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Don’t Overlook the Little Details

Team — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 16:41:20 +0000

We woke up this morning to a strange burnt oily smell in the basement. Years ago we had some trouble with our oil fired water heater and this presented itself as the first possible explanation… though the smell didn’t seem quite right.

I checked the oil tank and saw that it was low. Hmmm… perhaps the heater was trying to fire but couldn’t draw oil. The gauge indicated 80 gallons in the tank. Seems strange that the heater would be having trouble with that much oil in there. Hmmm. My next thought was that the gauge was not functioning correctly. We called and arranged an oil delivery.

I assumed that hot showers were out of the question if the heater could not draw oil. I gave it a shot anyway and to my surprise everything functioned normally.

Later on I went out into the garage and found that the smell strangely seemed stronger out there. Oh! It’s the car, I thought. A few weeks ago we had a power steering fluid leak that was repaired. The power steering fluid was leaking again… in fact there was a puddle underneath the car. I got a flash light, popped the hood, and did a little inspection. Hmmm… the power steering fluid is full. And the fluid line looks fine. Ah ha! There’s the dripping. But wait, that just looks like water. I wiggled my hand down to the source of the dripping and got some on my fingers. It felt like water and smelled like nothing. Ugh… it’s just air conditioner condensation. No big deal. The power steering fluid is fine.

Okay, it must be the water heater. Another trip into the basement and I could smell the smell, but it strangely diminished near the water heater. Argh.

I went back out into the garage to throw out some trash and the smell hit me again. Okay fine, so where is it coming from? I bloodhounded my way around the garage. The smell is familiar and unpleasant. I KNOW that smell. Some sort of chemical that I use. I started picking up cans and bottles until… BOOM! I found it. A metal spray can of Bombadier lubricant had rusted through and the noxious liquid had completely leaked out.

That was a welcome surprise! Both the car and the water explanations would have costs $$$, but throwing out and cleaning up after a leaking lubricant can was easy and simple. It’s funny how my mind went to the big expensive problems and lingered on them. It surprised me that it took so long to narrow down and location the true source of the problem.

Purchasing Leaf Filter is like buying a Time Share

Team — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 17:32:00 +0000

Just one time, my wife and I attended one of those Time Share presentations in exchange for a free mini-cruise and hotel stay. That day was one I will never forget. The pressure to buy was immense, but we both kept saying NO. Throughout the day they passed us on from person to person. Each new person we met would lower the price by thousands of dollars!

At the beginning of the day the original price was somewhere around $25,000 and people were buying at that price. By the time we met with the last person after saying NO all day long, the price had dropped to around $6,000. I felt incredibly bad for those poor chumps who bought at the $25,000 level for the EXACT SAME PRODUCT.

Well, a reader submitted the following story about Leaf Filter that evokes that same feeling as my Time Share experience:

I had the Leaf Filter “Field Manager” over to give the demo, etc. I have 134 feet of gutters all straight, no turns. I was amused while watching him labor over 5 minutes with pencil and calculator arriving at a price. He came up with $4,225.00! The flyer had a coupon for $250, and he immediately threw in another $250 “senior discount.” It still seemed very high to me ($3,725), so I said that I couldn’t do it. He then came up with another tactic – mine was a small job, he could fit it on when the crew was down, but I had to be on alert for a “last minute call” to install. Now the price was $2,750!

He immediately got on the phone and called a crew manager, and arranged for an actual date – after having said that they would call me when time freed up(!). I signed a contract, which allowed for cancellation within three days.

Finally, I read these posts on the internet, called the 800 number. They told me that they could do nothing and that the Regional manager would have to call me. In the meantime I sent the contract back with CANCEL written over it (certified mail), as the field manager originally had said I could do.

The Regional manager finally called 5 days later. He expressed disappointment in my cancellation and then offered to do the job for $1,300! This must be indicative of how they lead customers into getting the highest inflationary price from them at first. Who really knows what a real price is?

What kind of company that claims they’re number one uses tactics lower than that of used car salesmen? This turned me off more than the false product claims.

This is simply amazing.

Leaf Filter Homeowner Reports and Reviews

Team — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 16:17:04 +0000

Here are a couple of recent Home Owner reports about their experiences with Leaf Filter and their local installers. First up is Keith who is not having a good time with his recent Leaf Filter installation:

Courtesy of Leaf Filter

Keith writes:

(5/27/2011) – I had Leaf Filter installed a little less than a year ago (for what I consider a hefty price) after the sales person sold me on it. While they were installing it I saw them cutting pieces of ordinary insect screen in addition to the micro-screen that keeps the small grit out. He explained they put it at only the corners to deal with heavy water flow. OK, fair enough though a little slippery of the sales guy who took over an hour of my time demonstrating the stuff not to mention this limitation. Upon departing the installer remarks “don’t worry if it runs over – it takes awhile for the oil from the manufacturer to wear off the micro-screen”. Hmmm… sure enough at the corners where the water flows heaviest it shoots out like waterfalls – a year later! I have 6-inch gutters. This product is simply flawed and misrepresented by sales staff. Don’t believe what they say.

More recently, Keith continues his story:

(6/9/2011) – First, I left a post a in [May] 2011 explaining my bad experience with my Leaf Filter install – deceptive sales pitch, untruths spoken by the installer, still pours over the gutters one year later as if the gutters are not even there. [Strange that] I got a call from a somewhat perturbed dealer telling me to chill out and they would contact me soon. Two weeks later I have not heard a word and am sitting on my front porch during a shower enjoying the waterfalls eroding my landscaping. Thank you Leaf Filter for wasting $2200 of my money.

As is typical, we get a lot of poor reviews of gutter protection products. Angry people tend to write more than satisfied people. I’m sure that we can all understand that. It would be nice, however to get some detailed positive reviews of the various gutter protection products out there. Anybody?

User Review of Home Depot Gutter Guards

Team — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 16:48:02 +0000

You guys may know that I’m a fan of Do It Yourself gutter guards. A few years ago I posted about the success I’ve had with the American Plastics gutter guards that you can buy at Home Depot and other home stores. They aren’t perfect, but they are an incredibly economical solution to the comedy of the gutter guard contracting industry.

Here is a realistic review of the Do It Yourself gutter guard plastic mesh shields:

I installed this same DIY Depot guards on my gutters in CT. They install easily and work well…..well, in the summer.

After getting overflow due to gutter blockage the next spring, I climbed up to view the problem. Their lack of rigidity (thickness and strength) had allowed all of them to sag in the middle from snow and ice weight, and their width did not allow them to slip far enough under the shingles and some fell into the gutter at the shingle side. Also, those that had not collapsed had taken on a permanent bend allowing debris to collect in their centers, which like the gutter themselves, required cleaning out.

These would be super if you do not live in the northeast or anywhere snow and ice can accumulate on the eves. You don’t, the choice is to have something professionally installed, like one of the high rated micro-mesh systems, or find a way to prop up the DIY plastic ones so they don’t sag. Else, might as well get used to cleaning gutters every other year….or more ofter depending on how many trees are with reach of your roof.

I am also in CT and I pretty much agree with the general opinion. My gutter guards have not collapsed anywhere and they appear to be holding up fine. They do sag a bit in the center. Though I’ve noticed that this sag is enhanced when the guards are installed upside down, which is EXTREMELY easy to do. In fact, I installed the product upside down in a section of gutter, realized it, and left it that way on purpose… just to see what happens. That is the only section where I can see any significant sag.

Sure, some debris collects on top of the gutters, but it is much easier and quicker to clean this off than to dig into filled gutters and remove gobs of leaves, seeds, and twigs. I almost never clean anything and they seem to work fine.

And when the time comes to re-install, I’ll pay the $100 or $200 and do it myself in a couple of hours and be set for another 5 years.

Home Owners Recovering from a Tough Winter

Team — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 18:43:46 +0000

The Wall Street Journal recently post an article tabulating the various ways in which your home may have been damaged this winter. Here are a few excerpts:

Kathleen Hassinger and Brandon Halbert in Wynnewood, Pa., are among those whose home sustained multiple winter wounds. Ice dams damaged their 100-year-old home’s slate roof and left new gutters “twisted like a piece of tinfoil,” says Ms. Hassinger. Snow sliding off the roof broke branches on shrubs while gutter runoff wore bare spots into the lawn. Ms. Hassinger says they’ll be spending about $1,000 for roof and gutter repair, and she’s rethinking placement of plants and downspouts for next year.

and…

It was a banner year for ice dams, which typically build along roof eaves in periods of extended cold, causing leaks and other damage.

Not only is the resulting moisture inside a roof or wall “like putting gravy on meat” for carpenter ants and termites, Mr. Young says, it can lead to longer-term woes like mold.

Replacing wet drywall and insulation is top priority. Also, fix broken gutters and shingles.

“You’re going to see gutters where exceptionally heavy snow storms separated them” from the house, says David Dail, Home Depot’s merchandising vice president for building materials.

“A leaky roof is pretty much something you’ve got to deal with,” he says.

Read the full article over at the Journal.

More Praise for DIY Home Depot Gutter Guards

Team — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 17:24:36 +0000

We have previously reported our excellent experience with the DIY style of gutter guards sold by Home Depot and other home improvement stores. They are an attractive option for those home owners (us!) who balk at arbitrarily enormous price tags for professional gutter guard systems.

Cheap and Effective from Amerimax

We’ve had our DIY gutter guards in place for 3 years now with absolutely perfect results. Reader “Davey” writes in with some additional comments.

Hey everybody, I put my Home Depot screens in 18 months ago, and they are holding up well AND we have extra tall oak trees out the wazoo all around the house, when the acorns pop in the fall it’s a squirrel disneyland. Bottom line is I did find one crack after a year, right where someone clearly punched a hammer head shaped hole (could it have been the roofing inspector ‘insulted’ by a DIY job or a hammer wielding squirrel – you decide).

I kept a couple extra vinyl sections, easy to cut out a small section and replace the damaged part I cut out. Just leave about 1/2 inch overlap on each side. The gutter install business is expensive because people who climb heights and walk on roofs deserve the extra hazardous duty pay. But if you can easily DIY, it’s pretty silly to hire some one.

The vinyl used nowadays is much better weather resistent then ten years ago, and easy to swap out any damaged pieces. Listen to those who contest my argument as they use emotive language or other laungusge intensifyers to reflect the fact they know their argument is not well founded in ‘ground truth’.

Home Depot DIY Gutter Guard Review

Team — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 16:03:35 +0000

Here is a short review of the very same Do-it-Yourself gutter filter that I installed on my gutters. It cost me about $50 to install my system. This reviewer echos my same thoughts.

Cheap and Effective

From Pastor Scott in Seattle, WA:

I just installed these a week ago, so don’t have a lot to report regarding their effectiveness. There is no reason that I can see why they shouldn’t be successful against leaves and other large debris. Needles and grit from the shingles will get through easily, but my hope is that I won’t be cleaning out my gutters 4 times a year anymore.

They install beautifully and securely. A side benefit is that they prevent shingle curl that results in cracking is allowed to continue. For the money, I am very happy. Leaf Guard wanted $3500, these cost about $60.