For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

[seasprite]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Happy I converted. Cost me around $2500 I think but I've bought very few chemicals since then other than salt. I think salt is about $16 a bag from where I get it. I use Valley Pools in Madison. This will be my third season with it. First year I had to add a lot of Stabilizer to get the chlorinator just right, but last year I didn't add any chemicals to the pool other than salt. About three weeks ago my pool was pretty swampy because I had my liner replaced in the winter and never put salt back in the pool, so once it warmed up I put the salt in there and two bags of shock to kick-start it and the swamp was gone the next day. Haven't touched it again. My water is nice and blue, but a little cloudy, I need to put some clarifier in it. But yeah, the salt system has been great. Once you get it to where it is suppose to be, it's on auto-pilot from there it seems. Plus, my old system didn't have a scheduler or anything and my salt system does, so it turns on my lights, polaris, etc for me.

Nice, I have the guy from the pool place coming out friday (Valley Pools as well). The pool right now is pretty swampy.........not even considering even putting my foot in it right now lol

[mgoblue]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Nice, I have the guy from the pool place coming out friday (Valley Pools as well). The pool right now is pretty swampy.........not even considering even putting my foot in it right now lol

Ours has been touchy with the chlorine (tougher to keep from getting algae), so I'm draining 1/3 of the water soon...I think I have too much CYA (stabilizer in chlorine pucks that never goes away) and that makes it tougher to maintain....

Can't really just drain the whole thing right now, but I can backwash to my yard for a while and get 1/4 or 1/3 and that should help me out.

I'm sooo close to having it be easy to manage lol

[roadman]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Install a sump pump. I did years ago and it has saved my drum kit from floating around the basement several times. Just make sure it is always plugged in and you may even want a battery back up incase if power failure during a storm.

I had a guy come in and jack hammer a 16"x16" square hole in the floor in the corner of the basement. Then I dug down in the dirt 1 foot and placed the pump in the hole. I also had the guy make a hole in the basement wall above ground level so I could run the pump hose out side. Then I built a wooden box to hide the pump. I plugged it in 15 years ago and haven't touched it since. If we get a lot of rain as soon as that hole in the floor gets a couple inches deep with water the pump turns on and out goes the water. It never gets to the floor level.

Sorry to hear WTF, that's a tough blow.

Our sump pump was in place before we moved in. At least three times, the sump pump has died out on us and spilled out into the carpeting. Once, we needed a new sump pump, once where the ball was stuck, and once when Directv put in wiring near the sump pump and unplugged the sump pump in January. (We didn't know they unplugged it and moved it too. We received 10 bucks per month off the bill)

As someone who has lived in their house for 23 years I have a few experiences to share.

Make sure you go around your house once per year(spring time for us) and fill in any foundation holes, however small they are. Three times we've had bees near and inside the basement in the fall. Twice I've had to use Great Stuff to plug up holes in the foundation. One of the holes was near the electrical box outside the house where all the wiring goes into the house and in the basement, it comes out near the fuse box. Bees were pouring through their one year. 2 years ago, bees were coming in near the pipe of the outside sump pump. Here I am with our two boys after dark spraying bee spray and Great Stuff trying to plug up the space they were entering. We also had to spray in the basement utility room where the sump pump is located with bee spray and Great Stuff. Last year, the bees were going through our attic via uncovered light fixture on the back porch. This made entering and leaving our back door interesting.

Secondly, be wary of insurance companies tightening their policies up in the coming years. We have a 18 year old roof(with a 30 year warranty) on top of the original layer of the roof. Last spring, American Family sent a person to our house to take pictures of our house and garage. Before our premium was due, they sent out a notice to us that stated we needed to put a new roof on before Sept of this year or they would drop our home insurance. I didn't really think they would enforce that but just this week the office asked for an update on the roof status. I told them there isn't a new roof on. Roofs are over 10 grand around here and we have two kids in college. I told them no way anyone will tell us how to spend our money with two kids in college. Also told them we had over 4 inches of rain last Thursday and not one drop of rain came through the roof(sump pump was full, ball got stuck, no basement damage). Also, we have three teenage drivers in our family that we are shelling out over 3000 grand a year on.(they pay half) Make a long story short, I spoke to the Underwriter and they agreed to look at it on a year to year basis. He said he was going off the pictures and in some areas the roof shingles were starting to curl. I told the Underwriter it's apparent after 25 years of coverage they don't know their customer base. He admitted he didn't about our personal situation, but that is what the agent is for. Also, the Underwriter shared with me that over the last 10-15 years they have seen a huge upswing in claims from roof damage or leakage and he said everyone must pay.

Just be wary of insurance companies tightening up their polices over the years.

[ChaseB]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Thinking about converting the pool to a salt water pool. Anyone have any experience with this?

I converted mine, and now I would never go back.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

We're closing on Friday. I can't wait to get the moving stuff done, but I'm still excited.

[seasprite]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

We're closing on Friday. I can't wait to get the moving stuff done, but I'm still excited.

Congrats

[thaima1shu]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

I have tons of sugar ants. I'm annoyed.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Congrats

Thank you. We are moving from a house that is on an incline of roughly 70 degrees so I'm not looking forward to moving things out at all.

[Cyros]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

I have tons of sugar ants. I'm annoyed.

At least they aren't fire ants?

[mgoblue]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

We had some ants in our pantry right after we moved....had an exterminator come and that solved the problem.

Now I just got Ortho spray at Costco and go around every couple months to spray our outside perimeter to try and keep scorpions and stuff away. Thankfully the ants have stayed away.

[seasprite]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Pool (inground) lights..............suggestions? Preferably without having to drain the pool.

[mgoblue]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

Pool (inground) lights..............suggestions? Preferably without having to drain the pool.

Following lol....our light doesn't work anymore, but not really looking to pretty much drain the pool to get access to it. I guess I could though, and then my water would be nice and refreshed, but it's a pain...

Is there a way to change the bulb underwater? I doubt it, but would be nice...

[aukevin]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

You don't change it underwater. You just unscrew the light fixture and there should be plenty of wire slack to set it up on the pool deck. Then you open up the light and take out the bulb. The hardest part is screwing the light fixture back in underwater.

seasprite, do you not have any lights in your pool or is the light just burned out?

[seasprite]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

You don't change it underwater. You just unscrew the light fixture and there should be plenty of wire slack to set it up on the pool deck. Then you open up the light and take out the bulb. The hardest part is screwing the light fixture back in underwater.

seasprite, do you not have any lights in your pool or is the light just burned out?

No lights at all. I am wanting to install lights and looking for the best and least troublesome way of going about it. Have no idea why the original owner of the house didnt have lights installed in the pool when it was built. Gotta have lights lol

[mgoblue]

Re: For all of you guys who are homeowners or newly owned

You don't change it underwater. You just unscrew the light fixture and there should be plenty of wire slack to set it up on the pool deck. Then you open up the light and take out the bulb. The hardest part is screwing the light fixture back in underwater.

seasprite, do you not have any lights in your pool or is the light just burned out?

Ohhhh, so in theory I could unscrew it under water and pull it up to the pool deck to fix. Unscrew whatever to replace the bulb, and then get it set to go back under water?

I know it sounds stupid to ask, but didn't realize the light housing could be unscrewed and moved out, figured unscrewing that would just pull the cover off or something. I'll have to look at the light closer and see, would be cool to have it working again.