one of the rooms on the first floor extends past the basement, so there’s a kernel space. And I noticed just after they built that, that there was some moisture and mold in the adjacent closet in the basement to the crawl space. What they did was they put some thick plastic sheeting in the crawl space, and they put a dehumidifier in just a standard one that you can get at home, Depot or Lowe’s, with a drainage hose that goes into, I guess, a pipe or a drain.

 

And that’s been running continuously for 13 years. And I haven’t had any moisture problems since, so I was just kind of wondering, is that the safest solution? And I guess I just have nightmares that the dehumidifier catches on fire because it just runs continuously.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right. Well, let’s think, Peter, about the reasons why that humidifier is running consistently. I mean, you’re probably needing to control the moisture that’s coming into the space, so let’s think about the exterior of the house.

 

So now you want to look at that soil, and you want to make sure that it is actually sloping away from the house. And I’m not talking about, like, a drastic drop-off. You want to sort of slope away 6 inches, but over 10 feet, so it’s very gradual as it’s moving that water away from the house.

 

Now, then you want to look at your gutters and your downspouts. You want to make sure they’re clear, that the water flows, you know, freely down the downspout. Where that downspout goes is super important.

 

You don’t want all that water to go right next to your home’s foundation. So a lot of times you see sort of a bent piece that sort of kicks the water away, and sometimes it only sends the water a few inches from the house. You need to go a few feet away from the house.

 

And sometimes you can even have those downspouts buried underground and transporting the water away, but you have to make sure that those downspouts stay connected and don’t disconnect and just sort of deposit all of that water right next to the foundation. And so all of that water, if it’s not moved away from the foundation, can just really bring a ton of moisture into your home and could cause damage, could cause flooding. It depends on what happens with that water.

 

[Peter]

When they built the house, they put in French drains around the outside. I don’t have any trees next to the house that was shedding leaves. So, you know, I’m thinking the gutters are probably clear and I’m thinking, you know, they just have a dehumidifier set just to run continuously.

 

I was wondering, is that safe? You know, it’s been doing it for 13 years.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I mean, the type of dehumidifier that you’re probably talking about is meant for a crawl space and, you know, probably would work for about a decade. There are better dehumidifiers for this exact use and they hang from the ceiling of the crawl space and they can cover a much wider area. You can look at a good website, thermastore.com.

 

They’re a manufacturer of one of these sort of ceiling mounted in a crawl space dehumidifiers, if you will. They work really well. They get rid of all the moisture, they transport the water outside and, you know, sort of get it away from the foundation itself.

 

But I just want to double check. Did you put any plastic sheeting down on the floor in the crawl space to sort of help? All right.

 

And that goes all the way wall to wall overlap. So there’s no flooring exposed at all.

 

[Peter]

Entire height of the crawl space is maybe three and a half feet tall. And I haven’t noticed any, you know, issues in the closet next door.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Well, okay. I mean, it’s good that you’re not seeing any mold or anything. I think I would just probably replace that dehumidifier with a better one.

 

There are some out there that are not that expensive. You can have an outlet installed where you’re going to plug it in. That’s ground fault protected.

 

And then I think you have nothing to worry about. It’ll really do the job of getting the moisture out and keeping it away from the house.

 

[Peter]

Great. Thank you very much.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

And don’t forget, you can enter our porch and patio makeover sweepstakes right now through June 9th. We’re giving away $5,000 in Daich coatings products. You can learn more and enter daily at money pit.com slash sweepstakes. That’s money pit.com slash sweepstakes. Jim, who’s up next?

 

[Producer Jim]

Give me just a second. Leslie. I’m going to money pit.com slash sweepstakes.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

You are not allowed to enter.

 

[Producer Jim]

Damn.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

The fine print says, do you work for the money pit?

 

Then you’re out. Sorry, friend.

 

[Producer Jim]

Being with you is such a pleasure. Leslie. I don’t consider it working.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Excuse me. I say vomit.

 

[Producer Jim]

Nice. Real Nice.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Well, when you think of shrubs, you might not think of them as the most glamorous plants around. I mean, they’re kind of like the workhorse of the yard. They’re the backbone of this landscape design, but there are hundreds of different styles of shrubs out there.

 

So you need to make sure that you’re making the right choice so that they will thrive in your environment. Now, if you don’t, you can end up dealing with a high maintenance plant that really shouldn’t be. If you pick something that’s not meant for the space where you live or where you’re planting it, you are going to find that maybe it requires constant pruning or has odd pest problems or needs like weird specific watering patterns.

 

But if you go with something that is specifically for your zone, you will find that it will thrive and be trouble free for the most part. So you need to make sure that you are getting the right shrub for your climate and to figure out if that plant’s going to do well, you kind of need to consider its tolerance and you can use the USDA plant hardiness zone map. It’s very easy to find online and it will tell you whether that shrub is capable of growing in your location.

 

And a hardiness zone is a good guideline to kind of start with, but you need to also consider the sun, wind, snow. For example, if you live in an area where you’re getting constant snow that covers the shrubs, this can actually act as an insulator during the winter and allow you to plant types of shrubs that otherwise can’t be exposed to those freezing winds. Soil type.

 

That’s another thing you’ve got to think about. Some shrubs can thrive in sandy soils, others in clay, others not so much. So once you’ve kind of figured out the perfect shrub for your yard or garden, you’ve got to keep it pruned.

 

I kind of never know what’s, you know, too much, what’s not enough. So if I have a question about a specific area, I do take a photo of it and I go over to my local garden center because I know I’ve told you guys this before. I do not have a green thumb.

 

I’m just not good at keeping things alive in the yard. So the easier for me, the better. So if I have questions, I go right to the home and garden center and I say, hey, can you help me out?

 

Should I be taking this off? Is this the time of year? And it kind of gives me a catalog of what I should be doing seasonally with that specific shrub because those guys are the pros.

 

So when in doubt, throw it out. Nope. That’s what my grandma said.

 

When in doubt, ask the folks at the home and garden center because they will help you make sure that you’ve got something for the right area in your home and how to properly care for it because that’s what you want. You want to kind of put it in the ground, make sure it grows well and then kind of forget about the maintenance of it. Either way, I’ve got some landscaping projects coming up.

 

You may as well. Let’s talk about them as we tackle them this summer season. All right, Jim, let’s get back to the phones.

 

[Producer Jim]

Now we’ve got Heather in Tennessee who’s dealing with a flooring situation. Fill us in Heather.

 

[Heather in Tennessee]

Well, my husband and I were, we have a water filter on our countertop and we overfilled it one day and it leaked out onto the hardwood. And while we were at work and it’s less than six by eight inch diameter area of bulking of our hardwood floors. Can’t really see it, but you can feel it like when you’re walking over it with like socks on it kind of snagged.

 

So I didn’t know if there’s anything that you could do like a DIY project or if you have to have the whole floor re-sanded, re-stained. I really don’t want to go through all that mess.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Oh, that’s sucky. And it’s amazing how quickly, and it actually is sucky because all that water got onto that wood floor and it kind of got absorbed into it and then caused that buckling. Well, maybe do you have any extra pieces of that floor anywhere?

 

 

 

[Heather in Tennessee]

I don’t, I don’t. And actually another reason I’m kind of leery of it is because we got the same man that did our hardwood floors to begin with, come back and put hardwood in our bedrooms and they don’t match whatsoever.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Is there like a closet or a pantry that you could take that floor out and repurpose in this area?

 

[Heather in Tennessee]

Um, yeah.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, well then that’s a good solution for you because a good carpenter can actually cut out that floor in this less visible area and only cut out enough of it to do this repair in the kitchen.

 

And then they sort of cut out the bad board and put in the good board and they do it in a way where it really blends in very naturally. And this way you’re getting the exact stain, the exact flooring, albeit it might not have seen as much wear and tear as that area. So you could notice a little bit of different, but I really think no one is going to be the wiser and you’re getting the exact match to replace those damaged boards.

 

And now what you would put in that closet, you could do an entirely different flooring. You could put some boards in or restain that whole area cause it’s smaller. So there’s definitely a way to do this.

 

That’s not going to be hugely terrible, but this one definitely involves a pro carpenter to help you out.

 

[Heather in Tennessee]

That’s a whole lot better than, than restanding everything.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Oh yeah. It’s way better than restanding the whole floor. All right.

 

Good luck with that project.

 

[Producer Jim]

All right. Leslie, we have a decking question coming out of North Carolina with Tony. Tony, what can we do for you?

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

Great show. Thanks. Appreciate your great advice.

 

All right.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Thanks so much.

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

I just had a deck built and the, uh, my builder used a men in wax wood finish thing.

 

And his instruction is that I would need to restain it every year because it was all base. And, uh, I just wanted to do, I don’t have a whole lot of time like that, but one is, is there another, is there something on top of this product to use where it won’t fade and wash away with the weather?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I mean, it seems unusual that you would have to stain a deck every single year, especially a brand new one. But typically Tony, our general advice here with a new deck is to not stain that deck for the first year. Do you know what kind of wood it is?

 

Is it pressure treated lumber?

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

No, it’s not. He used a different type of lumber and I couldn’t tell you right off.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Does Cedar or Redwood sound familiar? Did they say composite?

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

No, not, not, not composite. It may have been, it may have been Redwood.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right. So you want to keep the finish clear so that you can see that red tone and see the graining.

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

Right.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right. Well, you typically need to restain or reseal on a regular basis, but definitely not annually. And when it comes to choosing the product that you’re going to use, you want to pick an exterior stain.

 

There’s different porosities to them, you know, sort of levels of transparency. You can use semi-transparent that gives you a little bit of colorant, but it sort of brings an even tone to everything throughout the lumber and it doesn’t completely cover it. But then you can go all the way up to a solid color stain, which is a ton of pigment and generally feels like a paint.

 

You don’t really see the grain as much, but it still has like a wood look appearance. So I think if you want to see the Redwood and you want to see the graining and you want to see the naturalness of it, a semi-transparent or a clear coat is going to be the way you want to go, but you have to make sure that you go with a very good quality deck stain. And it probably will need to be applied every three to five years, not every year.

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

Right. That’s been my experience as well. Three to five years.

 

And I just wasn’t sure if I was actually being told completely the correct thing or if there was something else going on.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Yeah, I mean, that’s our experience too, three to five years. You’ve got a coat of stain on there. I’d say just live with it for a year or two, see what happens, see how it wears and see what you think.

 

[Tony in North Carolina]

That sounds great. Great advice.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right. Good luck with that, Tony. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEYPIT.

 

Let’s jump into those email questions. Jim, who do you have this hour?

 

[Producer Jim]

Mary writes in, my water pressure is pretty poor and I’m pretty sure it’s due to the fact that the water line from the street is more than 50 years old and made of galvanized steel. I can’t even do a load of laundry and take a shower at the same time. There’s just lousy pressure.

 

Outside of replacing this pipe, is there a pump that I can install to increase the pressure for the whole house or even just make the bathroom better?

 

[Leslie Segrete]

All right, Mary. Well, that could be a solution, but I think what’s going to happen is eventually you’re going to be in a situation where there could be a pipe replacement project in your future. And I know you’re trying to avoid this, but it’s the time to do it now.

 

Could it be past the time to do it? And if you don’t take on this project now, you could be forced to take it on at some point in the not so distant future when you get a major break. And that could be really unlucky if you are not home.

 

So here’s what I recommend. The first thing you want to do is replace any visible galvanized piping in the house. Now, basement, attic, unfinished room, any place you can find a piece of old steel, replace it.

 

That’s going to be great. The second thing you do, if you ever do a repair and open up a wall, never put it back without replacing that galvanized pipe. And then the last thing you would do is replace that pipe from the house to the street.

 

It’s a big project. It could be expensive, but it definitely is a weak point for the house. So think about tackling it now before you have to.

 

[Producer Jim]

Leslie, it’s no big surprise that spring and summer are the peak seasons for real estate sales. And if you own a home that’s new or at least new to you, it’s tempting to move in now, but you know, there’s, there’s something else you might want to consider before doing that. And Leslie is going to cover that in this edition of Leslie’s last word.

 

Leslie proceed.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

Yeah. You know, I think it’s important whether you’re selling a home, whether you’re buying a home, or even if you’ve just kind of been in the home for a while and have no plans to go, having a home inspected is a great kind of starting point and understanding situation of what’s the current, you know, situation in your home. How are the things, are the appliances all working appropriately?

 

Are the home mechanical systems, heating, plumbing, electrical, how is that working? Is it in tip top shape? Is there room for improvement?

 

Does something need updating? Is the roof okay? What about the foundation?

 

These are all things that you as a new homeowner should be knowing about the house. And hopefully you’ve had that home inspection done before you’ve actually finalized the deal, because it can be a negotiation factor to make sure that you’re getting the best deal and that the right repairs are being covered by the right person. If you’ve been in your home a while, it’s kind of really a good place to just sort of get, you know, the pulse of what’s happening in your home.

 

Are there some things that I should be working on? Are there some things that are deteriorating? Oh my God, I worked on it.

 

I’ve been working on that word and I think I’ve done it.

 

[Producer Jim]

You nailed it.

 

[Leslie Segrete]

I did for that one time, but truly it’s a good sense of what’s happening in your home. And the inspection is sort of a very detailed book about your house. This is how this is working.

 

This is how much lifespan is left in that water heater. This is what type of maintenance you should be doing to that boiler. This is what’s going on with your HVAC system.

 

Have you changed a filter? No, guess what? There’s a filter, you know, all the different things that could be going on in your house that could help you sort of prolong all of those systems or make the changes to get more life out of X, Y, or Z.

 

So I think there’s never a bad time to do a home inspection. Obviously, if you’re buying a home, do that before you’ve closed the deal. If you’re selling your home, you can do it before you even put it on the market so you can make some of those repairs to sort of get rid of the chance that a potential buyer will say like, Hey, I see this needs to be done.

 

Can we negotiate a lesser sell price? So it’s really good for everybody. You can head on over to the American Society of Home Inspectors.

 

That’s ashi.org and find a certified home inspector in your area. It’s great to go with a pro. It’s not expensive and it’s awesome for you as a homeowner.

 

So definitely, definitely tackle that. We thank you guys so much for joining us this hour. There’s always so much home improvement going on all year round, but I feel like in the summer we really get to enjoy the work we’ve done.

 

So let us know what you are working on. Let us know how we can lend a hand. We are always here to help you out.

 

Thanks so much. Remember guys, you can do it yourself, but you don’t have to do it alone.