Rental House Work #1: Expect the unexpected!

A couple of months ago we visited our property and decided to come back up in Aug to do some “light” work on the house since we were not going to renew the lease with the tenants at that time. We scheduled a roofer to install a new roof, two new skylights, new vent caps and drip edge drains all around. Also, needed to replace some fascia and soffit boards we found that were rotted at the same time. We also planned to have a contractor replace one wall of siding in the back of the house and 3 of the 4 walls of siding around the garage due to water intrusion, age and rot at the same time we were there.

I am recovering from shoulder surgery so my capabilities were limiited, it pained me to pay someone else to work on my house but the reality was I just couldn’t physically do the work. So my wife and decided we would paint two rooms and do a bunch of needed gardening. Our plans changed in a hurry once we arrived.

We found that all the rooms in the house needed to be painted except for the two bathrooms and kitchen; okay, we can do this, no problem. Then there was some minor drywall damage by the tenant that needed to be fixed, as well as some old water damage to another section of drywall. Again, not a problem, we can handle this….

The first night in the house we heard an unusual noise and couldn’t identify where it was coming from, after some investigation, we found that the water heater was leaking, and had been doing so for some time. Boy was I glad a few years ago I put the water heater into a drain pan and piped it outside of the house. Probably saved me from buying a new kitchen floor and cabinets. So on a Sunday, I paid a plumber to install a new water heater and piping, my checkbook just got a lot lighter :o( Here are some pics of the new water heater:

If this story ended with only the water heater, then it would be okay, but it doesn’t, there are more trials and tribulations to follow in this series, stay tuned…..