LESLIE: Frank in New York needs some help with a flooring problem. What’s going on at your money pit?
FRANK: Hi. Yes, I purchased a home recently and the home is over 40 years old, having 5,100 square feet of carpeting. And I removed and had help removing the carpeting up to about 1,000 square feet, which is glued – it’s like a black glue – on to the flooring which is plywood. And one of the problems is that I’m scraping and trying to remove the glue. It’s like a black, tarrish glue …
TOM: Right.
FRANK: … onto a foam and it just sticks to my feet and everybody walks on it. They’re like walking on flypaper.
LESLIE: (overlapping voices) Oh, it’s disgusting.
TOM: (overlapping voices) Yeah, it’s like terrible stuff.
LESLIE: What are you trying to put on top of that?
FRANK: Well, eventually I may go for a tile; ceramic tile. I’m not sure as yet but certainly I’m very disenchanted with carpeting after watching this and a lot of it was disintegration from just age and it’s a lot of dust.
TOM: Is the glue lumpy or is it smooth?
FRANK: It’s flat.
TOM: OK. Well, what I’m going to suggest then is why don’t you go over it; just get off as much as you can.
LESLIE: (overlapping voices) Yeah, leave it.
TOM: Leave the rest and go on top of it. A laminate floor would be a really good solution here because you could lay down a very thin laminate underlayment, which is usually like a very thin foam, and then you put the flooring right on top of that and the foam will absorb any unevenness because of the glue that was there before and you’ll have a nice, clean floor on top of it.
FRANK: Thank you so much. Do you have a book? Are you going to publish a book? (Leslie chuckles) Because all your ideas on your show are just fantastic.
TOM: Funny you should ask.
LESLIE: Not only are we going to tell you that we have a book coming out called My Home, My Money Pit: Your Guide to Every Home Improvement Adventure but I think we can send you one.
FRANK: (overlapping voices) Can I get that at Barnes & Noble? Oh, you will? Thank you.
TOM: Yeah, we’d be happy to and yes, it will be available at Barnes & Noble and lots of other great bookstores.
FRANK: No, because everything you say, you know, like I’m conquering one thing and then maybe a week later I’ll forget what I heard on your show about a particular problem. (Tom chuckles)
LESLIE: Keep a pen and paper right by the radio.
TOM: You know, Frank, houses don’t come with owners’ manuals and that’s the book we tried to put together. So it’s called …
FRANK: Thank you so much.
TOM: … My Home, My Money Pit: Your Guide to Every Home Improvement Adventure and if you hold on we’ll send you a copy just for asking us about it. Thanks so much.
FRANK: Thank you.
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