After getting a few estimates and LOTS of really good info from several Tank Replacement companies, we decided to go with Xpress Energy.

Sam, who came in to give us an estimate, told me that he has a house about the same size and that he uses about 5 gallons a day in Oil..so off I go to get 5 gallons of “off-road diesel” a day! The fumes make me dizzy and give me a very slight headache…but better than the stress of ‘running out of oil’

This is Dennis, he is the brains in this (not that the other 2 guys are not smart, Dennis has the experience).

Gavin is the muscle and apprentice…

…and Rob, I’m guessing he is the supervisor/salesman

I’m going to call this the tank corner

The new tank in place

The orange hose is what feeds the burner…it’s been 20+ years since I have needed to bleed an oil line, and I know that it can cost up to $100 bucks if it’s ever needed. (The oil companies make money on people not knowing how to do this!) So…I asked alot of questions about the burner itself, the bleeding the line and how the water is heated. Yep, no hot water heater, it’s part of the burner.

They cut the old tank in half and siphoned out the oil, this is the back side of the tank! As much as I feel like these oil companies are full of shit, this does prove that they can’t fix and ‘resell’ the tank! Because I am NOT 100% convinced it needed to be replaced!

I was told by 1 of the guys that did an estimate that the oil that we were smelling was from the pipe coming into the house, that it was blowing back oil on the outside of the tank itself. You can see that in the picture, where it looks ‘wet’.

Every one had a different opinion on the tank replacement! We will not need to do this again for at least 25 years.

Jen seemed to smell the oil every time we had oil delivered, so she decided to call the oil company and come out and do an inspection of the system on 2/9/2024

At the end of the inspection, we were told that the heater is fine, but there is a small leak at the valve on the oil tank. They will provide a couple companies that can tell us if it CAN be fixed or if the tank needs to be replaced. They also tell us that they will NOT deliver oil to us until the tank is fixed or replaced. Fuckers!

Jen set up an appointment on Monday 2/19 with PTE (Professional Tank & Environmental) to have them come out to tell us if they can fix it or if it needs to be replaced. He was supposed to be here at 1pm, so I timed my lunch around this so I could go through everything with him. He did not show….and apparently PTE called Jen at 1:30 to say he had a family emergency. Ok, I get it…I can be patient!

So…now the next appt is for Tuesday 2/20 at 11, which is fine, but I have a weekly call with everyone at work. When this guy doesn’t show by 11:15, Jen calls PTE and says that we need to reschedule. (I did not know that she cancelled it)…the guy shows up here at 11:30, just as the meeting is starting. He said it should only take a few minutes, so I put the meeting on mute and escorted him down the basement to the tank. Immediately he tells me that it needs to be replaced, that there is rust on the legs. I told him that he needs to write up an estimate and email it to Jen. He continues to talk to me about the best plan…I am done with this guy!

I am sick of this shit…the man-spaining, the being talked down to, the assumption that I am just a dumb-ass woman, all that stupid MEN contractor shit! AND now, we need oil!

We are going to makes some more calls! Seems as though we were pretty much blackballed from getting oil delivered until we get the tank replaced, so we are going to need to get some estimates on the tank replacement….I’m still not convinced that there is actually a leak, but we are being forced to replace the tank!

Trying to find homes for everything in the kitchen has been a challenge and with this cabinet doing a dip made it even harder to figure out what to do with the house-cleaning stuff. I know I can rip out and re-build a platform, but it is NOT a priority! So I decided to rip out the cabinet flooring…

There’s still more to do under there, but now it can wait until we are ready to dive in!

New Years Eve 2023!

We needed one room that we can relax in…so we set out to unpack the boxes to make the “family room” feel like home.

Jen approved me re-doing the powder room…because there is a smell in there that makes us keep the door closed and makes it not worth using. So we went to Lowes and picked up a few things. We started with waterproof flooring, some toilet parts (wax ring, floor bolts), a vanity with the sink, and 3 new toilet seats for each of the bathrooms.

During our home inspection, one of the things that didn’t work was the shower in the main bathroom. No water movement through the shower. He said it was the shower control knob. This was not a big deal because we can shower in the master bedroom bathroom and I like epsom salt baths. I decided to troubleshoot it anyway…because I could! Turns out it was a clogged showerhead. While we were out we also stopped at HomeDepot to pick up the new shower head. I wanted the same one that we had in the old house (that I brought with us)…also got a curved shower curtain rod! I have gotten spoiled!

There are locks everywhere but there is only 1 key, so changing out the locks or having them re-keyed will probably be a project in itself! Since the shed is stand alone and a very easy fix, I changed out that lock. My bike and some tools are out there. Next up is the garage door lock! (there isn’t one). The garage door also needs a new door seal and possibly replace the springs (and if we ever put the car in there, we will need a garage door opener).

The spare bedroom now has a bed. I will eventually hang the bedroom TV in there. I decided not to put it in the master bedroom because the only time is it on is when Jen is sick and wants to do a “True Blood” marathon. Now she can be sick in there! HaHa!

One of the most frustrating things about moving is now matter how organized you THINK you are, you are NOT! Seek and Find is a real pain in the ass! It only took 3 weeks to find the lag bolts and remotes for my main TV.

Now I can relax a little!

Not sure what to do about this…one of the previous owners did NOT provide a forwarding address and according to the USPS, there were many family members having their mail delivered here…or they all lived here…totally unsure!! Well, they got a Kansas City Steak delivery as a Holiday gift!

We will call Kansas Steak and have them stop future deliveries, but if we ‘return it’, they would technically need to destroy it. After a few discussions on how to deal with it, we are having steak for dinner 🙂 I will not feel bad about it either!

and a little Irony…this time last year, we were in Kansas City…and I don’t think we had time to try any of the steak houses.

during:

after:

the shed too:

tomorrow morning the movers come, bright and early…so EVERYTHING needs to be boxed up and ready for them. Guess what, I need to work today…the 2nd phase of this big project is going to be put into production today…we start at 7am and the goal is to complete 7 customer moves. As much as I want to say we are ready, I don’t think anyone is feeling confident…but we will push through with high hopes! done by 2pm is the hope!

The house packing…I feel like we are in a good place with that…but every time I turn around my thought is…oh, we cant forget that.

UPDATE : we did not get done work until 5-6 pm, it was borderline brutal! The good thing is…work pays for dinner…no matter what we want (within reason)…so I let Jen choose, since she has to put up with me working and not getting anything else done. We had filet mignon at Outback! But again, I didnt get much packing done! I’ll get up early tomorrow!

for Mitchell Ave:

Home Inspection 11/15 -LIBERTY INSPECTION GROUP -Chris- got to meet the potential new owners…I like them!!

The things that he chose for us to fix seemed weird to me, not because the attention wasn’t needed, but because there are bigger things I would have thought were more important. The biggest thing was a split rafter in the attic on the back side of the house, this was probably caused by the leak we had after we re-did the kitchen. Scott spent an hour up there adding a sister rafter…DONE! The new attic fan wiring needed to be put in the junction box…DONE! A GFCI outlet needed to be installed near the washer (even though this was not even close to the laundry tub…DONE! The toilet needed to be tightened…DONE! And the weirdest thing, the Inspector said that the sump pumps needed backflow prevention installed. The sump pumps come with the sump pumps…Scott tested them and everything is in working order…DONE!

FHA Inspection 11/21 -Leo– Everyone is telling me that this is the Inspection that I need to worry about…

They normally don’t tell the homeowner what needs to be done until the report comes out, but since the timing was critical, he was nice enough to give me the “list”

The basement throne needed to be ‘removed’, but we can just remove it and sit it on the floor and temporarily plug the flange. Reason being, partial privacy walls and no exhaust fan. This is something that will NOT matter once the loan is underwritten for the new buyers…they can pick the toilet back up and put it back in place…

We will need to cover the wires in the hallway that are dead, but go to the emergency OFF switch to the heater. This has been that way SO long, it wasn’t even on the radar (should say, my radar)

We may need a railing to the attic, but since this is a ‘storage space’, it may not be an issue. Turns out, he didn’t even add this to the report.

Paint the exterior of the basement windows…not sure why the exterior paint would be a health and safety issue considering that licking the paint chips would probably be impossible…but go figure!

The new owners came over and did the painting, I pulled the toilet, covered the outlet box…Leo came out the next morning and ‘re-inspected’…we are good to go!

UOC – Ridley Twp – waste of money!

This is just another way for Ridley Twp to put the screws to you…occupancy inspection/certificate. They check the ‘public sidewalk’ (not one), driveway (gravel) and railings on steps. so who gives a shit what’s on the inside…what if all of the copper was stripped…or sewage pipes filled with cement…you know, unlivable?? And to top it all off, we are being charged double because the side lot is considered it’s own ‘parcel’.

as of 12/1…we are ready on the Mitchell Ave side! am closing on 12/4

We did one showing after another to the point where we couldn’t get any packing done. We were concentrating all of our efforts in staging/showing the house and getting the dogs out. Just about everyone that came through said it was too small for what they wanted. But everyone loved the kitchen! We knew if we didnt get an offer soon we would need to do a large mortgage on the new house…so I was trying to get used to the idea and find some good in it…like the pod could stay until we move, we could take our time getting out and I wouldnt have to move all of the outside stuff to Paul and Katt’s.

So we decided to go treat ourselves to a nice dinner.

This is when we got the call that we will be getting an offer tonight. The offer came in with a letter…it said ALL the right things!