Managing Home Maintenance Costs

Should we mount a satellite dish on the side of the house? That is the question many people ask especially if they have vinyl or aluminum siding on their homes. Even people who have brick on all 4 walls are asking this question. Many people allow installers to install the dishes on their homes regardless of the type of siding they have. Personally I am against allowing a satellite dish on the side of the house to be attached to my home for the following reasons.

Impact of a Satellite Dish On Your Home

• At least 4 holes need to be drilled into and through the siding
• These holes are potential points for water leakage
• You need one more hole somewhere for the cable to run through
• When you remove the dish, you have these unsightly holes to deal with
• It looks ugly to have this dish on your home

Alternatives

Now there are steps you can take to protect your home if you have no choice. Many people do not have access to cable TV services. They may live in the country or in a small village were cable TV is not offered or available. Here is a list of potential alternatives:

• Mount the dish on a pole away from your home
• Install the dish on a garage or other building
• Mount the dish on a side of your home were it is not visible
• Install the dish on the roof
• Attach the dish to the chimney

In all cases you must be able to have a line of site view of the satellite from the location were the satellite dish is being installed. This includes no building blocking the view or trees or shrubs partially blocking the view. If any of these things get in the way you will either not get any signal at all or it will be degraded.

Most installers are professionals and will seal all holes so that rain water and insects cannot get in. If you remove the satellite dish on the side of the house, you will have holes that must be plugged and sealed properly. You will have an unsightly set of holes, but after awhile you will not even notice them. They will be there of course and might be an issue for someone wanting to buy your house. We suggest that you leave the satellite dish on the side of the house even if you are not using it.

Let us know if you have any comments on our opinion about this. For more thoughts and ideas about mounting satellite dishes, click here.

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Whether it is for Christmas holidays, a family vacation or just a trip to see your  parents’ (or grandparents’) house for the holidays, safe driving tips include making sure that your car is ready to go and in good shape for the trip. Maybe you are making that trip to that ski resort with your friends? Or perhaps taking the family down south to warmer climate for the holidays. Either way if you are driving it is a good idea to make sure that you have a car that is ready and also safe to drive. Here are a few Tips For Safe Driving.

You may have had all the plans done, the reservations, the packing ready and the family is just waiting for that day to arrive. However, have you ever checked if your car is ready to go?  If not, then perhaps it would be time to do a thorough check or have your mechanic do it for you.

Tips For Safe Driving – Tire Tips

The following is a list of tips and things to check on your car if you are planning to head off on a family vacation driving trip:

• Tire air pressure
• Balance tires
• Tire tread
• Fluids
  • Engine oil
  • Brake fluid level
  • Power steering fluid
  • Cooling fluid
  • Windshield washer fluid
• Lights
  • Headlights
  • parking lights
  • Brake lights
  • Turn signal lights
  • Emergency lights
• Brakes
• Muffler system
• Engine air filter
• Any unusual noises should be checked out

Doing all of these checks will take less than half an hour, or you can arrange for your mechanic to perform all of these checks for you. You can leave on your trip with the confidence of knowing that all systems have been checked on your car and it is ready. Of course there can be break downs while you are traveling, however at least you have done all you can to be sure you will have a safe trip with your car.

Tips For Safe Driving

Tires are among the most important element of your cars systems. If the tread on your tires is getting low, you may need to invest in a new set of tires. Also take into account were you are driving. Snow conditions really require snow tires, while even heavy rain situations require tread that will move the water away from the tire and avoid the tires skimming along on the road and losing traction all together.

None of these things are really that expensive unless you have been neglecting your car. Tires can run $500 to $600 and if you need a full set of brakes, you may need to spend a lot more. Better to be safe than sorry!

Leave a comment and add your tips for safe holiday driving.

This will be our final post about conserving energy use in the form of electricity. We wanted to show the usage for the past week. In addition show the relative power consumed during on-peak, mid-peak and off-peak hours. We have saved over $400 on our annual bill for electricity this past year and we are very happy about this.  We could probably save more, but there is a certain quality of life that we look for in terms of comfort and lifestyle. Some consumers will not know what the word hydro means. It is a term that describes the generation of electricity by using dams with water driving the electrical generators instead of nuclear power or coal or gas fired plants.

But first our chart. This is for a week in August , 2011 when we are running Air Conditioning and a pool pump as well as the usual stuff that you would have in a house. My wife also runs a fan at night in our home in our bedroom as well to move the air around more.

Analyzing Daily Hydro Consumption

We reduced our consumption significantly by following these steps listed below :

• Running the pool pump in off normal hours
• Same with the AC and most lights
• Drying clothes at night or on the weekends
• For more information, refer to our previous post.
• Convert incandescent lights to florescent lights 100%

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This post may be interesting to people living in colder climates and are trying to save money on their heating bill without being cold all of the time in their homes. If your home is heated by natural gas or oil and you have a central furnace, then your entire house is kept at the same temperature throughout. Why heat the entire house when you need to only heat the rooms you spend the most time in? By heating only the rooms you actually spend time in can reduce your heating cost.

This year we are trying to keep the house cooler during the day and the evening and using a combination of a gas fireplace and small electric ceramic space heaters to keep the rooms warm were we spend a lot of time. For example our furnace temperature is set to 19C or 66F, which is pretty cool for many people.

Our family room and kitchen is an open concept and we use the gas fireplace in the family room to heat this are of the home and bring the temperature of this area up to 22C or 71F!  The rest of the house stays cool and we save on the natural gas consumption since we are not heating the rest of the home. At night we turn off the gas fireplace and we allow the temperature in our home go down to 16C or 61F! Pretty cool!

Electric Ceramic Space Heaters – Temperature

Now some people might consider this to be really cold, however we have a space heater in our bedroom which brings the temperature up to a comfortable level. It has a time and automatically heats the room for us before we go to bed. We can set the temperature at whatever we wish so that we are comfortable through the night.

In my office, I also have a small ceramic heater, which heats the room to a comfortable temperature while the rest of the home is kept cool. This seems to work well for us and we save on our natural gas usage, as well as electricity since the furnace is running less and not consuming electricity when the fan is running. Of course we are consuming electricity by using these small heaters, however this is much less than what would be used normally.

In theory this should all work and we should save money on our overall consumption of natural gas and electricity. However it really does depend on the rates you pay for electricity and natural gas.  It is really tough to figure out unless you have all of the facts.

You will definitely save energy and probably money as well by following this approach and enduring the cold in your home and the complaints from your family, however is it all worth it  from a dollars and cents perspective?

The facts I have are as follows:

• Furnace is 85% efficient
• DC motor which uses less electricity
• Our home is 2500 square feet
• Gas costs about .09 per CCF
• Electricity costs about .06 per KW at night and .11 during the day
• The ceramic heaters use 1.5kw’s per hour

Approximate your Savings

Now it is pretty hard to figure out what you are going to save based on consumption etc, so we will make  some approximations which will get us close to the number.  For example if you annual heating bill was $1800 and you kept the temperature at 72F all of the time and then reduce the average temp in all of the house to 64, the percentage decrease is  18%. Apply this against your annual cost and you should save around $330 per year.

Now as we mentioned your family might disown you if this was the temperature throughout the house all of the time. So adding electric space heaters in the most used rooms can make it more comfortable. We have seen oil filled heaters for around $80 and they take about 1.5kw per hour to run. Using our rates for the day time, this is going to cost you approximately $50 over the year to heat one room. Same thing with heating your bedroom at night. So you are probably looking at a cost of $160 for two heaters. An increased electricity cost of $100 for both heaters or a total of $260.

Of course your furnace will be running less. However we have not factored this into the equation. Based on this crude approximation you are going to be saving roughly $70 the first year. Then $230 every year after that based on current rates.

Not a huge savings, however every dollar counts and it is better in your pocket than someone else’s. It does get better over time. You can use this approach to figure out what the savings might be for you depending on your homes size and current energy usage.

Sources of Electrical Power

If you are concerned about the environment, you also have to take into account how your energy is produced. When you burn natural gas, you are burning a fossil fuel and depleting the earth’s resources.  The same goes for electricity generated by coal or oil  fired plants . However if your electricity is produced by nuclear power plants that brings up an entire other issue. Especially  terms of the overall safety of these plants. You may not want to encourage investment in more of these plants by using this type of electricity. Electricity produced by dams is far better. They do not pollute the environment, although there are 1000’s of acres that are now under water . You have to decide which one you are going to support.

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There is a huge variety of fencing to choose from and let’s face it most people select a fence based on the way it will look around your yard and not for security.  Cost is also a big factor since the cost of the materials as well as labor has gone up in recent years. Security that fencing is usually pretty far down the list. This particular fence will not stop thieves, but will make it uncomfortable to climb over. Most are looking for an easy score, so the more difficult you make it for them the less likely they will pick your place.

However anything that makes it difficult for a would be burglar to gain access to your property is a deterrent and if he goes elsewhere because of the fence then it has done it’s job.

Fences that are difficult to jump over because they are high or have spikes at the top are often better than short fences. Let’s face it if someone really wants to get into your yard over your fence, there are multiple ways to do that. Still most burglars are really opportunists and will choose a fence that is easy to get through or over vs. one that is difficult. They will also try the gate first and if they can get in that way vs. going over the fence they will. See our comments about gates later in this post.

This is one of the biggest deterrents you can have as part of your overall security program for your home. When building a fence that looks good, also build a burglar deterrent fence. One that will persuade burglars to go else where. You can achieve both pretty easily and without spending a fortune as well.

Low Fencing as Burglar Deterrent Fencing

The picture on the left is an example of a low fence. As you can see would be relatively easy to jump over and gain access to your yard. It might keep dogs out and small children. But will not keep anyone out who really wants to get in.

In fact it is pretty easy. This fence looks nice and might create the right decorative atmosphere that you are looking for, but will not deter burglars. It is a basic residential fence that you see around many back yards in homes all across North America.

High Fencing as a Burglar Deterrent

High fencing on the other hand is much more difficult to get over. It has standard five foot boards with a one foot lattice on the top. This makes it at least 6 feet above the ground.

Can someone pull themselves over the fence? Yes they can but it is much more difficult compared to the first picture we showed you.

The next step of course is to install a spike at the top to add another level of difficulty.

Gates need to be locked and latched and not easy to open for a burglar. There is no to spend money money on a high fence if you make it easy to open the gate. Pull though chords are helpful to you and the burglar. Make your gate so that they cannot get through the gate unless you leave it unlocked!

Of course this is our last point. If you are supposed to keep your gate locked all of the time,  make it part of your evening routine. Make sure gate is properly closed and securely locked. Do this before you retire for the evening or leave for the day or go on a trip.

Stay safe, comments welcome

You have just installed your brand new hardwood floor and it looks beautiful. You painted the walls, the trim and even replaced the window coverings. It is perfect, no scratches or blemishes. There is no fading from the sun or marks from cleaners or imprints from furniture and on. You might be thinking that you should just not use them, keep them pristine.You are wondering How Do I Protect my Hardwood Floor?

Well they are going to get some marks and scratches, it cannot be helped. But you can limit the damage and get many years to of your floor before re-sanding is required. There are simple things you can do without finding it difficult or cramping your lifestyle and enjoyment of your home. It is relatively easy to do and becomes habit forming which will keep your floors looking great for many years.

How Do I Protect my Hardwood Floor – Tips

First remember that you have invested a lot of money and hardwood floors are a lifetime investment if looked after properly and they add a lot of value to your home as well. Most buyers are now looking for hardwood floor upgrades in their homes when they purchase them. Buyers are just not interested in doing their own upgrades preferring to purchase homes that are already with hardwood flooring that compliments the home. Buyers also want this floor to look pristine, shiny and great looking so that it will complement their furniture.

Hardwood floors are also better for people with allergies. You may need to vacuum more often, but at least the dust is picked up instead of sitting in the carpet to be spread into the air each time you walk across it. If you do have allergies purchase a central vacuum with the exhaust of the vacuum exiting outside into your garage area or outside the home. This will reduce the dust significantly.

If you want to keep your floors looking great for a life time,  then its very important that you keep them clean and scratch free.
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