Joys of Home Ownership

[spotty_dog]

Last night as we prepared to start cooking our Christmas dinner, the toilet erupted. Gallons upon gallons of raw sewage spewed into the bathroom, then the hall. Four hours later, after an hour spent with our Christmas guests running a bucket brigade to bail out the toilet, floor, and tub as we waited for the emergency plumber to be called in from an hour away, we fled the house for a hotel not knowing what the problem is but only that it will probably require digging up the yard and replacing part of the sewer main.

My house smells like poo.

Simultaneously, after two years of dealing with a roof leak every winter, we went under contract in June to replace the roof. After months of delays they are scheduled to start work...today. Shingles were already flying when we got home from the hotel we had to stay in last night.

Thank goodness for homeowners insurance AND a healthy emergency fund. (We don't know if insurance will cover the sewer repair, as it might be considered basic plumbing maintenance.) Also, that rule of thumb about 2-3% of home value in annual maintenance is no joke. We've gone 4-5 years without major work, but we're making up for it now.

Merry Christmas!!

[medpedspouse]

Yikes! That sounds dreadful!! On the other hand, good thing you had extra hands to help. Crossing my fingers and toes hoping for a straightforward resolution/fix.

[SoonerTexan]

Is your house historic?

[spotty_dog]

Yeah, I do think that's a silver lining. We wouldn't have gotten nearly as much containment as we did if we hadn't had all hands on deck. Literally five adults and a very helpful fifth grader were in the thick of it.

The professional cleaners are wrapping up the preliminary work, nearly three hours later. They'll be back though -- after the dehumidifier has done what it can, our brand new LVT flooring has to go, and possibly the hallway of irreplaceable wide-plank pine.

Still haven't seen hide nor hair of a plumber, but I think the garage roof might be done by the end of the day so there's that! A kind of big disappointment is that with all this waiting around, I don't see any way for us to get to the good movie theater an hour away and watch Star Wars.

[spotty_dog]

[MENTION=1889]SoonerTexan[/MENTION], yep. Over 100 years old. But it was remodeled in 2000 and taken down to the studs -- modern wiring, modern plastic plumbing, drywall instead of plaster. Thing is, as one of the first homes in the neighborhood, and predating the sewer system, that whole thing could have been installed wonky and the remodel wouldn't necessarily have improved that.

[Ladybug]

You should write an epic Christmas movie. Holy sewage!!! Start a diary.

[spotty_dog]

You should write an epic Christmas movie. Holy sewage!!! Start a diary.

So many Christmas songs just write themselves. "All I Want for Christmas is Poo." "I'm Dreaming of a Brown Christmas."

[SoonerTexan]

@SoonerTexan, yep. Over 100 years old. But it was remodeled in 2000 and taken down to the studs -- modern wiring, modern plastic plumbing, drywall instead of plaster. Thing is, as one of the first homes in the neighborhood, and predating the sewer system, that whole thing could have been installed wonky and the remodel wouldn't necessarily have improved that.

This is good for me to hear. I've been realtor.com stalking houses from the 1920s in a neighborhood I like

[spotty_dog]

Yeah...I hate to say it but I'm a little over old houses at the moment. And, with the plumbers about finished here, it does look like it was mostly an old house problem. Though, admittedly it's more of a >40 year old house problem, not a >80 year old house problem. The concrete sewer main is just shifting, crumbling, letting old roots in...doing what old pipes do.

We're definitely hitting our deductible on the interior cleanup and repair, and the deductible is 1% of the home value, so a nice mid-five-figure outlay there. We're also looking at another couple grand in emergency plumber fees, extra heavy-duty snaking, camera work...and then it looks like at least 60' of main needs replacing, which means tearing up the back patio, cement garage pad, gravel drive...so that'll be fun.

But in the meantime we should be able to flush toilets and do laundry, for a little while. Fingers crossed.

[PrincessFiona]

You should write an epic Christmas movie. Holy sewage!!! Start a diary.

This!

Holy cow. What a story!! I hope the house is odor-free now!

Kris


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[spotty_dog]

Yeah, I'm incredibly grateful that there are such things as disaster restoration professionals, and I can't even begrudge how very much they're going to cost. The inch of sludge is gone and the majority of the odor with it. It's dissipating more as time goes on, though I doubt it'll be completely gone until the contaminated flooring has been ripped out. They even cleaned out the heating duct that the stuff had dripped into.

DH is so looking forward to bleaching all.the.things now that we have water restored. We've all been walking around the house with a creepy feeling on our skin, it's like living in a microbiology lab.

[civilspouse]

So sorry. This will be a Christmas you always remember!


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[spotty_dog]

Definitely. That's what the grandparents have been saying too. I'd rather have a memory that didn't have a $30k price tag and a trigger word "fee-shees" (which is the way my mom, a former nurse, pronounced "feces" when trying to get across to the plumbers and city sewer experts that this WAS indeed an emergency worthy of a Christmas dispatch). But this is definitely the stuff of family legend.

[alotofyarn]

Oh man, how awful. I'm glad it's getting cleaned up quickly, at least!

[rainbabies]

Ohhhhh noooo, A! That’s terrible! I’m so sorry. Home ownership is for the birds. Our house was built in 98 or 99
Dh thinks if we had a brand new house we’d be issue free. He’s so wrong. It’s just the “joy of home ownership”. Upkeep and repairs are what’s needed. I hope you’re smell free soon. I have a wicked sense of smell...😂


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