Water damage - not to the vert

[DeXteR]

First, I'm posting this here because you guys are my true Nico family here in the vert section, and you're probably the only ones who care.

I'll give the cliff notes version at the end as that seems to be the trend here these days.

Last Thursday night I got home from work like any other day with the exception that my wife didn't go home because she went to her parents' house to sew. No big deal. I walk up to the door with my empty lunch pail in one hand and my keys in the other. I started opening the door and heard this horrendous sound... WATER - a LOT of it!

In the seconds it took me to realize what the sound was and where it was coming from, I had so many things rushing through my mind.

What is that sound?!That's WATER!Where is it coming from?!THE CEILING?!!!!

You know the sound your bath faucet makes when you turn it on full blast? That's the sound I heard.

I ran down to the basement and got on my cell as fast as I could to call my wife and have her come right home and bring her mom and dad and call the neighbors and... WHERE IS THE MAIN SHUTOFF?!!! AH!!!!!

The water was pouring into the basement too as I went down to start shutting things off. I didn't really have time to think about what I was doing other than knowing that I had to shut off the water. Since I had no idea where the main was and didn't feel like tracing the pipe from the well, I just shut off every water valve I could find. The whole time I'm shutting the valves off, I'm getting dumped on with water leaking through the kitchen floor - all the piping valves are in the same area.

After I got all the water shut off, I figured it'd be a good idea to shut off the electricity on that side of the house. In hind-sight, I should have turned the electricity off first - that would have been the smart thing to do. Regardless, I got everything shut down. What made things even worse: It was definitely hot water leaking somewhere. My house was very warm and extremely humid.

After the water stopped coming down and we got most of the cleanup well taken care of, we decided to find the source of the problem upstairs. We found the pipes in the basement that went up and then we went upstairs and ripped a few panels off the wall in the room next to the upstairs bathroom. Once we found the pipes, we quickly found the problem. The side blew out on the copper pipe near a joint. it was about an 1-1/2" - 2" burst near a lap. Wow, all that from that little thing? NO. Upon further inspection, we saw the other pipe had completely blown out of an elbow joint! At full pressure, that's like have 2-3 hoses turned on full blast in my upstairs wall!

I called my insurer that night when things were a little calmed down between cleaning and moving things. The field adjuster came out Monday and basically told us we were covered. After he saw the pipes were blown out upstairs, he told us they would cover everything. He was a pretty nice guy.

In the mean time, we're staying at the wife's parents' place while the work is done. The contractor said it was probably going to be about a month before we can move back in... yikes. The entire kitchen is going to be gutted - walls, ceiling, floor. My cupboards and cabinets all need to be custom made because they're non-standard sizes. The bathroom needs to be ripped up too because the ceiling and one wall need to come out. The upstairs bathroom and adjoining bedroom are also going to need to be gutted. Once all that's done, things can start going back together.

At least my polebarn is still ok.

On the bright side, we're going to get a whole new kitchen and bathroom and a bunch of new stuff. Maybe we'll have enough money left over to add a few things too.

Cliff Notes: Pipes froze in the wall for the upstairs bathroom. Water leaked through the ceiling into the kitchen and then to the basement. This made a huge mess. Insurance is covering it. We get a new kitchen and bathroom.

Of course, I took pictures.

Kitchen ceiling:

Cupboards:

The culprits:

Under the kitchen floor:

My books from when I was a kid and my Legos:

Outside wall:

Kitchen/bathroom minus interior wall:

Ceiling insulation:

Nismo (our drift cat) checking things out:

Here's the rest of the album:http://s47.photobucket.com/alb...t=all

I'll update when I can.

[krash]

duuude that blows!! atleast insurance covers it so thats good. lookslike romance with the wife is gonna be on a low for a month eh? hahaha

[94_240sx]

Man, this doesn't look good. All I can say is things happen for a reason. Someone else is paying for fresh new stuff, so let's look at the bright side!!!

I just hope your bunny doll didn't get damaged much.

[Eikon]

Man that sucks! Thank God for insurance!

Make sure you press the insurance company and contractors to find all the damage... You don't want to find some wood rotting out in a couple years from water damage that they didn't find today.

Sounds like the insurance guy is cool though.. so that helps a ton!

A new kitchen and bathroom will be huge for resale on the house at some point down the road, and having it paid for by the insurance company (minus deductible) will be a great upside to the whole situation.

Not sure what we can do to help as it sounds like things are well under control, but let me/us know if there is anything we can do.

[DeXteR]

My bunny doll? If you're talking about those stuffed animals, those are all about 20 years old or older. They're mostly fine. My children's books got it the worst.

Something I forgot to mention: my wife and I are fine with this. Nothing like when our vert got smashed by that stupid ****ing deer back in October 06... We were devastated for weeks after that. This... eh... whatever. It happens.

Insurance, people. Get it. We've got great coverage and only a $500 deductible.

If you guys wanted to help... I need a pignose lip, arp hardwares, and some forged pistons for my ka-t project

[Loki]

Ouch. Glad to hear it is covered and you didn't fry yourself in the basement.

Oh, and I love your cat. Next pet I won is getting named Nismo.

[biggie]

That really sucks. Hope all goes well with the insurance and repairs.

[jamesblonde82]

that sucks, yay for good insurance though, hope the contractors do it right.

[slip69]

holy ****!!!!! that sucks dude but like everyone else said, at least your covered!! and thats awesome that you still have all your stuff from when you were a kid i wish i still had my Voltron and Thundercats toys from when i was a kid

[sci2000tech]

Sorry to hear about the bad news Dexter, that really sucks

If you need anything, don't hesitate to ask.

[cmkelly]

To echo everyone else here, glad you're okay and that everything appears to be working out. I'm thinking granite for the countertops...

Also if you need anything at all don't hesitate to ask sci2000tech

[DeXteR]

I need a pignose lip, arp hardwares, and some forged pistons for my ka-t project

Might as well ask for a JGS exhaust manifold flanged for a Holset turbo and an Xcessive intake manifold with the Q45 throttle body addition too. Could use some coilovers, 1-piece aluminum driveshaft, some 300zx 4-piston aluminum calipers... You get the idea.



Everything is taken care of as far as getting the house taken care of, accommodations, and whatnot. Thanks for the offers for help. If we do end up actually needing something, I'll let you guys know.

[assideways*]

hopefully its a blessing in disguise man!

[jdshift]

I had a similar situation with one of my pipes..........thank goodness I caught it early. Pipe was leaking right over the boiler, leaked into my game room...........lucky for me my comics were in protective plastic covers. Water had flooded most of the room. Water leaked into the garage as well, the pipes we have running through the house were recalled!! The previous owners got a settlement and pocketed the 30,000-40,000 or so that was suppose to take care of it all . Hate to rant in your thread, could have been worse for ya dude.

*EDIT* Insurance should cover the mess though.

[jspec603]

Samething just happened at my place. Waiting on the landlord to replace the carpet. Happened 3 weeks ago now... On the plus side, the leak dripped 6" to the right of my 50" tv! (up stairs pipe broke)

[GoinTopless240]

Damn Dex... Sorry just saw this.. been there and know how that feels.. my shut-off was out at the street and needs a wrench to turn it off (you can use some large channel locks for future reference ). We have a few with some weep holes (old age on copper pipes). Lucky for we live where freezing is something that happens to ice cubes... was almost 80 yesterday (was a top down ride home... but not in the Nissan ). I know the whole humid thing is not as much a problem with time of year up your way, but watch for MOLD in the carpet padding, wall insulation, studs..etc. A bit of bleach and water mix in a bug sprayer will help kill it off (diluted bleach mixture and light spray). At least the insurance company is helping out. Keep us posted on the progress. Hopefully everything that was damaged is easily replaced. Good thing you posted pics..lol

[BOOMSHAKALAKA]

That sucks Dex. Hooray for insurance though.

[DeXteR]

was almost 80 yesterday (was a top down ride home... but not in the Nissan ).

We had a blizzard yesterday. Low visibility, 3' drifts, ~15" of accumulation. 4x4 Pathfinder weather... good thing we have one.

Good thing you posted pics..lol

I'm the picture police. Of course I post pictures. I waited until I had picture uploaded before I even bothered saying anything here.

The aforementioned blizzard is going to put the house behind a day or so. I'm going to have to go home after work and shovel and snowblow my driveway so people can get in and out of there.

[DeXteR]

Here's some more pictures.

We have all the walls, ceilings, and floor ripped out of the kitchen and bathroom.

Here's the pile of rubbish sitting outside my back door. This is after it got snowed on so the effect isn't as great.

Found some old, old records stashed in the wall. These weren't vinyl - These are the old breakable kind.

This is where the stove and fridge used to be:

Here's the southwest corner of the kitchen:

Since those pictures were taken, we ripped up the whole floor in the kitchen and bathroom. We actually ripped up two layers of laminate vinyl and the wooden backing. The top floor came up pretty easy, but the next one down was back-breaking. Took us (me, Michelle, and her dad) about three straight hours to get it up.

We went and did some shopping on Saturday. We picked up a couple windows to replace the ones in the kitchen since they've been leaking for quite a few years. Picked up a light for the kitchen as well as some wire for moving outlets and switches. We went out to Midland Sunday to shop around for other things too. We picked out our bathroom counter thing and found the cupboards we wanted.

Here's the space-saver sink:

Here's what we want for cabinets and cupboards:

The adjuster sent us an estimate for replacement costs. I told Michelle and she was not happy. Apparently it's WAY too low. Not being very familiar with prices for house stuff, I can agree that it's too low. I'm not going to disclose any figures because we need to discuss this with our contractor and go from there.

Great, now we need to dispute stuff. As if this wasn't a big enough pain in the arse...

Here's a picture of the snow in front of my shop after I finished snowblowing. You can see the ouline of where the snow was sitting against the wall. At it's highest, it was to my chest (I'm 6' tall).

[DeXteR]

I just got done talking with Tracy at AAA (the lady I always talk to, she's awesome) and we got some things straightened out. Apparently, the way it works is that the insurance company is going to low-ball everything: labor, material, personal property and they give you a check. Then we (either Michelle and I or the contractor) needs to front the money. After it's paid for, we need to produce the receipts and the insurance company makes up the difference - to an extent. So we can't go buy granite counter tops and marble floors when we had laminate and vinyl and expect the insurance company to make up the difference.

Any discrepancies we have between the adjuster's estimate need to be hammered out between the contractor and the adjuster. In the mean time, we're going to be sitting on the sidelines saying, "WE JUST WANT OUR HOUSE BACK!" That's just the way it works.

She said, "Besides a fire, water damage is the worst claim. It's complicated and time consuming. Just remember it will all work out in the end and things will be back to normal. It won't be exactly the same (it can't be), but it will be close enough."

[Eikon]

Thanks for keeping us updated on this.. it's a good learning experience.. Hopefully I will never have to go through this, but if so, I'll be a little better prepared having learned from your experience.

[DeXteR]

Nothing new. Everything in the house is still the same as it was last time I updated. The only thing going on now is that we have our kitchen planned out. This is what we're expecting it to look like once we've completed.







After I'm done with work, I'm going to call my adjuster and see what's new. He's supposed to be sending us a check to bring the original estimate check a little closer to reality and he should be sending us one for all the stuff that got wrecked and another one for "rent" at the in-laws'. We're going to get back to work regardless of the dispute - we're both tired of not having our house.

[DeXteR]

Time for an update.

We finally got a little bit of a go-ahead from the adjuster. I talked to him yesterday and hopefully the dispute will get settled very soon.

Here's some of the cool stuff we bought:

New kitchen windows, light, and bathroom sink:

Finally some insulation and drywall:

Insulation in the walls - hooray.

We figured out that the wiring in the house is completely screwed up. Without going into it too much, there's stuff from 3-4 different rooms on one breaker... This means we're going to have to spend a lot of time figuring out the wiring.

[Rellik27]

that sucks and is cool at the same time, btw your a great story teller lol good job

[Eikon]

It's going to be SOO nice to get back into the house and have it done up nice and new!

What's the ETA on rebuild? A couple weeks yet or sooner?

[DeXteR]

What's the ETA on rebuild? A couple weeks yet or sooner?

The cupboards alone are going to take that long. They haven't even been started yet and won't be until the contractor and adjuster can come to agreement. Looks like AAA is paying for at least another month of "rent" at the in-laws'.

[YOUNG240SX]

thats sucks bro...i had 2 deal with it for 2week,cause they couldnt find the leak .

[Silvia2NR]

Looks like winters are mighty cold in your area. I would strongly advise you to use a vapor barrier along with the insulation. You'll save on heating/cooling costs and it's a minimal expense. Google: Vapor Barrier.

As for the electrical problems, add a sub panel. You can DIY this yourself if you're familiar if not it can get costly. Screwing with the main panel can sometimes require a permit and inspection.

[DeXteR]

So the adjuster FINALLY came up on his estimate and we have the go-ahead. So over the weekend we finished the insulation and started on the drywall.

Instead of renting a dumpster, we decided to just burn everything. That's one nice thing about living in the sticks - just grab your gas can and light 'er up!

More drywall and measuring for counter top. We had to put the bathroom "wall" up to get measurements for ordering our countertop:

Here you can see the new windows installed - we put those in last week.

After we were done working Saturday, Michelle and I went to go spend some insurance money. We went to Menard's to order our solid surface countertop because they had free color upgrades (that means we got a lot nicer counter for the cheap price) and they don't force you to have it installed. So about $950 later, our countertop should be there on April 12. We picked up stuff for completing the wiring including switches and outlets and corner beads for finishing the drywall.

Monday night, all I did was put in the new subfloor for the bathroom - I'm no carpenter:

Tuesday we had a full crew again and got some the bathroom "wall" installed, put up more drywall, and put up corner beads.

The rest of this week we should get some mud-work done, order materials for the new cupboards and a few other things. Once construction of the cupboards starts, I need to get in gear and rip out the old chimney - from the roof to the basement floor - it's all coming out.

More updates later as more progress is made.

[DeXteR]

It's been a while since the last update. Things have continued to move along slowly, but they're moving.

Here's a shot of the new pocket door I installed for the bathroom. It needs to come back down though so we can cut the bottom off to clear the new floors that are getting put in:

Here you can see the entrance with a coat of mud. Another coat and some more sanding and it will be ready for paint:

Since we removed the window from the bathroom, we needed to add an exhaust fan. This is a fan and a light combined - you'll see it later when we get it installed. We didn't have the fan before, so this will be really nice:

With the fan and pocket door installed, we could put up the moisture-resistant drywall. Yeah, it's purple:

FINALLY, what we've really been waiting for - cupboards!

The picture of the drawers didn't turn out right, so this is the only sample for now. By the next update, they'll probably be installed.

Here's a picture of the carpenters hard at work in the wood shop:

Yesterday, we picked up our tile and spacers for the kitchen. We still need to get cement board, thin-set, and mortar before we can install, but I wanted to get a feel for what it was going to look like:

Lastly, this is what we're thinking about using for the bathroom floor:

That's bamboo. We both like it and think it will look really nice in bathroom with the rest of the theme we have in there. However, we're not sure how it will hold up to the moisture in the bathroom. Last night I soaked that sample in a bowl under weight so it wasn't floating. It seemed fine this morning, but we'll see how it dries. Next time we're at home depot, I'm going to talk to the "flooring expert" and see what he/she thinks about using bamboo as a bathroom floor. I'll do some of my own research as well.

We still have a long way to go, but we're making progress.