All Forum Posts by: Bob H.

Whatever you do, don't leave the oven next to the refrigerator. That seems like a bad place for a heat source.

Recently I get many more responses from Zillow and its companion sites Trulia and Hotpads than from Craigslist, but I always post in both systems. I don't see any decline in prospect quality on Craigslist.

One thing that can happen with Craigslist, which I've seen personally just once in 20 years, is that a scammer can copy your ad, substitute different contact information and claim to be out of town. Then the scammer lowers the rent and offers to send keys in exchange for a deposit sent by untraceable Western Union wire. People lacking skepticism may fall for this, but they could be fooled on other platforms, too.

You should find out whether the replacement siding is available. If the contractor just doesn't think it's available and isn't making an effort to find out, it may be that he wants to make money on the new siding job.

If you divide the heating bill among the tenants without giving them a way to control all the usage they pay for, it may create friction among the tenants.

This reminds me of the house I rented long ago in college in Missouri. My roommate and I, on the second floor, paid 35% of the bill, as did the first-floor tenants, and the basement tenants paid 30%. We got tired of the tenants on the first floor leaving windows open while the heat was on. We conspired with the engineering students in the basement to install a replacement thermostat on the second floor. Our engineering friends disconnected the regular thermostat on the first floor and connected our new one, so the open windows no longer cranked up the furnace. Our problem was solved until the landlord somehow found out. :)

Lime-Away, CLR or the generic version of Lime-Away sold at Dollar Tree will take off mineral deposits better than vinegar.

A pic from above would help.

I think you'll end up removing the black grout on the edges, but first try taping it with an edge-holding tape, such as Frog Tape, and then paint the outside half of the grout with the wall paint, making the grout visually thinner. If that doesn't work, maybe you could cut off that grout and, with careful knife work, dig out a little slit under the edge of the tile -- enough to insert a modified metal or plastic edging. You would need to cut the edging so that there is only a narrow piece to insert under the tile.

As for the outlet, leaving it covered violates the electrical code, I think, and of course leaves you missing an outlet. But I'm not sure you mean it's covered up; maybe the tile is just too close to where the screws for the plate go. Either way, you __might__ be able to use an angle grinder to cut away the excess tile instead of removing entire pieces. Make a test "wall" with some spare tile and wallboard or cement board first, and practice on that.

Rent a truck that has a lift on the back so the refrigerator can remain upright and does not have to be lifted manually. If rolling the refrigerator over a nice hardwood floor or another kind of floor that a could be damaged, have two pieces of thin Masonite hardboard, about 3 feet by 4 feet, so you can roll the fridge onto one, then move the other into the path, until you get to the destination.

I like the french drain, too, and I don't see why it would need to be inside. I had a similar situation, with one major difference. This was a house in California, which like most there was built on a slab and had no basement. It had a hill in the back that sloped toward the house.

When we bought the house, the sellers disclosed drainage issues that had led to a lawsuit. They sued the owners who had sold to them for not disclosing the problems. When the people who sold to me lived there, they experienced wet floors in some rooms in the winter. There also was quite a bit of efflorescence on the garage floor and driveway, causing the surface to be crumbly. The diagnosis was that water seeping through clay from the next-door neighbor's house, uphill, and from that hill in the back would build up pressure in the winter and push through the concrete, making the floors wet.

The previous owners settled their lawsuit and built a french drain on the side of the house, where the hill was closest. We hired an engineer who recommended extending the drain around the back of the house, and we took that advice. We hired a company to come in with equipment to tear out the back patio and sidewalk, which were pretty ugly anyway. That company dug a trench for the drain to go out to the street. I built the drain, with the perforated pipe at the bottom and a solid pipe for downspout water higher up. Then I rented a Bobcat to regrade the back yard and added a short retaining wall at the base of the hill. Then came a new sprinkler system, a deck just off the ground, etc.

It was a big deal, but it worked! In the 17 years of owning the house, we never had any problem with wet floors or other drainage issues. So I'm a big believer in french drains.

You might want to tell the tenant the approximate cost of replacing the whole mirror and explain that, for small things, you have to stick to a practical solution, which in this case might be no glowing ring. I fix a lot of things, so if it were my rental I probably would try to take the light apart and figure out what's wrong with it.

As for the warranty idea, I try to buy with a credit card that provides an extra year of coverage on items that come with a warranty.