r/homeownerstips

Hi! As the question states. Was cleaning my house and saw there are yellow spots on my cabinet faces. Toilet smells musky. Sofa that is cloth has occasional yellow spots that I clean immediately once i see it.

Already am placing thirsty hippos everywhere even before i saw these spots appearing. how does everyone combat these mould/stains that appear due to high humidity and the smells that may accompany it in the cabinet??

As a homeowner i would appreciate any tips regarding maintenance and how to remove the stains! Thanks! 🙏

Just what the tittle says... I'm getting these bouts of sick... At times a pungent odour accompanies this event... It bothers my dog...low lying. I can't pinnpoint what it is... The neighbours have been pouring some sort of liquid on their plants.

Anyone have knowledge of something I could use to monitor for say ammonia , chlorine... Other gasses? Ive searched and become overwhelmed,, frankly overwhelmed with all the ones on amazon. Please help.

Young couple moved in next door about a month ago. Nice people, first house, clearly overwhelmed by the yard situation. Their grass was pushing knee height by the time they got around to thinking about it.

They didn't have a mower yet and were getting quotes from lawn services, one place wanted $120 just for the first cut cause it was so overgrown. I told them I'd knock it out with mine on Saturday morning.

Took about 30 minutes to do their front and back, maybe 0.2 acres total. The tall stuff was rough, had to go slow and do double passes on the worst patches. But the mower handled it fine, just had to raise the deck and take it in stages.

When I was done the guy comes out and he'd been watching from inside. He could see the brand name on the mower and said he'd never heard of senix before but it clearly had no trouble with any of it. I told him I got it off amazon, the power's been solid and it starts easy every time.

Two weeks later he texts me a photo of the same mower in a box on his porch. Said he looked at a bunch of options but kept coming back to what he saw mine do to his yard.

Anyone else gotten their neighbors into the same tools? There's something satisfying about it.

My grandmother insists we keep the house at 84⁰ f at all times. She says if i put it below 80 something will explode. The house is over 70 yrs old and i have a ceiling and tower fan, still with both fans at max i am still sweating. I cant put ice infront of my fan either, what do i do💔😭

Hi Reddit! This is my first post so I hope I’m doing everything correctly.

I recently bought my very first house and it’s been having trouble staying cold if the temperature outside gets above 80°F. (In central Indiana if you’re curious about climate)

At first I thought the problem was that the AC unit hadn’t been replaced since 1999 so I dropped a pretty penny on a whole new unit about two weeks ago. Things were going great until the weather got above 80 and now it still can’t keep up. Yesterday when I got home from work, the first floor was at 75°F (set at 70). I called the AC company today and they came out to inspect the unit- they said everything is running smoothly and “it’s just a really hot time, all the houses are struggling”. I could see this maybe being true if it was over 100, but it’s only like 93 out.

After the AC guy left, I also left the house for a while and came back to the first floor being 77 and the second floor reading at 82.

Other things I am doing:
-changed the filter
-having a mini split put in on the second floor tomorrow
-all windows are fully covered
-almost all the lights in the house are off
-fans everywhere and bowls of ice behind some

Is there anything else I can do? Should I get an energy audit? Add insulation to the walls?

I can’t imagine the old owners were living like this.

Please help! I’m worried about my dogs, especially the old one

Edit to add: 1700 sqft, built in 1891, burned and rebuilt in 1999

I'm finally giving up on fans. They just move hot air around, and sleeping has been miserable lately.

I've been checking out portable AC units, but the reviews are all over the place. Some people swear by them, while others say they're too loud to sleep with or barely cool the room.

My bedroom isn't huge, so I don't need anything massive. I'd rather have something that's reasonably quiet, cools the room well before bed, and isn't a pain to set up.

If you've been using one for a while, which model did you end up buying? Would you buy the same one again, or is there another one you'd choose instead?

Need 1 asap

Not every valuable home upgrade is flashy or obvious. Sometimes the improvements that quietly boost property value are the ones people overlook the most.

What home upgrade ended up increasing your property value more than you expected? Maybe better insulation, updated windows, curb appeal, storage solutions, energy-efficient upgrades, or something less obvious.

Curious to hear which upgrades delivered the biggest long-term value without getting much attention.

My house was built in 1899 and has suffered a mice infestation in the past that I've been cleaning up as I renovate. The house can sometimes smell really musty and micey but has been so much better than it was when I bought it, although the (unfinished) basement always smells really bad and I'm still working on cleaning that up. However, this winter I had to replace my furnace and in doing so upgraded to a central cooling heat pump. But now that cool air is coming through, the smells are again permeating throughout the house worse than it ever used to. I had the company who installed it come out to make sure it wasn't pulling up any air directly from the basement and they said it was all fine and recommended getting my air ducts cleaned. Everything I've read about it says that it is a waste of money. I've also gone down there in the basement and looked through some of the ducts that I could manage loose and it looks like standard dust but no mice nests yet. I'm wondering if the stronger system mixed with cold air is forcing more through the old returns that definitely look pretty gross when I've looked into them from the main floor. I'm wanting anyones advice or experiences with something similar. Is it worth it and is it realistic to hope that I can manage a company to clean them for 500 or less?

I'm trying to build good habits early and avoid learning costly lessons the hard way. What maintenance item has saved you the most money, or what do you wish someone had told you when you first bought a house?

Need 1 asap

Hey everyone, I’m hoping to get some perspective from people who have been running solar for a while because I’m currently staring at my utility bill in absolute shock. I finally pulled the trigger on a rooftop system earlier this year. I was expecting to see those immediate, satisfying drops in my monthly expenses that everyone talks about, but my most recent electric bill just came in and it's barely any lower than it was last summer before the panels went up.

I’m trying to figure out if my system is underperforming, if my utility company is screwing up the net metering credits, or if my expectations were just totally unrealistic. For context, my family's daily routine hasn't changed much, though we have been using the central air conditioning during this month for a bit longer. Still, seeing a massive triple-digit bill when you have a roof full of panels feels like a total punch in the gut. Has anyone else experienced this initial lag in savings right after installation, or should I be calling up my installer to see if something is not working?