Leaving your house for six months

[Ozz]

When you plan on leaving your primary residence for a lengthily time, there are a myriad of things that will more than likely follow ‘Murphy‘s law‘.
A home does not do well in your absence, I would like to think it misses you, but more likely, there are gaskets that dry out, furnaces and water heaters that may need attention, little bugs and nasty things that would like to live in a nice enclosed structure. When we are living in our home, we attend to the problems, maybe fix one in a week or two weeks time, keep the bugs beat back, and it’s no big deal. But leave for six month’s?
My first day back after six month‘s absence, was a busy day and evening.
My house-sitter informed me that the water was not, and would not, completely shut off, around a month after we left.
I then, had the water company shut off the service at the street, as our main water shut-off valve would not hold. It seeped water into the drained lines I so carefully blew out, one would think that the valve would hold, as we had two, a ‘butterfly’ valve; (This is a quarter-turn shut off valve, gas valves are this type) in line also. I had both of them shut off.
When we got home, I made a gasket out of some reinforced rubber I had, ground it round with a belt sander, drilled a hole for the mounting nut in the valve stem, and installed it. I took my ‘street key’ and opened the main water valve out at the curb.
You have add to the complexity of leaving for a long time, ‘The Human factor’ of your house sitter. I have a programmable thermostat, which I had set for a 40 degree locked in set-point. My house sitter came in one day, the house was warm, so he started punching buttons, thinking he would save me money by lowering the furnace kick-in temperature, which wasn‘t on. My home is very well insulated, it stays warm, even in cold weather. His well-intentioned meddling, resulted in my furnace reverting back to normal operating conditions. Not what I wanted in our absence. He couldn’t figure how to reverse his actions. Now we are all thinking right now, why did he not ask me what to do? Sometimes people take the path of least resistance. He did.
Now the bugs. I sprayed like a maniac all over the house, all over the outside of the house, around the doors and in the basement before we left. Used a sizable quantity of bug spray, good insurance, I tell myself.
Actually it was, we came home to maybe 4 dead bugs inside, two live ones. Like I said that is not bad. Unfortunately, one of the live ones was a Brown Recluse spider. I stripped the bed back before getting into it the first night, (I am a ‘worst case scenario’ person), it was right under my pillow. I dispatched it with a tissue in the toilet, nary a word to Sue. Spiders are her worst nightmare. She will never hear of this, just not necessary. I am still trying to ‘shake it off’ as all the sports guys say, when they encounter a serious blow to someplace tender….
We have made the commitment to ready our home for sale, on the seriously damaged real estate market. Spiffy, is the image we want to attain for the house.
I have had a balance of 4 new double insulated windows that did not get installed when we bought them for the house. I did replace 5 a few years ago, these 4 survivors have been sitting patiently waiting for me. Procrastination was the title for this subject.
But the second day we were home, I installed 2 of the 4 we had left. I trimmed them out today. Sue is stripping wallpaper in our great room, a Herculean task that she will complete in short order.
We have many yard, or garage sales, Craig’s list and E-Bay offerings and a few dumpster fills to go.
We are on a mission, we built this house, we are capable in our goal to get it ready for the market. Just hope it sells.
Anyone have the name of a good ‘shrink’?

[ggranch]

Lem Motlow, is the best I know of. He has branch offices in every liquor dept. in the nation. Appointments not needed. Bob

[Ozz]

Ha! I may call on ole Lem.

[Charlie]

Have you learned to sing "The Eyes Of Texas"? Notice that you have a great insert in your receiver.

[richfaa]

We just returned after 5 months on the road. The house was just as we left it. We shut off the water at the meter in the utility room and set the thermostat for 50 degrees. Our neighbors and #1 son looked in and had no problems.. Couple of strange things.. 4 light bulbs that were Ok when we left burnt out while we were gone.. and they were never turned on?????? The gaskets in the kitchen sink faucet dried out and when the water came on we had a waterfall.. Helen just crawled out from under the sink replacing the faucet and some plumbing. While we were purchasing the faucet we dropped by the Honda dealer (My Honda Civic lease was up) and wound up with a shinny new Honda Accord EX- L .Helen has not been the same since she had to turn in her Accord Lease car last year..so out with MY Honda Civic and in with the Accord that has stuff that I will never learn to use.. Oh welll.....

[sailer]

Well Ozz you have to learn the house you leave , you never worry about , because if you do sell it 1st as its a anchor around your neck.. we leave our wis cottage as we call it on the lake but its 3400 sq ft but we heat it at 59 degrees as my furnace man tells me there is too much moisture in the unit if it does not fire hard at times.. now this winter we tried the house sitter to raise the temp to 70 degrees for 4 hours or 6 as his time sets also but we only did that ever 2 weeks .. 5 years ago we went through a rehm furnance in 3 years and they gave us nothing but no on warenty so we went to bryant as we have 7 bryants on our blding in green bay so they help us out on service as the cottage is 65 miles away ,, also you have to flush tiolets every 3 weeks or so or drain them dry and shut off the heat total but then you have plaster cracks and tile seperation etc , so the securt is a good house sitter .. we leave the cottage for 10 months of the year but am looking to sell in 2 years when the market comes back some i hope ,, we have the same problem here in florida as its empty for 4 or 5 months as we travel for 2 to 3 months besides so a good house sitter and here in fl we need grass cutter , bug man , bush trimer , pool man , and we still have hurricans to think about , but thats what ins is for , i hope john

[refocused]

When you get your house sold and are ready to buy one in the great state of Texas, come take a peek at ours in San Antonio which will be on the market shortly after Christmas! Onward to Arizona!!!

[Ozz]

Are you in town? I read that your market there is still strong. I wish you a speedy sale. Arizona is a good choice.

[Hemlockusa]

So your working your way to HOMELESS... ha ha As soon as you and Suzie Q get to Texas we will get to geather and have a WELCOME TO TEXAS PARTY...One thing about it Jim... Those truck tags will be a lot cheaper down in Texas.
Later John

[Bill and Ann]

But, John, from what I hear the insurance on it won't be. We also bought a park model in Texas this year and I was surprised at the price of insurance on it. Ozz and Rich, you must live in different climate than we do as I always put RV antifreeze in the toilet bowl and closet, and all sink drains, and also drain the water line in case the heat doesn't come on. Everything still had some in the them.

[garyka]

I also leave my stick house for 4 months to snowbird.I leave the thermostat at 50 and have someone come to the house about once a week to empty the mailbox and check the house.This year the furnace decided to hibernate in January,(buffalo,NY)don't know how long the heat was off.Dw was not happy about her plants freezing to death,fortunitly no pipes broke as I have hot water heat.I had it fixed that evening.(thermocoupling).I since found out there is a gizmo you can buy when the temperature gets to a setting you determine a light will go on,didn't know about this.My neighbor can now see this from his window and contact me.

[Ozz]

Bill, I did use anti-freeze, also drained and blew out all of the lines, left a low point faucet open as well. Yes gary, I got one at Ace hdwe, just plug into the outlet, load plugs into it. Glad the pipes did not freeze.

[Driftwoodgal]

Ozz,

When you become my neighbor you won't have to do all of that stuff. Won't it be nice to just turn the water off and set the heat on 40???

Colleen

[Ozz]

Yes, it will!
Things would be much easier if you would peel off an acre or two for the Ozzman......
I would be a close fix it guy...... Cheap....