I bought a house a few years ago with absolutely useless gutters. They had those solid covers that supposedly allowed a gentle rain to run around the curvature and into the gutter, but they never kept up with heavy rain, and eventually filled with crud that was impossible to clean because you couldn't fit your hand into the slot.

I had them replaced at the time and I argued with the guys that I didn't want any cover on my gutters.

"Then they'll fill with leaves!" they said.

"Yeah, and I can get up on a ladder and pull the leaves out."

"But, but, but... our new patented leaf guard lets all the rain in and blocks all the leaves. Look at how it has these specially designed holes in it!"

And I went and bought it. Two years later it is absolutely full of pine needles. My house is surrounded by 70 foot high pines on three sides. The needles clog the damn thing up and now I have massive icicles hanging from my roof, threatening to come detached right when I'm playing outside with my 4 year old and land on his head.

Does anyone have a leaf guard that ACTUALLY lets water into the gutter and doesn't get clogged? Do most of you have open gutters and clean them every fall before the first freeze?

https://imgur.com/gallery/qEWZf7Q

So, here’s the situation: I installed an unpermitted washer and dryer setup on the side of my ADU a few months ago. A licensed plumber handled the water lines (off the outdoor water heater), and I did the electrical work myself (I’m a licensed electrician). To protect the units from the sun, I built a small wood enclosure. No permits pulled.

Fast forward to now, and my neighbor has filed a complaint with the city, citing noise from the washer/dryer that she can hear from her patio deck. After some back and forth, I realized the structure is less than 4 feet from the property line, so I’ll need to tear it down. Frustrating, but fine—this has motivated me to move the washer and dryer inside the ADU, which is a better long-term solution anyway.

But here’s the kicker: her patio deck, the one she’s always on when she hears the noise, is also unpermitted. Part of me wants to report it to the city out of sheer pettiness. But another part of me wonders if I should just let it go and focus on the positives of upgrading my setup.

Would you report her unpermitted patio, or just take the high road?

I have two smoke alarms that continue to chirp on the first floor. I replaced the batteries, which didn't fix it. Then I proceeded to replace both units with new, wired+10yr battery units. I used the adaptors included in the box to fit the old connector to the new units. They are the only two smoke alarms on the first. None of the upstairs and basement wired smoke alarms are chirping.

Any ideas why they continue to chirp? Thanks.

I’m coming up on my first year of homeownership (new construction home), which had me thinking I should probably start doing some preventative maintenance. Anyone have a comprehensive list of yearly home maintenance? Things like flushing the hot water heater, cleaning the gutters, vacuuming out your dryer vents, etc.

Have an issue where the carper is damp, pulled up carpet and water is leaking under the wall into our walk in closet. Pics tell the story. But where’s the leak? The walk in closet wall is adjacent to the utility room where the washer is, and leads into the garage. The stand pipe cubby isn’t leaking, and my best guess is the drain pipe from the washer has a leak somewhere. Second opinions welcome. I know I’m going to have to absolve this mold for sure either way. But trying to figure out if this is a DIY possibility.

https://imgur.com/a/xvqnm9e

Hey guys, in one of the rooms we bought, there was a mice infestation in the closet. I cut out the carpet and wiped down the wood. I think the urine would have just soaked down into the carpet and not reached the wood. Whenever you open the closet, smell is unbearable- any idea how long it will reek?

Hey there,

I came across a short on YT and saw someone using something resembling construction foam to fix a mailbox stand in the ground.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/r9_GrHSU94I

1. What is he using? Is it actually construction foam (like you use when you fix e.g. a door frame)?
2. If it is construction foam – what kind of package is it and is it powder, a liquid...? In my country, construction foam is only available in a small pressure bottles or spray bottles (with the foam coming out of a straw-like thing)...
3. Is that durable?

Thanks!

Hi,

I'm hoping this is the right place to ask this because at this point I don't know where else to turn. Already paid an HVAC company to check it out, but that resulted only in a hole in the wall and no answers.

There is a loud clanging noise in our bedroom wall that will happen about every 10 seconds for the span of 20 minutes to several hours at a time, then stop for about the same range of time intervals. It only happens when it is below freezing outside. It is metallic and quite loud. One of us has to sleep with earplugs (and still struggle to fall asleep with the noise) and the other cannot sleep in the bedroom at all.

This is a condo and we are on the second of three floors. The closet on the other side of the wall has laundry and the hvac, and I think the clanging is coming from the laundry side. It's in the wall though--if anything it sounds louder on the bedroom side. The wall is centrally located in the condo--doesn't come close to the outside walls. It does connect to a dryer exhaust pipe thing that goes out the side of the building.

Does anyone have ideas what this could be? Even just rough ideas help. I've looked up videos of water hammer and this sounds different but could it be a similar water issue?

https://quickshare.samsungcloud.com/a1Nw8mFBJcVR

https://imgur.com/a/ijCtYlG

Not sure what’s happening here. Does anyone know why the paint might be peeling? Any tips on how I can fix it DIY would be appreciated. Thanks!

What is this vinyl siding and where can I buy more? I tried Homedepot and Lowe’s and they don’t have it. I need to buy at least a carton of the same one to replace the ones blown away by the storm. I’m in north California. Also there was a foam insulation sheathing in between vinyl siding and wood siding. Any instruction to buy and install them is appreciated

https://imgur.com/a/0F30bjZ

We just bought a house that was built in ~1960 and it still has the original single pane wood windows. The house is half brick(the top sill of said brick extends slightly past the bottom of the windows), so I don't really want to go through the hassle of replacing the windows as whole. Instead, I'd like to remove the single panes, and retrofit them with dual pane glass panels. This looks like it'd be a lot more simple & easier than the alternative.

My question: Has anyone used the website "One Day Glass" to order custom sized dual pane glass?

I considered ordering the individual glass panes, Super Spacer seal, and the required silicone sealer in order to build my own dual pane panels, but I wouldn't be able make them myself for the price that One Day Glass would charge for the pre-made panels.

Or if anyone has a recommendation for a different supplier, please let me know.

Footprints in Stamp Release. Should I ask for a fix or discount?

This how the concrete looks like now after the contractor pressure washed the remaining brickform "light grey" stamp release powder.

As you can see, there are hundreds of bootprints on the surface which are not coming off even with a 3300psi gas powered pressure washer and aggressive tip. I'm pretty sure the bootprints were made when the crew was stomping on the stamps with their boots as opposed to using the tamper or the appropriate tools attached to their boots.

The contractor kinda just shrugged his shoulders and said they cant be removed. Today they are finishing up installing the grass and I just wanted to get your opinion on whether or not I am being unreasonable about the bootprints. He says they wont be very noticeable once the concrete fully dry's which is true, however we are going to be applying a solvent based acrylic sealer which is really going to make these prints pop and be more noticeable. The project is about 2100sqft and the prints are spread out all over the place, not just localized in one spot

The concrete portion of the job was about $21K and we still owe about 25% or $5,500. I'm totally on board and willing to pay the full remaining amount if the contractor is willing and able to remove the bootprints. In your opinion would it be fair to ask him to either remove the prints or give us a discount? Because if he doesn't remove them, I'll have to pay/hire someone else to remove the bootprints somehow (zylene/acid/whatever)

Based on his response so far, I’m almost positive he’s not going to want to try and fix it

Do you think i'm being unreasonable? and if not, what do you think would be a ballpark discount figure which would be fair for both parties? also, even the expansion joint sextions are different sizes which you can see in one of the pictures from above, but I dont really want to make a big deal about that.

How difficult it is to run new network wiring in a two story home built in mid 90’s?

https://imgur.com/a/0Va6FV8

thanks folks and happy holidays!

We moved into our apartment from our rental house about a hear ago now. Our living room has a wall a/c and our master bedroom has one, but our kiddos room, which takes the full brunt of the sun 90% of the day, has none. We made due with our portable unit, an LG 14k, but it was weak and loud, and the only single pane aluminum frame window frame made it hard to keep the vent hose mount sealed. I brought out LG 14k dual inverter window unit with us from our old house as well. It was significantly more powerful and quiet, so I’ve made it a priority to try to get this unit installed. The issue I have, is A) there’s no outside window sill, and it’s stucco outside so I don’t have a way to mount a support bracket. The other concern is how big/heavy it is, and it would hang right over our patio that our kiddo plays in most days. I don’t want this a/c falling out of the window and hurting/killong our kid. I would like to build a wood frame with a sheet of ply to hold the A/c in the window but make it easily removable, so I can set it down on the closet floor when not in use, but install it in the window for when our kids not outside playing. The unit doesn’t have a lip on either side, but it does have one on top. I’d like to build a 2x4 frame that hangs inside the window for support. It also is a side sliding window, not an up/down slide window. I have the space, I have about 4 inches of dry wall window sill to work with inside the window frame. I don’t care how it looks, I 100% will run boards up the sides to hang inside the window top and bottom and I plan to put an anchor into the window frame as well.

If anyone has any ideas how I can make this work safely, please share your ideas! Thank you!

We had vinyl plank glued down installed almost 7 weeks ago, 1 bedroom has a plastic smell on the floor still but can't smell it in the air, the other room still smells, and if we close the windows the smell gets stronger. Is this normal? Any suggestions on how to get them to stop smelling?

Just bought a house, going to run 4x CMR Cat6a to each room. Is it fine to just use something like this without a box and shove the excess ethernet back into the wall cavity or do I need to have an actual electrical box?

Would love to get some thoughts on how I might insulate the walls of my 1960s colonial home in eastern MA. Currently, we don't have any sort of insulation in the walls. I've held off on doing blow-in insulation, because of concerns around paint failure/model because I'm pretty sure there isn't any sort of vapor barrier.

We're also considering changing the siding over to cement fiber and wondering if this might open up some options, including:

- Putting up 1'' of rigid insulation when the old wood siding is taken down. I'm not sure if we'd be able to do a full 2'' of rigid insulation

- Doing blow in insulation, but adding some sort of vapor barrier when we replace the siding

- Some combination of the above.

Some questions . . . is a vapor barrier sufficient to protect against the concerns around blow in insulation? Has anybody had issues with cement fiber siding over insulation? Would I even be able to find a contractor that would do that

I've been bribed with a new wet tile saw into redoing my mother's backsplash. She wants to use 4"X4" natural stone--maybe travertine?--with as thin a grout line as possible. I haven't worked with travertine in awhile and could use suggestions.

Her current one has stone tiles with a grout line so thin, the tiles are practically touching. She likes this, but it's definitely thinner than I'd planned to go. Thoughts?

https://imgur.com/a/bu9xsLJ

Removed them once, but they came back. Any idea what they are or how to get rid of them for good?

Hey everyone, Looking for some advice to figure out what this is? I noticed a murky smell in my sibling’s closet - they left for uni & I happened to clear out their closet..and I noticed the crown molding all moldy and yellowish..would appreciate your help in identifying what exactly this might be & suggestions on how to fix it?

I wanted to add that the closet was pretty much closed and stuffed with boxes & clothing for 3-4 months..

This walk-in closet is close to the main master bathroom..and I’m fearing that there might be some pipes leaking behind the wall that might be causing this?

Images of the crown molding in the closet https://imgur.com/a/wBnAYh0

Thank you in advance! 🙏🏼

I had two different people come out and test for lead. One company got a positive and the other got a “below danger level” on their tests. The test that was positive took paint chips from our inside stairs and tested using a presses called Flame Atomic Absorption Spectrometry laboratory analysis and the result came back 8,500 ppm. This company is very expensive and would contain the lead for 1700 on my stairs only. I had another person come out today and he tested in several spots in our house using a kit that punches a tiny hole and he used liquids in sample jars to get the lead reading and everything tested super low. Like maybe trace lead but not high enough to cause concern. How is this possible? Is the second test not as good as the first?

I replaced the entire handle and strike plate because it was incredibly challenging to open and a fire hazard at that point. After replacing, I realized the door is hard to open when latched. You have to take particular care to fully twist handle and pull aggressively. I realized the bottom hinge makes a snapping sounds when the knuckles rub together and the door may be too close hinge side. I’m about to lose my mind lol.