Lemme tell you, our bathroom’s wallpaper wasn’t its only problem-to-be-remedied recently. So brace yourself while we weave a little plumbing tale that spanned over the last few weeks (in fact it just wrapped up a few days ago). You know how we solemnly swear to share the good, the bad, and the ugly? Well, this one can be filed under “the bad” and “the ugly” with a side of “the gross.” So for everyone’s sake, we’ll leave out the graphic pictures.
During the process of buying this house we noticed a very small, dried out water stain on the ceiling in the living room, right below where the bathroom was. We and the inspector concluded it was likely from a toilet overflow from long ago, since the stain was only about 3″ wide and long dried up. So we weren’t too alarmed and just figured it was solved decades ago, so a little primer and ceiling paint were all that it needed. We never even photographed it, but here’s a hint as to where it was.
Then this fall, the toilet started to act up. Namely in that it would occasionally clog (this is your first hint to put down your breakfast) and when we attempted to plunge it, well, it would back-up into the shower. If that first hint didn’t work, something tells me you’re putting your breakfast down right about now.
Yeah, it was gross. And since a certain half of this relationship was already queasy from growing a tiny human, I was the only one on duty (a little pun to lighten the mood). Usually a bit more plunging and maybe a bit of snaking would fix the issue. I say “usually” because this happened more than once. And before you start judging our gastrointestinal prowess, I should note that this sort of back-up sometimes happened when the toilet wasn’t even involved – maybe after a shower or after I shaved in the sink. We googled for answers and contemplated calling in a pro, but the “incidents” were few and far enough between that we figured we could hold out ’til we remodeled the room.
But last month came the back-up that plunging could not conquer.
***PHOTO OMITTED TO PROTECT YOUR DELICATE RETINAS***
And in all of my furious plunging, I managed to create a new water stain in the ceiling below. I’d later learn that all the pressure of such vigorous plunging had compromised the wax ring and water started leaking again. That was our cue to call in a pro. He removed the toilet, ran an 150 foot snake and dislodged what he concluded was “years worth of paper build-up” way down in our pipes somewhere. Phew! Problem solved.
Except it wasn’t. Fast forward another week and the shower starts to back-up again. In fact, it happens as I’m using the tub to fill up the steamer during may latest wallpaper removal spree. So not only was that process miserable on its own, I was doing it with a less than fresh-looking (and smelling) shower nearby. Not to mention that we’re both beyond frustrated that our first call to the plumber didn’t solve the problem. So yeah, clearly the picture below was taken before the back-up happened. Just look at me all footloose and fancy free.
Remember when I called this post-wallpapered look: “gas station bathroom.” I was really thinking it was more reminiscent of that scene in Trainspotting. Yeah, you know the one. And if you don’t, well, I highly suggest that you NOT google it right now. Okay, maybe our bathroom wasn’t that bad. But it was bad enough that I was embarrassed that this was the state the plumbers would see it in.
Then again, things didn’t get much prettier once they arrived. Now that I think about it, I guess they’ve pretty much seen it all.
The plumbing company sent a different guy this time and, after explaining the series of events, he had a pretty solid theory. But it meant cutting into our ceiling to confirm it. Welcome to our crash course in two-story home issues. Kinda made us miss the days where virtually everything was visible from a crawl space or attic.
His hunch was correct. All of the bathroom plumbing was configured wrong. And it had been for 30+ years since they built this house. A key element – the slope of the main drain pipe – was incorrect. So rather than having gravity to help water leave the vicinity, it was actually sloped uphill – so water and sewage that should have been flushed down and out of the house would collect and pool and eventually back-up into the lowest opening in that bathroom (i.e. the shower). In the words of Clara: yuckaroo.
The only solution was to cut a bigger hole in the ceiling and have the experts replace all the plumbing. It even meant cutting out one of the load-bearing joists and reinforcing it with a new one so the new pipes could be configured at the right angle, so it was nothing that we dared to attempt ourselves.
Did we like having our house torn apart? No. But we were pretty relieved that the root of the problem was finally getting fixed. And I’ll admit that we were pretty entertained by the view through the floor.
It only took them a day to complete the task (they came back a few days after their initial diagnosis to get it done) along with a somewhat painful $650 check, but we were relieved that this hidden-behind-the-walls issue that had plagued this house for over three decades was finally solved. Which meant we could finally get back to our little bathroom update. And hey, while the toilet was removed, we were able to strip that small swatch of wallpaper that had been hiding behind the bowl, so that was kind of funny (very marginally at the time, but more so now).
But we were still left with that gaping hole in the living room ceiling well after the bathroom was trimmed out and painted.
We went back and forth about drywalling it ourselves – which basically involves mudding, taping, sanding, re-mudding, and re-sanding. Smooth ceilings are especially tricky (imperfections are a lot more visible up there) and we knew any remaining dents or seams would have bugged us forever, so we finally just pulled the trigger and called a highly recommended local drywall guy.
He fixed it flawlessly in a few hours for around $100, and was also very nice (he said Sherry looked like Topanga from Boy Meets World, which pretty much made our day). So now all we’ve got to do is prime and paint it.
Update: A few folks have asked if our home warranty would have covered this issue (that actually ran out before this fiasco) but it most likely would not, since this was an “existing condition” (the plumbing didn’t break after we moved in, it was configured this way for 30 years, so that’s not something typically covered by a home warranty).
These unplanned homeowner curveballs never feel good (especially when we’d rather be spending that money on fun updates that we can actually see and enjoy) but it’s nice to have things all put back together again. The irony is that we have another “oh the joys of home ownership” story unfolding (it’s still halfway-solved, so we’ll wait for the full resolution before crying on your shoulder). Please tell us we’re not the only ones. Regale us with some of your tales of woe in the plumbing/heating/other house systems arenas. We’re all in this together. Right?
Psst- The “Volume Two” part of this post’s title is thanks to this original leak lesson that we dealt with a few years ago at our last house. Best thing about that one is that it was something we could solve ourselves (read: zero benjamins).
Paula says
We had a nightmare issue like this where some flashing had been installed wrong causing water to always leak INTO the house from the roof when it rained. It took about 4 months of people coming back to look at it when it STILL leaked before the problem was finally discovered and solved once and for all. Doesn’t it make you wonder how no previous owners ever bothered to deal with something like this?!
YoungHouseLove says
Yes! I always wonder if they knew how bad it was or just thought it was “slightly glitchy” (for a while we didn’t think it was a big deal… and then it got crazy).
xo
s
Reenie says
While reading this….I thought, oh man, that’s gonna cost a couple thousand. Maybe since I’m not writing the check ~ I think what you paid is cheap!! HA!!! :)
Nicki says
We recently had a $1000 plumbing issue. Our downstairs toilet was also backing up into our shower, and any time someone upstairs took a shower, the downstairs toilet looked like it was boiling. Our plumbing must travel uphill to the main lines, and there is a sewage pump in our crawl space that pumps it up to the main line. Well, it broke. Our entire house smelled like sewer, and the pump had to be special ordered, so we could not use the toilets or shower for a week. We were forced to leave the house. the smell was so bad one evening that I was physically ill. It is finally fixed thought. But I would have much rather spent the money on a new sofa! I kept thinking, there goes my new sofa for another year!
Sarina says
These little “surprises” are no fun! But, it sounds like you have a good plan of saving for contingencies.. With your steady parade of improvements, I guess it’s always possible to delay a “fun” improvement for a needed repair.
This is also something I tell people who are thinking about buying a house for the first time. Things break, things stop working. Don’t just look at the payment and think “hey I can afford that”. What if the heat pump goes? or the roof needs replacing? Homeownership is not all fun and picking out new paint:)
Cathy C. says
Oh where do I start :) I am like you, definitely purchase fixer-uppers. In the current woes of home ownership… The upstairs master bathroom is unusable due to a rotten floor (purchased that way). The kids bathroom wax seal just started leaking about 3 days ago. The water softener isn’t fixable, and needs to be replaced. The well’s pressure tank also needs to be replaced, the bladder inside of it gave up about a month ago. The water softener and pressure tank are in a closet, and all the way in the back is the hot water heater, so we are considering replacing that at the same time, since it is blocked in by the other things we would be ripping out to replace. That closet alone is about $5000 worth of work. *sigh*
It is totally worth it though, buying a fixer.
Heather says
I feel your pain! We are in the middle of two bathroom remodel/ fixes due to our upstairs toilet leaking into the downstairs bathroom. We bought our house in April, and noticed the toilet was crooked, which really bugged me. We assumed they bolted it down crooked, but we were wrong. They never bolted it down! So it has slowly been moving and leaking over 20 years or so. Moldy gross mess! Upstairs bathroom is fixed and downstairs bathroom is gutted. Our materials are being delivered today, after 6 weeks of waiting… I’m crossing my fingers it’s getting delivered today. Outside is a snowy, windy, winter weather advisory mess so I might be waiting even longer…
Michelle says
So sorry…. Those bills stink. We had to use the money we had saved for a kitchen remodel to replace our sewer line…. Not fun. At all.
YoungHouseLove says
Ouch! I feel for you Michelle!
xo
s
Amanda says
I bet you are glad to have that problem solved! We are still dealing with our own plumbing issues, but ours are outside where the line needs to be replaced. To the tune of around $3k. So yeah, be happy with $650!!
YoungHouseLove says
Yikes!
xo
s
Sloan says
I have to say, I thought it would be a lot more than that to fix the problem! Not that I know ANYTHING about these types of things.
Stephanie says
Our home was built in 1959 (slab foundation, single story), and a few years ago we had sewage spilling out into the yard outside our house (yuck!). We ended up needing the entire sewer line from the house to the street replaced (it had been torn up by years of tree roots). Two years later, cue the same problem inside the house! This time the entire interior sewer line had collapsed (it was just old), and we had to run a new one outside from the other side of the house. Our poor front yard is still recovering!
It always helps to have a plumber you trust; I joke we ought to be best friends with ours. :-)
Jennifer says
Woe is us! We delightfully experienced this same dilemma over a Memorial Day weekend when we had houseguests. My husband prides himself on certain DIY issues but when he tried to snake and plumber’s friend our toilet we ended up with two less than fragrant tubs and showers! Who knew that all of these pipes were connected to each other? Yuck! Since it was on a holiday we had RotoRooter come out at the record screeching price of $500. Which ,I guess ,was worth every penny. I literally used about four bottles of bleach to clean up the aftermath and quite frankly considered not bathing for a few weeks! Glad you are in better shape. One other note……our house was one of the lucky ones that has polybuteline pipes. We are waiting with bated breath to have those pipes bust and have to replace the entire house to the tune of 3 to 5 grand.
The great thing about these home ownership delights is that you learn the lesson and can help others in the same trouble. And the other is that you can laugh and tell the story over and over!
Hope your latest problem does not involved anything else backing up on you!:)
Jessica M says
We bought our house 9 months ago and in that time we’ve had to replace the shower unit (the existing one melted while I was in the shower and because it was originally wired wrong the fusebox didn’t trip so I could easily have been electrocuted)
Get a plumber last week to fix an issue with a pipe up in the attic. It had come loose from another pipe which it was attached to which started affecting the water pressure and every time the toilet would flush or the shower was turned on then it would sound like a jumbo jet taking off inside the house.
Tomorrow we have to buy a new washing machine as the existing one that came with the house stopped mid spin on Saturday and it has a safety locking mechanism which meant my boyfriends clothes were actually locked inside for the best part of a day until we manually drained it and it eventually clicked open.
I’m 23 and my friends think we are nuts for getting a mortgage so young, but house prices in Ireland are really low at the moment and our mortgage is actually only costing us half what we would be paying in rent. My friends argument however is that if you are renting and things go wrong, it’s up to the landlord to cover the issues, but I think replacing a shower unit and some minor repairs are a small price to pay in the long run when it means we have something to call our own :)
Needless to say I won’t be telling my friends we have some repairs though, i’d rather keep the “I-Told-Ya-So’s” to a minimum!
Nice to see we aren’t alone too though :)
Isabel says
Oh the joys of homeownership indeed! You guys are not alone though. Couple of days after we moved into our current house, my husband was taking a shower when all of a sudden my sister starts yelling: “it’s raining in the kitchen!” I called the plumber and after making a hole in the kitchen ceiling and not finding the leak, he removed the thing you use to turn on the water in our shower, to reveal a small piece of pipe that had apparently frozen, since the house had been vacant a while, and burst when we started using it again. So we were left with a gaping hole and a $500 plumbing bill. $300 later the hole was gone and nicely drywalled, but man it hurt! Every time something like this happens I just think of the movie The Money Pit and comfort myself with the thought that it could be worse!
Manda Wolf says
I’m so sorry guys, but at least you got it fixed.
When we bought our house it was a foreclosure and the water was turned off. We have an inspector come through and he told us the old galvanized steel pipes would need to be replaced down the road, but we assumed we had another 3-5 years with them. So we bought the house, turned the water on – and nothing. We only had water to our kitchen sink (which we fought with drainage because it was originally routed out the house and into the old clay weeping tile that had collapsed over time instead of out to the sewer). All of our galvanized pipes were clogged with rust because (since it was a foreclosure) the lines weren’t drained properly and just left to sit for 2 years.
Luckily my husband is good friends with and used to work for a licensed plumber and they were able to fix our problems, but man was it a mess for a while. It took two years to even have our upstairs bathroom plumbed correctly so we could use our on suite.
I will highly recommend the gas tank less water heater we went with. So great to never run out of hot water and to not have to pay to keep 50 gallons of water heated at all times.
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks for that rec Manda! We have been thinking about a tankless water heater when it’s time to replace ours. So good to hear that you love yours!
xo
s
Venetta says
Plumbing woes I have had. The day after we bought our current home and moved in, our downstairs toilet started backing up and the other toilets and drains were having issues. We ended up calling a plumber and he snaked it and figured out we had a crushed pipe. Apparently when the builders were building this house, they poured left over concrete from the foundation into any hole in the yard, i.e. over a freshly laid pipe. Well over time the hardened concrete crushed the pipe. So $3000 later and our front yard having to be dug up on day 2 of moving in we had a new pipe (and worried neighbors wondering what the NKOTB were doing).
None of this was disclosed because the previous owners had sold the home to a relocation company and the company knew nothing about it. We had noticed the wood floor in this bathroom was warped but thought maybe just a back up happened while they were at work. Now we really know why the wood was warped. We’ve since replaced the wood with tile.
Leigh Anne says
You are not alone. We are here with you. Although we’re far apart…you’re always in my heart.
OK, enough of the MJ lyrics. Our story begins when we took our first shower in our new home about a month ago. The water pressure was miserable, as in, shampoo-while-under-the-showerhead-in-order-to-get-all-the-suds-out miserable. A “quick shower” was an absolute impossibility. Tried a couple new showerheads to no avail and called the plumber in. Some ring had slowly worked it’s way into the pipe and clogged the water line. They estimated it had been like that and gotten worse slowly over years. It probably happened so slowly the previous homeowner didn’t even notice. A couple hundred bucks later and the water pressure is amazing and doesn’t make me want to curse and scream when I have to take a shower. Money well spent!
I’d also like to add that the lights to turn on the front porch are located in the master bedroom on the second floor. Not in the foyer. She liked being able to turn off the lights from bed. That is our task for another day. To be continued…
YoungHouseLove says
Oh man! I loved your song though, for what it’s worth! Haha!
xo
s
julianna says
Wow, I can’t believe how cheap home repair professionals are in your area! You guys are so lucky.
Jess says
A good lesson to never ignore or put off water issues. They’ll bite you in the butt (pun intended). LOL I’m actually pretty impressed it was only $650 to fix. Glad it happened before a newborn was around!
Theresa says
Silver lining — new wax ring and rock steady toilet that will last for years and years, even with Clara and her brother dancing on it.
YoungHouseLove says
Haha!
xo
s
Dawn says
Our home was built in the 70s. When we moved in, we noticed the shower was slow to drain, and the toilet would clog easily occasionally even without..ummm….”solids”. We ignored it like you did, because it was very intermittent. Fast forward a few years, think during the huge snowstorm we got in Central VA in 2010. Of course, this is when the sewage started to back up in our toilet and shower. We ended up having to dig up and replace the pipe running from our house to our septic tank, and replacing our entire drain field. (When I say “we” I mean the plumber.) The pipes and drain field were ruined by several large maple trees we have on our property. The check was hard to write, but no problems since!!! So, I feel and SMELL your pain!
Sarah MC says
Yikes! We haven’t had any major issues so far… ::knocks on wood::
…although we did have to disassemble our staircase and cut a hole in our ceiling to get our queen-sized beds up our narrow, 1934 staircase. (Getting the mattresses in through the windows wasn’t an option, either.) We’ve joked that if/when we sell the house, we’re including the beds just so we don’t have to get them back down the stairs!
As far as plumbing issues go, your “symptoms” sound a lot like what happened at my parents’ house 3.5 years ago: a flushing toilet would back up into the tub in the downstairs bathroom, etc. Eventually a plumber figured out that one of the large trees in the front yard had spread its roots over to the main plumbing line and penetrated it! After tearing up the front yard to build a “workaround” into the main line and having to re-landscape the front yard, everything flushes/drains appropriately…but my parents can’t have low-flow toilets in the house because they don’t generate enough force per flush to actually clear the workaround in the main sewer line. (They even had to put “dummy toilets” in the house after their reno was finished just for the inspection and then replace them with the old toilets!)
Janice @ Life Begins at Thirty, RIght? says
OMG repair work is so CHEAP where you are!! I don’t think I could get anyone to my house for 650. To do ANYTHING.
I’m sorry you had to go through that but at least the fix wasn’t tooooo crazy.
Ali Burtt says
Early last summer, we were just getting ready to pull the trigger on new hardwood floors for the entire house when first our air conditioning failed and both the furnace and compressor had to be replaced. And while we were debating going ahead with the floors anyway, the water heater stopped heating. We don’t like to get below a certain threshold in our house fund (in case of emergencies, ha!) so that put the whole flooring project in hold for a YEAR. Crossing my fingers that come April, nothing else happens and we can finally afford to get rid of all this beige wall-to-wall carpet.
Sarah says
We woke up one morning and discovered that our ceiling had fallen in the kitchen on our washer and dryer…which are conveniently located in the kitchen of course…ha. The culprit was the upstairs toilet that we’d fixed the wax ring on in the fall, supposed it fixed, but it wasn’t. :( Come to find out the whole floor was rotten from the previous owners, so when we allowed water back into the toilet, it came running into the kitchen ceiling every time someone flushed. Gross. So basically whenever weight was applied to the seat of the toilet, the floor would move away from the wax ring due to the rotten wood and allow the water free reign. Bathroom has since been gutted and rebuilt with new subfloor, floor joists, the works…because you know…having the entire toilet in the kitchen was imminent and not so appleaing. :/
YoungHouseLove says
That’s so crazy! So glad nobody got hurt!
xo
s
Leah says
We had a rotted subfloor too. Our maintenance guy would keep coming out to retighten the bolts on our loose subfloor. I finally pointed out, to the head guy, that our floor was squishy too. They replaced that bad subfloor so fast. Upside: beautiful new tile floor instead of poorly installed linoleum!
Condo Dweller says
If it makes you feel better, I had a similar disaster case with my shower last year. A roof repair dislodged part of the piping for the shower drain and all of the water from the shower drained directly into my living room ceiling. Unfortunately, the water ran across the living room ceiling, down a door jamb, and into the living room ceiling of the apartment below me. The neighbors were the ones that noticed the damage first. All told, the damage was closer to $3000 but covered partially by condo insurance.
Sarah says
Oh I feel your pain! 2 months in to owning my townhouse (that was only 5 years old) I had a huge leak from the toilet in my upstairs bathroom… (luckily it was clean water and nothing else!) that went downstairs through the dining room light fixtures below… then down through the wall into the basement… so, a 3 floor fix was needed! Everything was wrecked from flooring, to ceiling to the walls, so pretty much a total gut job of the main floor and basement. Insurance covered it, and I basically got them to do the reno that I wanted to do anyway… but chaos.. for 3 months. Not fun! Glad yours only took a few days to get back to normal!
Jody says
Our house is 112 years old. Two thanksgivings ago the electrical box almost caught on fire. Two days before our huge ohio state party. We had the chimney cave in at midnight in the basement. Rain=water in the basement. One hard rain we had water running down the living room wall. It happened one more time before we got the problem fixed.
mollie says
Still laughing. I first read that as “Sherry said that the guy looked like Topanga.” I was thinking that was a little alarming and NOT that it would have made my day!
YoungHouseLove says
HAHA!
xo
s
Jen @ The Decor Scene says
Oh yuckaroo is right!!! The first house I had ever owned….picture it, you just pay all of that money on a house and then BAM 2 weeks later and you literally have “poop” floating in your backyard. UGH!!! One of the very old clay pipes broke that went from the house to the cesspool. So about $650 later I had a new PVC pipe and I had the cesspool cleaned out. Oh and I had to redo the grass in the backyard after all of that digging. Yard was never the same again. :( Yup sold that house a year later and made my money back and then some!!! LOL. Win win for me and the new owners. ;)
Michelle says
A few years ago our third child clogged the toilet on our second level (two story with a finished basement) by using too much paper. Apparently he kept flushing, because while I was making dinner, I heard this trickling water noise. Horrified, I ran around trying to find the source. Water was pouring down into our main level bathroom through the walls and ceiling.
Now completely panicked, I raced to the basement to get some beach towels to soak up the (mercifully clean) water. As I raced past my oldest’s bedroom, I see a literal waterfall cascading down through his ceiling (drop ceiling) and down onto the bed. The cat was cowered under the edge of the bed terrified to move.
I don’t even remember how we cleaned all of that up. I think I blocked it out of my conscious. I feel like my PTSD is acting up reading your story.
Glad all is well now!!
Sarah J. says
we had the same toilet backing up into the bathtub thing happen in an old little duplex we rented (which ment that our adjoining neighbors had their bathtub filling up at the same moment due to connected plumbing). ours was due to tree roots had grown into the pipes. and thankfully the landlord was on the ball and called the plumber asap! but i know the feeling of dread when the tub is filling from the drain up… yuck!
Anna says
We bought a new washer and dryer when we moved into our current place, and within a few weeks we started smelling smoke whenever the dryer was running.
Our first thought was “Crap, we bought a lemon!”
Oh no, the dryer was practically perfect in every way. We discovered our vent was all wrong and not up to code. The dryer had been pushing all that hot air into the drywall and essentially burning the insulation…
Right now, my husband rigged the dryer to vent into the laundry room, which I keep telling myself is really like having a personal sauna. The longterm fix is to start cutting drywall and replace the vent pipes.
Steph Reiner says
I read this whole post laughing and thinking “Ewwwwww pooooop!” because apparently I’m a 5-year-old boy. Still, I love that you guys shared the bad, ugly, gross because it makes me feel better about having to deal with our own toilet/bath situation that was pretty horrific.
Everyone poops. Even famous (yeah, I’d probably go all fangirl if I ever saw you guys) internet bloggers. :D
Tiffany says
We had a couple big “joys” after first moving in. First, our sump pump was connected to the storm drains, a big no-no, especially for my civil engineer hubby. Since we knew a plumber pretty well, we got off pretty easy. But the best was our crumbling, poorly installed roof that got hit by a well timed hail storm. We knew the roof would need to be replaced, but when my hubby called our insurance about his truck being damaged, our agent sent an adjustor to check out the roof just in case. My husband worked in forensic engineering for four years (think CSI for buildings) and knew the hail storm was not to blame, but this adjustor said he was a pro and would make that decision. Free roof for us!! Thanks hail storm!
Julie R says
Mine isn’t a gross story, but we just purchased a quad level home. Somewhere, two circuits were wired together, and every fuse in the box will shut off everything (minus the bathrooms & laundry room). This also means we never blow fuses, we just get brown outs. The result? We cannot use the microwave if we’re watching TV. Turning on the microwave (installed above the stove) will actually shut our TV off. And now we have our old counter-top microwave in a corner of the laundry room. Don’t you just love old houses?
Heather says
Oh young peeps, things like this are always painful. We once had a house with a septic tank, and after it rained things didn’t drain well. As in, flushing the toilet meant gurgling grossness in the shower. We had the tank emptied — if after emptying a septic tank you hear the sounds of pouring water, that means your lead lines are broken, probably by the dozens of trees the previous owners decided to plant Right By The Lines. Our 3-digit $$ repair then hit the 4-digit price. We ended up having to put in leech field. Oh, and i was pregnant with our first one at the time. And now fast forward 20 years, different state, different house. No gurgling or plumbing issues, but the odor when it rains — it’s #reallife stuff. Tank was emptied, that same sound from 20 years re-introduced itself, and … big sigh. But I need a new roof and deck, so the lines will have to wait. Fingers crossed nothing starts gurgling anytime soon. I feel your pain, I truly do.
Rachel says
Didn’t you have a homeowners warranty to cover this sort of thing? We purchased our house last spring, and this winter (right between bouts of Polar Vortex) our heater died! As in, wouldn’t light, wouldn’t turn on, made horrible screeching noises if we tried. Thankfully, because of our warranty, we’ve had 2 visits from a repairman, a new motor, a thorough cleaning and duct repair covered 100%! We were hoping the AC would die over the summer, but no luck. It’s older than me, which is worrisome in a major appliance!
YoungHouseLove says
Sadly ours ran out before this fiasco (but it did cover a whole new furnace, so we’re grateful for that). The slightly comforting realization is that this probably wouldn’t have been covered anyway since it was a “prexisting condition” (the pipes were obviously configured this way since the house was built, so it wasn’t like something new broke, which is what home warranties cover).
xo
s
abby says
It’s so disheartening having to spend money on the must-dos when there are so many want-to-dos. I’m in the same boat right now. I’m having to weigh a moderate spend to patch some problems in my roof, crossing my fingers that it will buy me a year or two before a new roof is necessary. Or, bite the bullet and spend the big money on a new roof now and be done with it. So many more fun things I’d rather throw money at! I feel your pain. Here’s hoping for no more surprises for you!
Teresa says
My husband and I purchased my mothers home from her with the plan that she would live with us in the “mother-in-law” quarters that she had remodeled into the house before we moved in. In enlarging the house she had reconfigured the laundry room to open out opposite it’s original design…this entailed facing the washing machine and dryer in the opposite direction, as well. In order to accomplish this the remodelers used the original drain pipes from the washer, which now drained UPHILL for a short but very important 18 inches. Over the years, although I never knew why, each time the washer drained I had to race like a madwoman to shut it off and let it continue draining without the added pressure of the drain pump, otherwise it would back up and flood the tiny laundry room; this doubled the time it took for each load. I developed sonic hearing, able to hear the change in sound indicating the drain cycle from anywhere in the house!
Pia says
Well. We had a company rip out our entire bathroom prior to moving into our new home. We just didnt want to end up with these kind of problems :-) Our house is from 1960 and the bathroom was never updated so it was about time and we only have one bathroom so it is kind of important to have that working. Now I just need to worry about the toilet… those pipes have not been replaced… I will do some serious wall and ceiling staring when I get home…
Lindsay says
We wanted to install a new shower head in the master bathroom. Only problem was the curved pipe coming out of the wall was twisted, so water was spraying the side of the shower once the new fixture was installed. Seems like an easy fix – replace the curved pipe with new, reinstall shower head, and call it a day. Nope! The curved pipe was stuck to the pipe in the wall with some type of non-normal adhesive. After cutting out a section of drywall, using a torch to ‘sweat’ the adhesive off, and trying not to overheat with two people in a shower, the curved pipe finally came off and a replacement complete. Since the bathroom was a disaster from this project, we took it one step further and replaced the linoleum with tile. Nothing like a ‘Joys of Homeownership’ fiasco to get your boot-ay in gear to tackle another project on the never-ending list!
Lisa says
Oh, the plumbing tales I could tell you (140+ year old house) years of plumbing issues, the last which involved heavy equipment and two DEEP trenches in the back yard – the bright side, we found a brand new manhole in the back yard (from the 40’s or 50’s we think) – never used! Instead, they had routed the old terracotta pipes across the yard to a spot in a parking lot behind us. Needless to say, when the parking lot was renovated, all the pipes were crushed and chaos ensued inside the house. Thousands of dollars later, the plumbing is now rerouted & fingers crossed, all is well. (Except for the leak under the kitchen sink… but that’s a story for another day)
Rosie S says
Oh yeah….plumbing issues are the worst. We had a toilet back up when we did the wash…that was a ‘tree root in the sewer line’ problem. The only good thing about that was, the water was basically ‘clean’, er… except that it backed up thru the toilet. Still, kind of clean water! We had a furnace fail and replaced at -25 degrees (air temp, not wind chill) and let me tell you, there is no bargaining for a good price when you AND the cat are wrapped in down sleeping bags, teeth chattering! Those are some highlights, with many more small tales of woe untold. But still, I have loved every home we have owned! Hopefully, the yucky problems are behind you! ;)
Amy says
I’m impressed that it was only $650. We had some plumbing done last fall that seems less involved and it was more than that!
YoungHouseLove says
Yeah, thankfully that section was only a few feet of piping that needed to be replaced, but I think for longer spans it can be a lot more! We were lucky!
xo
s
Karen says
Thanks for the drywall guy’s info. I was going to ask next. I think we have the same house! (30 year old house in Richmond, wood trim that we are in the process of painting, a kitchen re-do needed, and a hole in the ceiling from a master bath leak :)
CarrieE says
Frustrating as it is, it helps to see that leaks and repairs are just part of home ownership and we all have issues. Lately, it seems like things on our to-do list are multiplying. Then something happens and gets bumped to the top of the list. Like our recent adventure — replacing the inside and outside units for our HVAC system. Ouch! But it sure feels good knowing that we will be warm throughout the next polar vortex!
Tess @ Cross Country Cajun says
We bought a major fixer upper (sidenote: my secret goal is to submit to the home crashing series in the future). Part of our problem with the house was that the water heater was in the middle of the living room in a weird closet along with the AC return. Thousands upon thousands of dollars later, we have a garage homed water heater and an AC return in a more workable spot. We didn’t do our research about moving both units and wow, were we shocked at the price. We also have completely rotted subfloor between both of our full upstairs bathrooms so that is our next house woe to undertake. Thanks for sharing these stories because your site is the only one that gives the REAL behind the pretty updates and I totally appreciate it!
Jess says
I don’t really have a gross one (yet, we still have to replace the 30 year old toilets), but it definitely wasn’t great to have to replace the water heater suddenly after trying to take a hot shower and instead taking a cold one.
Did I mention we had a solar water heating system? Yeah, like the first one ever made, even had the owners manual to prove it…printed in 1986. To replace the unit like with like would have been $2500. If we replaced it with a regular water heater we would have to cap off all the plumbing to the roof solar panels and add some pipe in the basement. Since the stupid thing hadn’t worked right from the day we moved in, and I was sick of this green “coolant” crap leaking in my basement (supposedly the “safe” kind, yeah right), I put my foot down and opted for the regular old energy-sucking unit. In the end we were out $580 for a new 50 gallon heater installed, and the guy actually hauled the old 200lb cement line solar tank out for us, we really got lucky as he could have charged a lot more. It took 4 guys to drag it up the basement stairs.
And then 2 weeks later the water softener puked it’s salty guts out all over the basement floor. That one my husband replaced and it was super easy. Unfortunately when he tried to replace the water filter unit next to it at the same time a pressurized pipe broke and spewed a freaking geyser of water straight up onto the insulation and floor joists above. 4 trips to Lowes and a day off work later we were finally back in business. Silver lining though: I got 3 five gallon buckets full of dry rock salt out of that thing, which had to be empty before the trashman would take it. Didn’t need to buy driveway salt for 2 years :)
Elaine says
Very similar story but not a clog, just a vent drain with bad placement. A shower install screeched to a halt while we found a plumber to move the pipe.
$1100 and a patched hole in the kitchen ceiling later and we have a new master shower.
Jayne says
Love the Topanga comment. I totally agree!