If you don’t change the oil on the car — it won’t keep running.  If you don’t make that dreaded trip to the dentist – your teeth will fall out.  Are houses any different?   I think not.  Take care of it today and it will look great, appreciate and in value and provide you loads of pleasure.  Ignore it and your savings this year will put you in the ‘money pit’ category in future years.  If you don’t take care of the house… it won’t keep appreciating.  Pretty simple concept, but not one that every home owner practices.    Ongoing maintenance costs are estimated at 1.5 to 4% of the purchase price annually.  Here is an interesting article from Coldwell Banker about estimating maintenance costs http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/News?action=viewNewsItem&contentId=700662&customerType=Buyer 

At Home Fridays we walk the walk and encourage, plan and execute regular maintenance for our home owners.  Not taking care of the furnace – will mean replacement, not painting will save you money for a few years and then cost more when the paint job requires siding replacement.  Decks look great if you seal annually, but ignore them for years and you might be looking at a major replacement job. 

Recently a home owner (not a Home Fridays client) ordered new floors installed in their home.  When the flooring installer went to the home, they found the floors wet due to a major leak.  The home owner is remote and had no idea about the leak.  Someone was called in to fix the leak.  To fix the leak, the roof needed to cleared of snow.  So the homeowner paid the floor installer to clear the roof.  

Roofs and floors are substantially different and wouldn’t you know it – something awful happened.  The guys clearing the snow tossed so much snow on top of the gas meter – that they broke it.  But they didn’t know it was broken.  So someone else figured that out.  The gas company came and capped the meter and shut off the gas.  So the repair guys come out 3 days later to finish the job and the house is cold (no gas, no heat) and the pipes are freezing. 

This will be a fun one for the owner to explain to the insurance company!  The simple solution – have a local contact that watches the house, hires and manages all the workers.  That way you are getting the right people, doing the right job and in the end – saving a lot of money!   

Lots of owners tell me stories about what awful things have happened on their homes.  One that I really hate to hear about is getting taken advantage of by greedy vendors.  I heard about a home owner who paid over $1,000 to have her roof cleared of snow.  That is really too much (unless her home is very very very large and has a flat roof)!  She was called by the neighbor who told her she needed to have the roof cleared and they had 7 guys in the driveway that could do it.    Were they roofers?  Were they licensed?  How are their references?  Who knows in an ‘urgent’ situation such as this – neighborhood  peer pressure.

What would Home Fridays do?  First we would be checking on the roof regularly (we look 2x per week to inspect the roof snow levels and ice damns during extreme weather).  We would call in a licensed qualified roofer to remove the snow.  We want the folks on the roof to be experienced with roofs, understand how roofs are built, where it is safe to walk and what needs to be cleared.  We look at what is necessary to clear.  It is almost always necessary to clear the eaves – this clears the way for snow melt and helps minimize ice damns.  Then depending on the shape, slope and ice damns we figure out what else needs to be cleared.  Many times you can get the valleys cleared, the eaves cleared and around the sky lights.   This will create a safe roof and minimize your cost.  In the clearing process we make sure the decks and other key areas are not burdened.  Some snow removal companies just do the roofs and then you end up with a deck that has over 5 feet of snow built up – which is over the structural load for the deck. 

It is hard to get these items taken care of when you are far away.  That is why it is better to have a local contact who can manage everything.  You shouldn’t find yourself in a pickle with last minute ‘urgent’ needs and at the mercy of unknown ‘guys’ clearing your roof in the seventh hour. 

We have had a busy week.  We have had 3 furnaces go out –  one after the other and each with a unique problem.  The importantance of checking weekly on temps can not be over emphasized.   One furnace was a faulty part that caused the propane leak, another was snow blocking the air intake and the third was caused by heavy winds blowing down the exhaust pipe – shutting off the furnace.    None of these problems are the result of neglect – but without an inperson visit who could have known.  Cold alerts on the house are great – but what do you do if you are not close by to fix.  With the ever-changing temperatures in Central Oregon a personal touch is important.  Right now everyone is up and running, keeping warm and we are enjoying a few days of sunshine and warmth.    Don’t let your home go unattended!

I have been hearing about some companies that offer inexpensive ‘drive bys’ to home owners as a means of checking on their homes.  What the heck is a drive by?  What can you see from outside the home that is helpful to maintaining the home?  What about the back side of the house?  What about inside?  What about the temperature?  What about water leaks? What about pest intrusions?  What about propane leaks?  What about the hot tub status -  is it cold, did the top blow off?  None of this can be detected from the outside of a house.  Save your money – driving by won’t tell you a thing about the house.  A proper inspection inside and outside of the house is necessary to identify the issues.  And continued knowledge of the house is helpful to spot anything that is running amiss before it becomes critical. 

At Home Fridays we are inside and outside the house every week.  We know the house and watch it closely to see what is happening, what needs immediate attention and what needs to be kept a close eye on.   Some things (like ice damns) might melt away safely on their own – or they might not.  But if you only show up once in a while how will you know?  If you drive by what do you know about the ice damns on the back side of the house?   Spend your money wisely and stay away from ‘drive by’ home management.  Here is a link to questions you should ask when hiring someone to watch your home.  http://www.homefridays.com/property-management-questions.php 

The not so sweet smell of propane greeted us upon entry and inspection to one of our homes.  If left unattended either the house would have blown up or the furnaces shut down and major freezing occurred.   The number of propane explosions across the country is scary.  Here is a link about the dangers  http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/case/propane-explosions.html

What Happened  Upon entering the house we found the unmistakable smell of a major propane leak – rotten eggs in the house.  We quickly exited the home and made calls from outside to get help.

Home Fridays Solution  We called the furnace company because they had been in the house just last week for a repair and the furnace was most likely the cause of the problem.  If the furnace company had not been able to come to the house immediately we would have called the fire department.  Once the fire department shut off the propane to the house – the furnace guys would need to come in and get everything fixed.  The furnace guys showed up while we waited at the the top of the driveway with the house doors open and airing out.  He was able to identify the faulty part and shut down the furnace.  This house has two furnaces – so the other furnace was called upon to heat the entire house.  The solution took several days to finalize and included digging out the propane tank (buried in the snow) and replacing a part several times.  But in the end the house was aired out, the smell was gone and the furnace was back in action. 

The importance of removing snow from the roof and around the house can not be overstated.  The problem we had with this furnace was a direct result of too much snow blocking the intake.  Whether you intake is on the side of the house or the roof – it should be checked.  We have had intakes/exhaust for furnaces blocked in both instances and it can cause some very expensive damage!  Of course if the dryer isn’t working – that could also be a snow blockage to the external vent. 

What Happened   Home Fridays entered the house and found the temperature to be 44 degrees.  In this current cold winter we are having it would be a sure thing to freeze the pipes if the house temperature continued dropping over night.   The furnace was running – but pushing out cold air.  This house is in the middle of a major remodel and I knew we had a great deal of traffic in the home.

Home Fridays Solution  Home Fridays made a quick call to the contractor to make sure they didn’t shut off the gas or do anything that might affect the furnace.  The house had been warm when the contractors arrived in the morning (  it had dropped 20 degrees in 4 hours inside the house after their departure).   A second call was made to the furnace guys – who put off their afternoon plans and rushed over to help.  The problem was identified as not enough air intake.  The intake valve was buried in the snow.  Unusual for the area – but not unheard of with the levels of snow we have right now.   After digging, tampering, replacing some burned out parts and some additional cleaning the furnace was warming the house once again.  

It is the season of ice damns and we have a few on our home at Home Fridays.  There are several great articles out there about why they exist and how to prevent them  http://www.buildingscience.com/documents/digests/bsd-135-ice-dams/   The primary solution printed is usually stop warming the attic, stop the air flow.  All great advise, but useless once the house is built, the winter is upon us and the ice damns are here. 

So what are they?  Simply put the snow is in a freeze melt cycle – melts off the roof, starts down the roof and then freezes as it gets to the colder edge of the roof or gets stuck behind ice with no place to go.  Water is a fickle thing – it wants to travel down with gravity to the path of least resistance.  Unfortunatley this does not always mean ‘off’ the roof.  It might be down under the shingles as the ice can push up the shingles and create a cavity for the water to flow into.  And once it starts that downward path into the house – well it is just a matter of time.

So what to do?  You can have the ice damns chipped off the house.  Ice is a strong, strong material and a build up can be very costly to remove.  Also, chiseling away can damage the roof and gutters that might not  currently be damaged.  So what do we do at Home Fridays?  We inspect the ice damns and watch to see what is happening on the roof as it builds.  If the cavities are forming under the shingles and we see water intrusion – we are chipping them out and repairing the roof.   We watch the weather to see how much melt we are having.  During the intense cold we wait – the activity happens with the melting.  The first damage is usually to the gutters which can easily be pulled off by the ice (in some cases the gutters are currently held on by the ice).   If only the gutters are damaged – we will still wait and fix those in the spring (or remove them all together).  On the roofs we are also looking for valleys or puddling.  Some of our roof architecture lends to puddling – and thus ice damns.  Again we are watching to see what the ice/water are doing.  A well built roof with sufficient underlayments should not allow water intrusion.  Of course it is impossible to tell if you have a well built roof when it is under snow. 

So what should you do if you have ice damns – keep a very close eye on the outside and the inside area of the attic all around where the ice damns are.  At the first signs of water intrusion or puddling get a licensed roofer and or contractor to get the problem corrected.   In Central Oregon this is the first time in many many years we have seen any significant ice damns.  So the waiting game begins…

Snow has reached such a high level in some areas that it is blocking the intake and exhaust of the furnace systems.  Not even in Sunriver did they build thinking they would need to worry about 8 feet of snow on the ground.  It is very important to look at your furnace and see where the exhaust and intake are.  Then go ouside and make sure they are above the snow and have a clear path of oxygen.  If not, dig them out right away and make sure they stay clear.   If they system is blocked from getting air it will shut off – and then very quickly you will have a frozen house. 

You thought you only had to worry about snow on the roof, access to the front door, or too much on the deck!  Get digging and stay warm:-) 

At last – the sunshine has returned!  And that means the snow will melt.  And now the fun begins – where does all the water go?  Travel will start getting tough as the roads flood.  Yards with drainage issues are going to have problems – and there isn’t a lot we can do right now.  The big issue is the keep your eyes open for leaking roofs.  The ice damns on the roofs that have been so nicely concealed by snow, will start melting.  Water likes to travel downward following gravity.  That does not always mean down the ‘outside’ of the house.  If it is easier (due to ice) to travel down under the shingles and into the house – now is the time.  So as we warm up – keep an eye out for drips in the attics, under the garage doors and keep an eye on the crawl spaces.  Yes, it does happen where the flooding starts from the ground up – so keep an eye on the crawl space.  Of course the nightly freezes will add some interesting transportation issues – do they sell ice skates for my car?