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StormDrain posted:If a person has bedbugs they don’t see and don’t react to, do they have a problem at all? Even though as a nonreactive person I wouldn't be affected, anyone who stayed at the house overnight would be potentially hosed. We were supposed to have friends up this weekend but now with the bad news we are postponing. If I didn't know, they'd have risked infestation to their house if they'd stayed with us. We are getting an exterminator ASAP, and probably ripping out the carpets, which I'm totally fine with because they are gross and hate carpet anyway and would rather have subfloor, but steam cleaning them is acceptable too. Pillows are all in the dryer right now. Will probably have to dispose of 2/3 mattresses (they suck anyway, no great loss, even though they were clean before being in this house).
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Oct 5, 2018 03:30
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Queen Victorian posted:Even though as a nonreactive person I wouldn't be affected, anyone who stayed at the house overnight would be potentially hosed. Oh hell no you don’t have to justify it like that, getting drained of your blood every night by invisible creatures is awful. Little bastards hide in the creases and sleep all day, then ambush you while you rest. I’m itchy just thinking about it.
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Oct 5, 2018 03:37
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StormDrain posted:Oh hell no you don’t have to justify it like that, getting drained of your blood every night by invisible creatures is awful. Little bastards hide in the creases and sleep all day, then ambush you while you rest. I’m itchy just thinking about it. I think what bugged me (lol) was not knowing. If my husband were also unaffected, we'd be prime vectors for spreading bedbugs far and wide because we have people over to stay a ton because we'd never have any reason to suspect that we had an infestation. Until the exterminator can exterminate the problem, no overnight guests, and also, topical Benadryl is a gift from the gods.
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Oct 5, 2018 03:57
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Bedbugs are a nightmare. Make sure to check behind outlet covers. They live in the walls sometimes too. I had them 11 years ago and I still get panic attacks on occasion from it. Granted, my case was severe, I was in an apartment where all the neighbors had them and didn't care, and it cost me a lot in the end. At the time they were a relatively new problem and there weren't that many treatments for them, and none were effective. Now they are much better understood and treatable so I wish you luck.
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Oct 5, 2018 04:11
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If/when you get new beds, get bedbug covers for all mattresses and box springs. When I had them in a cheap apartment years ago, I was lucky they were only on my box spring and one of the couches we got rid of. I was terrified of taking them with me when I moved and I didn't have any issues thanks to the bedbug covers.
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Oct 5, 2018 04:27
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burn down the house, it's the only way to be sure
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Oct 6, 2018 00:29
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Finally finished the garage!    
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Oct 6, 2018 03:48
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Dango Bango posted:If/when you get new beds, get bedbug covers for all mattresses and box springs. When I had them in a cheap apartment years ago, I was lucky they were only on my box spring and one of the couches we got rid of. I was terrified of taking them with me when I moved and I didn't have any issues thanks to the bedbug covers. One of my clients wanted to install a hot box so tenants could put all their stuff in it before moving in to kill all the bugs as an amenity and the housing authority said that was discriminatory. So now they get to spend $10,000 month treating apartments and everyone rent is $200 more a month. Science!
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Oct 6, 2018 16:35
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Leperflesh posted:burn down the house, it's the only way to be sure Eh, no need to BURN it -- just heating it up to 140'F for a day or two should do it.
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Oct 6, 2018 16:52
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SpartanIvy posted:In my quest to eliminate cracks and squeaks from my house I think I've pinpointed that most cracks are caused by wood and sheetrock sliding on loose nails and squeaks are caused by subloor/floor looseness. Screws should fix the first, shims, screws, and adhesives fix the latter. Nail pops through drywall/loose nails are because the wood is moving (too wet when built, drying) or house is "settling". This is assuming that an appropriate number and type of fasteners was used in the first place. You're probably observing a symptom, not a cause. With subfloors it's almost always because they were too cheap to screw and glue.
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Oct 6, 2018 18:25
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Elephanthead posted:One of my clients wanted to install a hot box so tenants could put all their stuff in it before moving in to kill all the bugs as an amenity and the housing authority said that was discriminatory. So now they get to spend $10,000 month treating apartments and everyone rent is $200 more a month. Science! Wow that's terrible and dumb. How would it be discriminatory if it's an amenity or you straight up make all new tenants use it? If I were a building owner and wasn't able to take measures to prevent new tenants from bringing in bedbugs because it's "discriminatory", I'd be loving pissed (and would find grounds to sue to implement said measures). Bedbugs give no fucks about socioeconomic status or cleanliness anyway.
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Oct 6, 2018 19:04
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Queen Victorian posted:Wow that's terrible and dumb. How would it be discriminatory if it's an amenity or you straight up make all new tenants use it? If I were a building owner and wasn't able to take measures to prevent new tenants from bringing in bedbugs because it's "discriminatory", I'd be loving pissed (and would find grounds to sue to implement said measures). Bedbugs give no fucks about socioeconomic status or cleanliness anyway. There must be something missing from that story, like the hot box being mandatory for tenants of certain income levels or something.
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Oct 6, 2018 19:05
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Any thoughts on why my washer drain would back up into the bathtub on a home that was flipped? I'm assuming it has to be a shoddy work issue rather than an actual clog or something like that (and plunging does nothing).
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Oct 8, 2018 00:34
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Is the shower that overflows the last point your wastewater goes before it leaves the house? This is pretty normal behavior for a backed up sewer main.
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Oct 8, 2018 00:38
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HEY NONG MAN posted:Is the shower that overflows the last point your wastewater goes before it leaves the house? I'm honestly not sure. And I haven't had any issues with other drains - just the washer.
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Oct 8, 2018 00:41
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Get the system scoped. You can even rent a scope yourself, either doing that or hiring a professional are both pretty inexpensive and will show you where the problem is. If you're lucky it's just partially clogged Probably it's partially clogged and the reason the washer is the only thing that causes water to back up into your shower is that your washer drains a lot more water all at once than any of your other appliances. QuarkJets fucked around with this message at 02:26 on Oct 8, 2018 |
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Oct 8, 2018 02:23
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It’s probably the lowest point in your system so a slowly draining main backs it up to there. I had the same issue because we were focusing flushable wipes that would get hung up in the main and eventually clog. It was intermittent though because sometimes it wouldn’t get too bad and the clog would force through with enough pressure.
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Oct 8, 2018 03:42
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StormDrain posted:It’s probably the lowest point in your system so a slowly draining main backs it up to there. I had the same issue because we were focusing flushable wipes that would get hung up in the main and eventually clog. It was intermittent though because sometimes it wouldn’t get too bad and the clog would force through with enough pressure. My understanding is that the only things that should go down the toilet are water, piss, poo poo, and toilet paper. Anything else that claims to be flushable isn't.
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Oct 8, 2018 04:00
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:My understanding is that the only things that should go down the toilet are water, piss, poo poo, and toilet paper. Anything else that claims to be flushable isn't. Yeah, flushible wipes are NOT flushible. Nor are condoms. Also tampons/pads. Seriously don't flush anything but TP and things that come out of your body's various orifices. And that also means no kleenex or paper towels. Those are designed to stay intact when they get wet. Even if these items make it past your house's pipes and in to the main system, they'll wreak havoc on the sewer system. Fatbergs are bad enough, they're made worse by "flushible" wipes and other things that degrade slowly or not at all. So while you may not have to call a plumber, your property taxes and/or utility bills are going to go up when your city/county/whatever has to fix the problem.
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Oct 8, 2018 13:09
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Another not so obvious cause of squeaking in your floor is potentially the carpet pad. There's really hard pieces of rubber that sometimes cause squeaking even in high quality 8# pad. If the sub-floor is totally jacked it could be something more, but just it's usually something you can fix in a second if the flooring is up. Your carpet installer should fix squeaks but most installers suck (source: was an installer). e: I guess I should mention that to fix it you just remove the hard piece of rubber by pulling it out with your fingers. You won't feel it with your feet unless it's a massive piece and I've never seen that. Knyteguy fucked around with this message at 15:49 on Oct 8, 2018 |
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Oct 8, 2018 15:47
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What's the general consensus on refrigerators? Looking at online reviews, every refrigerator is terrible. LG and Samsung seem to be popular among review sites but the actual owners don't like them. I am looking to spend 2-3k and don't want a side by side. edit: For what it's worth, our builder is putting in a KitchenAid oven, dishwasher, and microwave. I have read middling reviews on that brand but again, all the customer reviews for every brand seem to be terrible. TheWevel fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Oct 8, 2018 |
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Oct 8, 2018 19:39
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TheWevel posted:What's the general consensus on refrigerators? Looking at online reviews, every refrigerator is terrible. LG and Samsung seem to be popular among review sites but the actual owners don't like them. I am looking to spend 2-3k and don't want a side by side. Yup, you pretty much nailed it. Make sure you measure and know if you want "counter depth" or the super deep ones. I just bought a LG LFXC24726S for $2,298 (+tax, free in home delivery, no haul away.) It is nice and keeps food fresher way longer than my old clunker. Only things I don't like about it so far are drawer freezers all universally suck, the water comes out of a rando place (you get to play a fun game with guests), and the ice cubes are a bit small for my liking. Nothing that would make me want to send it back or curse at it. Definitely have a plan for your existing food, a bunch of stuff spoiled when we transferred it due to how long it took to get cold initially. Ongoing that hasn't been a concern at all.
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Oct 8, 2018 19:46
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Definitely get one with a smaller door-in-door.
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Oct 8, 2018 20:06
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TheWevel posted:What's the general consensus on refrigerators? Looking at online reviews, every refrigerator is terrible. LG and Samsung seem to be popular among review sites but the actual owners don't like them. I am looking to spend 2-3k and don't want a side by side. https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/the-best-refrigerator/ goes into quite a bit of depth on the subject
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Oct 8, 2018 20:09
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TheWevel posted:LG and Samsung seem to be popular among review sites but the actual owners don't like them. Single data point, but: people are loving idiots. My (GE) fridge has an ice maker. 90% of the bad reviews for it are essentially "the ice maker makes ice making noises" because yeah, fuckers, it dumps out ice into a bucket and then fills trays and makes more ice, and no, it does not know what time it is and avoid making ice at night. If you didn't want ice making noises, don't buy a fridge with an ice maker. Other complaints I saw while shopping for my fridge mostly amounted to surprise that the water filter has to be replaced, and it costs money... and things having to do with clogged drains having to be cleaned out. All of those things are pretty much universally applicable to fridges that dispense water and ice. So... take reviews with a grain of salt. Mostly people don't go post good reviews of their major appliances after using them for a year... it's much more common to get angry and post a bad review because something wasn't what you expected.
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Oct 8, 2018 20:17
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We're about to have our carpeted stairs rebuilt with natural hickory treads. My wife brought up the possibility that the natural grain lines on the treads may make it difficult to tell the steps apart when going downstairs and make it more dangerous. The entire staircase is enclosed on both sides with walls, so you wouldn't be able to see the side edges of each stair. I've never heard of this being a problem, but now I"m wondering. Anyone ever had this issue? Not my photo, but an idea of what I'm talking about. I'm wondering how much of an issue this could be in reality, where you're actually looking at a physical staircase with depth perception. 
gregday fucked around with this message at 21:11 on Oct 8, 2018 |
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Oct 8, 2018 21:05
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totalnewbie posted:Definitely get one with a smaller door-in-door.
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Oct 8, 2018 21:07
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gregday posted:We're about to have our carpeted stairs rebuilt with natural hickory treads. My wife brought up the possibility that the natural grain lines on the treads may make it difficult to tell the steps apart when going downstairs and make it more dangerous. The entire staircase is enclosed on both sides with walls, so you wouldn't be able to see the side edges of each stair. I've never heard of this being a problem, but now I"m wondering. Anyone ever had this issue? I hate stairs like this for the same reason, but it should be a simple fix, no? Just paint the edge of each stair white, or some other natural color, so you can visually distinguish it.
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Oct 8, 2018 21:22
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There's a lot of appliances/home crap that almost no one cares about unless it stops working. So people buy them and are okay with them unless it has a problem and then they go bitch about it on the internet. OTOH, people who do really care about that kind of thing have some weird reddit where they post about it all the time. Those kinds of communities will tell you that you need some kinda mega expensive obscure whatever and you are just setting your money on fire to buy anything else. This makes online researching a headache. I've been going with what professional outlets like Wirecutter say is the solid option and so far so good. Anecdotally, no problems with our Samsung fridge.
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Oct 8, 2018 21:35
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TheWevel posted:What's the general consensus on refrigerators? Looking at online reviews, every refrigerator is terrible. LG and Samsung seem to be popular among review sites but the actual owners don't like them. I am looking to spend 2-3k and don't want a side by side. I have a Samsung fridge and a friend of mine does too, and we both like our fridges. People don't generally post reviews for appliances unless they have something to complain about, instead I would recommend looking at the appliance review sites that do professional testing and score fridges that way, e.g. they will measure how well the drawers retain or keep out moisture, how much the freezer temperature varies (because large temp variations cause frostburn), etc.
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Oct 8, 2018 23:33
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gregday posted:We're about to have our carpeted stairs rebuilt with natural hickory treads. My wife brought up the possibility that the natural grain lines on the treads may make it difficult to tell the steps apart when going downstairs and make it more dangerous. The entire staircase is enclosed on both sides with walls, so you wouldn't be able to see the side edges of each stair. I've never heard of this being a problem, but now I"m wondering. Anyone ever had this issue? I personally wouldn’t worry about it, based mostly on my knowledge of the logic behind building codes. Stairs have to be built within a set of limits for rise and run, as well as allowable variation between each step. Mostly because we don’t look at them when we use them and expect consistency. As long as you can tell where they start and end, it will be fine. Of course it’s going to be kind of slick in socks, but I also slipped down a set of carpeted stairs this weekend. If you hate it have a carpet runner installed.
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Oct 8, 2018 23:40
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Is there a home security/camera thread? Someone broke into my house today. On the upside, other than a few upturned drawers of clothes, I'm only missing a hundred bucks or so in foreign currency.
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Oct 9, 2018 00:41
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StormDrain posted:I personally wouldn’t worry about it, based mostly on my knowledge of the logic behind building codes. Stairs have to be built within a set of limits for rise and run, as well as allowable variation between each step. Mostly because we don’t look at them when we use them and expect consistency. If anything, having uniform carpet would be harder to tell the stairs apart but its really not an issue in person. Also, I used to live in a house that we tore out the carpet on the stairs and installed wood and the only time(s) I ever slipped going down the stairs was when they were carpeted. Wooden stairs (with white risers) are awesome.
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Oct 9, 2018 17:57
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StormDrain posted:If you hate it have a carpet runner installed. Do this. It's not a visual thing so much as a socks-on-slick-stairs thing... nobody really looks at stairs when they're using them, but throw on a pair of socks and you've got a nice little death trap. Also dogs. They have a hell of a time on hardwoods, so put that on your stairs and you have a leg breaking machine. Don't forget about kids... they're going to wipe out on the stairs anyway, no reason to make it any more hazardous. The runner lets you show off your nice hardwood but also makes it a little safer to walk on.
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Oct 9, 2018 18:52
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totalnewbie posted:Is there a home security/camera thread? Someone broke into my house today. On the upside, other than a few upturned drawers of clothes, I'm only missing a hundred bucks or so in foreign currency. There is, or used to be... I had it bookmarked but I can't find it. Mostly it was about smart home stuff, but that is all changing so rapidly now I don't know how helpful old posts would be. From my experience, I use Samsung Smart things with multipurpose open/close sensors on my doors and windows, and I really like everything with a few caveats. I think Apple has a homekit version now, and google has one too that I don't know much about. Simplisafe is one I keep hearing if you want to pay monthly for a professionally monitored system. I like Smart things because it's Z-Wave and Zigbee compatible, so most sensors and lights and junk work with it, whereas other stuff is pretty siloed. They even have an ADT panel and kit now, which I bought because it has a keypad. You can get 'professional' ADT monitoring with it too, but only with the ADT proprietary sensors, so apart from the keypad, I think it's pretty useless. Otherwise, smart things is free apart from the upfront cost, and you can set it to automatically arm/disarm when all the phones in your household leave the house (uses geofencing), or when someone arrives home. It'll give you alerts and reminders, like if it's set to away and someone smashes a window or opens your front door, you'll get a intrusion alert text or notification on your phone. Besides being based on location, you can also set it to automatically perform routines like set to home/away/arm at nighttime or like after you normally leave for work. It'll even alert you if you left a window open or something and rain is coming or you're setting it to away. I've also got my entire network on battery backup, so if I lose power everything still functions, and the ADT hub has a cellphone backup if you lose network connectivity if you wish to pay monthly for that feature. The ADT hub seems less functional than the regular smart things hub though, so I'd skip it unless you REALLY want it to automatically go to ADT and call the cops instead of just keeping an eye on your phone and doing it yourself. The other nice thing about smart things is the variety of other sensors, like motion or water sensors. I've got my front porch lights set to go on with motion, and water sensors under my kitchen sink, in the basement, and behind the laundry so I know if there's a leak before it becomes catastrophic. The main downside is that I've got a NEST thermostat and smoke/CO detectors, so it's not compatible with Smart Things, because google silos their products. It sucks that it doesn't all integrate together, but really it just means that I have to install another app on my phone and I still get the alerts/remote monitoring capabilities. Batteries have to be replaced roughly every 6-8 months in my experience, which is honestly the suckiest thing about the system and sensors, but I've got a 115 year old house so running wire is a pain in the rear end. Did it for wireless access points upstairs and down, and some new electrical circuits, but that was even a stretch. As far as cameras go, I've got two systems. One, an NVR from Lorex (the same company as Flir), which PoE cameras that I can remote into with my VPN that I set up to my house. Newer systems probably just have an app you can use. PoE cameras are ideal, because they only need an easily run and terminated ethernet cable to provide data transfer and power, and it's much more reliable than wifi cameras, which still need a power cable anyways. Plus they record locally to a box you can cable to your router/switch. If you know or are willing to learn a tiny bit about networking or can follow instructions, these are awesome. I really like their small vandal proof dome cameras, you can rotate them and they're inconspicuous, which I would rather not attract attention to the fact I have cameras. https://www.lorextechnology.com/hd-ip-camera/2k-nocturnal-ip-audio-dome-security-camera-/LND4750ABW-1-p They also run some pretty great black friday deals if you keep your eye out. I've also got a few amazon home security cameras, which I like. They're easy to set up, record motion events to amazon cloud and send you notifications, and if you have prime, they'll keep a day of recording for free, and a week for something like 10$, which is pretty great. Downside is they still need power (plugged into a wall), and they consume a lot of bandwidth, which you'll definitely notice if you have crappy home internet service or use your router for wifi instead of wireless access points. Again, a little bit of networking is your friend to upgrading your home network infrastructure to make these solutions palatable. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer anything, but I think I've already sperged a bunch and it's already tl;dr
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Oct 10, 2018 15:08
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Nest/Smarthings chat: There’s a custom Nest SmartApp to get Nest integrated into SmartThings, but it’s a bit kludgy and kind of a pain in the rear end to setup and keep updated.
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Oct 10, 2018 16:43
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Homeowners love maintaining kludgy solutions that break without warning. Perfect.
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Oct 10, 2018 16:50
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MrYenko posted:it’s a bit kludgy and kind of a pain in the rear end to setup and keep updated.
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Oct 10, 2018 19:56
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MrYenko posted:Nest/Smarthings chat: There’s a custom Nest SmartApp to get Nest integrated into SmartThings, but it’s a bit kludgy and kind of a pain in the rear end to setup and keep updated. For all the conveniences smart home things offer, I know I can depend on my 50's Honeywell round thermostat to never need a firmware update or any of that stuff, never poo poo itself over a wifi/power outage/integrating with other smart home things, and never be hacked. Also, I can count on it to never break. Not having to worry or even think about all that stuff (ever) is a fair trade off for it not being programmable, in my opinion. Take this with a grain of salt though because I'm a giant Luddite. Except I'm probably a Luddite because I work in the tech industry.
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Oct 10, 2018 23:13
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There's plenty of basic programmable thermostats that have those properties too. What you want to avoid is the smart thermostats, because they don't have 30+ years of refinement behind them and aren't being used to leverage a multi-thousand-dollar ecosystem.
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Oct 10, 2018 23:17
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