Speaker 1: Ruby.
Speaker 2: I just go out there and I see it, I
Speaker 2: know it, and boom. You need a boiler, you need
Speaker 2: to hot water heater, you have lead pipes coming in
Speaker 2: your house. You have mold over here, you got this
Speaker 2: over here. I take pictures and then move on.
Speaker 1: Every house has problems.
Speaker 3: Well that feels ominous.
Speaker 1: Uh no, that's just true. But the question is whether
Speaker 1: you know what those problems are because they're not always obvious.
Speaker 4: They could be quietly destroying your home while you're I
Speaker 4: don't know, watching Netflix.
Speaker 1: And that's why today's episode is about all the things
Speaker 1: in your house that can hurt you, poison you, flood
Speaker 1: your basement, give you jingles for us. Leah, do you
Speaker 1: know the joy it brings me to see your face?
Speaker 4: I think I might because I feel that same exact joy.
Speaker 1: I've learned so much from hosting this show and looking
Speaker 1: at like the list of episodes for making this season,
Speaker 1: we're just in for another dose of learning, and so
Speaker 1: I'm so pumped to get into it with our topic today.
Speaker 4: A lot of people say you don't know what you
Speaker 4: don't know, but this show really points out to me
Speaker 4: everything that I don't know, and then I feel so
Speaker 4: much better when I even learn a little tiny bit
Speaker 4: about so many different things.
Speaker 1: Welcome back everyone to Grown Up Stuff, the podcast where
Speaker 1: we figure out all the things you feel like you
Speaker 1: should know by now.
Speaker 3: Uh, maybe don't. I'm Leah Paul.
Speaker 1: Mary and I'm Matt Stillo and today we're talking home
Speaker 1: safety with home Inspector Joe Masa. Joe Masa is co
Speaker 1: host of the HGTV series What's Wrong with That House
Speaker 1: and previously Home Inspector Joe. He now runs his own
Speaker 1: home inspection business.
Speaker 4: He's basically seen everything that can go wrong in a
Speaker 4: house and more importantly, how.
Speaker 3: To prevent it.
Speaker 1: And not to humble brag, but he agreed to chat
Speaker 1: with us before heading off to inspect a too big
Speaker 1: to be mentioned celebrities house Fancy, very fancy.
Speaker 3: We were still the highlight of his day.
Speaker 1: Well stuff.
Speaker 2: So I'm inspecting her house. So she's probably gonna hate
Speaker 2: me once I'm done.
Speaker 1: Well, I think that takes us right into it.
Speaker 2: Right, I'm the hater. Yeah, So, you know, just like
Speaker 2: yesterday's job, it was a gorgeous, gorgeous house and they
Speaker 2: have the cameras on the outside of the home and
Speaker 2: I heard them talking. They're like you know, let's hear
Speaker 2: what this a hole is saying. Right now, I can
Speaker 2: hear him, and I turned around. I looked at the camera.
Speaker 2: I go, I hear you.
Speaker 4: God, all right, Matt, Well, let's hear what this a
Speaker 4: hole has to say.
Speaker 2: Look, you know it's what every house, right, every house
Speaker 2: has a problem. Yeah, house has a problem. Yeah it's
Speaker 2: all it's just how big the problem is.
Speaker 1: Home hazards cause millions of injuries every year.
Speaker 4: And most of the hazards aren't dramatic. They're just things
Speaker 4: that people ignore or don't know how to.
Speaker 1: Spot, water, air. This is like an episode of Avatar
Speaker 1: the Last Airbender fire maintenance, basically all.
Speaker 3: Of the invisible stuff.
Speaker 1: So this episode is about catching problems early before they
Speaker 1: become very expensive lessons and dangerous safety hazards, because.
Speaker 4: As Joe puts it, small problems don't stay small for long.
Speaker 3: Here he is describing exactly what he does.
Speaker 2: My job is to inspect a home. That typically is
Speaker 2: people that are buying. I do pre sell home inspections
Speaker 2: and I do regular home inspections for people that I've
Speaker 2: been living there for a while. So my goal is
Speaker 2: to tell you what's wrong and how to fix it
Speaker 2: in a sense, I like to tell people how to
Speaker 2: fix it because I know how to fix a lot
Speaker 2: of things. I've been in construction for a long time.
Speaker 2: My big, big role is safety, safety, safety, safety across
Speaker 2: the board.
Speaker 1: In your experience, what is one of the single most
Speaker 1: preventable home safety issues that you see that you know,
Speaker 1: one that makes you think like, oh my god, you guys,
Speaker 1: this was so avoidable.
Speaker 2: Mold? Mold. Yeah, I can't stress mold enough. Actually, just
Speaker 2: at a house. It was last week. In the garage
Speaker 2: it had mold. In the basement it had mold, and
Speaker 2: in the attic it add a lot of mold. These
Speaker 2: are the typical spots of where you're gonna find mold. Dehumidifiers.
Speaker 2: You must have a dehumidfier in your garage and in
Speaker 2: your basement. It is a must. It is a non
Speaker 2: negotiable when buying a house, living in a house, you
Speaker 2: want humidity fifty percent or less. If you don't have
Speaker 2: it fifty percent or less, you are going to get
Speaker 2: mold across the board. So a dehumidifier you spend one
Speaker 2: hundred bucks on hundred fifty two hundred doesn't matter if
Speaker 2: even if it was five hundred dollars you get those,
Speaker 2: and I have one in my garage and I have
Speaker 2: one in my basement. So the house that didn't have it,
Speaker 2: they had mold in the garage and a lot of mold.
Speaker 2: You really couldn't see it. But when I take my
Speaker 2: flashlight and I shine the flashlight on an angle, all
Speaker 2: the spores is shine. And then in the basement you
Speaker 2: need it as well. So the attic mold in the attic.
Speaker 2: So you have your sop advance where the roof comes
Speaker 2: down over the gutters underneath there there is a sopping
Speaker 2: and it has vents. Not every house but a majority
Speaker 2: of them have vents there. People think there's air getting in,
Speaker 2: which there is, and it's supposed to. They stuff insulation
Speaker 2: down inside there. What that does is it stops all
Speaker 2: the airflow, now heat loss from the house in the wintertime,
Speaker 2: Condensation on the mails that are going through the roof mold,
Speaker 2: and it was just mold everywhere. And they didn't have
Speaker 2: a lot of sunlight in that section of the home.
Speaker 2: And that was all avoidable, one hundred percent avoidable all
Speaker 2: the way around. And they ended up paying twenty thousand
Speaker 2: dollars to have it repaired WHOA.
Speaker 1: Let's take a minute to explain why mold in the
Speaker 1: house can be a hazard. Most mold really isn't harmful, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, we use it to make yogurt, penicillin, cheese,
Speaker 1: all kinds of good things. Mold spores are in the
Speaker 1: air we breathe, and it's usually not an issue. But
Speaker 1: extensive indoor mold contamination that could cause some health problems, probably.
Speaker 4: Not more than the cheese though, But according to Harvard Health,
Speaker 4: the biggest issue for most people is coughing, congestion, scratchy throat,
Speaker 4: and if you already have allergies or asthma, it can
Speaker 4: hit a lot harder, like real flare ups, not just
Speaker 4: mild symptoms.
Speaker 1: Plus, obviously kids, older adults, people with weaker immune systems,
Speaker 1: they're more at risk. So if your house smells musty,
Speaker 1: that's your house telling you something.
Speaker 4: And let's be clear, mold doesn't need a big splashy
Speaker 4: leak to show up. It just needs moisture and time
Speaker 4: like twenty four to.
Speaker 1: Forty eight hours, which means humidity alone can cause it
Speaker 1: big problem for people living in high humidity states like Louisiana, Mississippi,
Speaker 1: and of course Florida. Which usually ranks at the top
Speaker 1: for most at risk from mold.
Speaker 4: So that dehumidifier Joe mentioned that is way cheaper than
Speaker 4: ripping out drywall, because once mold spreads, you're not talking
Speaker 4: about prevention anymore. You're talking about a costly remediation and
Speaker 4: greater potential for health problems.
Speaker 1: Okay, Joe, So let's talk about the differences between an
Speaker 1: old house versus a new house, because I feel like
Speaker 1: I know which one might be safer overall.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're buying one hundred year old house. You're gonna
Speaker 2: have one hundred year old problems.
Speaker 3: Okay, great.
Speaker 2: I tell people, you know, they're like, Jo, my floor
Speaker 2: is a little slope over here. I'm like, when you're
Speaker 2: one hundred years old, I want to see you walk
Speaker 2: a straight line. And everyone needs a V eight right
Speaker 2: when you get that old, you gotta straight yourself out.
Speaker 2: A one hundred year old home has one hundre ye
Speaker 2: old problems. You're gonna find a lot of different issues,
Speaker 2: especially insulation, the insulations in the walls. If they haven't
Speaker 2: done anything, you're either one gonna have none or two
Speaker 2: it's gonna be completely compressed. You're gonna have air leaks,
Speaker 2: all over. The house is going to be drafty, your
Speaker 2: utility bills are going to be through the roof. A
Speaker 2: newer house, everything is more air tight, which doesn't necessarily
Speaker 2: mean a good thing. Because now your house is so
Speaker 2: air tight you have no air moving in and moving out,
Speaker 2: which can also for breathing issues. Mold can grow easier
Speaker 2: with that, So there's pros and cons of old and
Speaker 2: of new old houses. Lead paint. Anything built for nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy eight is assume to have lead paint. Galvanized pipes
Speaker 2: Galvanized pipes are the worst to have. First of all,
Speaker 2: you don't want water lines to be galvanized because you
Speaker 2: drink that you're gonna have a problem.
Speaker 4: And here's the problem. Galvanized pipes are basically steel or
Speaker 4: iron pipes coated in zinc to keep them from rusting,
Speaker 4: and they were super common in homes built before the
Speaker 4: nineteen sixties.
Speaker 3: They don't age well.
Speaker 4: Over like forty to seventy years. That protective coating breaks down,
Speaker 4: and instead of preventing issues, it actually starts causing them
Speaker 4: rust build up, weird brownish water, lower water pressure, and
Speaker 4: more concerning, they can start leeching heavy metals, including lead,
Speaker 4: into your drinking water. So it's one of those things
Speaker 4: that used to be a smart solution but now is
Speaker 4: more of a hidden risk. Okay, back to Joe.
Speaker 2: Two lead piping coming into the house. You don't want
Speaker 2: that either. But galvanized pipes take the pipe to say,
Speaker 2: it's a two inch diameter in the middle. And I
Speaker 2: always say to people eat fast food every single day,
Speaker 2: all day long for years and years and years. The
Speaker 2: average person, their arteries are going to shut down. And
Speaker 2: that's what happened with galvanized pipes, and they leak out
Speaker 2: like the one I did the other day. The guy
Speaker 2: thought it was a good idea to take scotch tape
Speaker 2: and taped the hole in his pipe in his laundry
Speaker 2: room scotched.
Speaker 4: Oh my god, I don't even trust scotch tape to
Speaker 4: keep an envelope close.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like, dude, scotch tape really, you know.
Speaker 1: Some guys are just scotch taping over all the problems
Speaker 1: in their life.
Speaker 2: I mean, if that was a cave and I just
Speaker 2: I'd invest in scotch tape, but you know it doesn't
Speaker 2: work like that. But anyway, Yeah, older houses present a
Speaker 2: lot of older problems. The house I did yesterday was
Speaker 2: twenty years old. Monster foundation cracks. Wowly twenty years old?
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: So yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean, if you're buying like a pretty new house,
Speaker 4: is there anything else from like a new house that
Speaker 4: you should be on the lookout to because you're thinking, oh,
Speaker 4: that's brand new, shiny, everything's good here. Is there still
Speaker 4: something that homeowners should be making sure is double checked?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Cheap labor, cheap workmanship, cheap materials on the home.
Speaker 2: I've done new new houses that were going for you know,
Speaker 2: well over a million, two million dollars. They just use
Speaker 2: horrible material It was just not done right.
Speaker 1: I think there's definitely this default assumption that newer homes
Speaker 1: are safer, you know, like newer equals better built, fewer problems,
Speaker 1: less risk. But what Joe's getting at here is the
Speaker 1: newer homes just have different problems.
Speaker 4: Oh but they got problems because older homes are kind
Speaker 4: of like you know what, you're dealing with, lead pain,
Speaker 4: older wiring, maybe some questionable plumbing choices. Yeah, but newer
Speaker 4: homes they're tighter, more sealed up, less airflow, which sounds
Speaker 4: cool until you realize that also means moisture and pollutants
Speaker 4: they have nowhere to go.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and he said that there's also like the build
Speaker 1: quality piece. With newer homes, people are building them faster
Speaker 1: with like less quality materials, sometimes less oversight, so you
Speaker 1: might not see the problems right away, but they could
Speaker 1: show up later.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean, in trying to save some money right off
Speaker 4: the top, you might be only adding on some more
Speaker 4: later when you have some problems. So I want to
Speaker 4: move on to detection. Now, how do we make sure
Speaker 4: that we are set up to detect some of these
Speaker 4: things before they become big issues aka.
Speaker 3: A lot more money.
Speaker 4: So I want to start with detectors because fire is
Speaker 4: one of the big home safety considerations.
Speaker 2: Smoke detectors. Everybody needs one. In every sleeping court. You
Speaker 2: need one. You walk in the room, boom right on
Speaker 2: the ceiling. Put it there. I don't care if it's
Speaker 2: wired in, I don't care how you want to put it.
Speaker 2: Just have one right there. Every hallway smoke detector and
Speaker 2: COEO detector, carbon monoxide detector. Every level of the house
Speaker 2: needs a smoke and carbonoxide I always like to have
Speaker 2: one in the garage, a smoke and carbon You can
Speaker 2: even put a heat detector in there as well. Any
Speaker 2: room with a fireplace have a smoke and carbon monoxide detector.
Speaker 2: These are just the areas that produce carbon monoxide and smoke.
Speaker 2: They have a ten year life and they are on
Speaker 2: the side of each one and it has a date
Speaker 2: You put the data in that you installed it, and
Speaker 2: in ten years throw it out. Most of them now
Speaker 2: they don't even have batteries that go in. It's a
Speaker 2: built in battery. You get it, you pull the tab out,
Speaker 2: install it, and then it'll tell you the ones I
Speaker 2: have here. They talk to each other on every level.
Speaker 2: They're not Wi Fi. I don't want Wi Fi from
Speaker 2: my own person reasons because let's say I lose power
Speaker 2: in a home and I lose Wi Fi. Now my
Speaker 2: smoke detectors don't work, and they're not talking to each other.
Speaker 2: But there's so many different kinds you can get out
Speaker 2: there that go to your cell phone. They give your
Speaker 2: heads up, this is what happened, this is what's happening.
Speaker 2: And if you are going to change a battery, change
Speaker 2: a battery, don't take it down and not change a battery.
Speaker 2: I was with a real estate agent the other week
Speaker 2: with a beautiful house. She had a fire in her
Speaker 2: kitchen a year earlier, she took the smoke detector down.
Speaker 2: Want to change a battery put in her draw forgot
Speaker 2: about it? Well, in her kitchen almost burned down. Avoidable, right,
Speaker 2: it's just avoidable.
Speaker 3: I did just want to ask you about the smoke
Speaker 3: detectors too.
Speaker 4: We know you're not going for the Wi Fi option,
Speaker 4: but like, do I need like a really fancy expensive
Speaker 4: one or just like a regular basic one works? And
Speaker 4: also do you recommend the kind where like you have
Speaker 4: to put in two double A batteries supposedly every time
Speaker 4: you like change your clocks or is it just better
Speaker 4: to have the kind that you were talking about where
Speaker 4: you pull the tab and it's like good for a while.
Speaker 2: You don't need an expensive one. You really don't. If
Speaker 2: you want them to talk to each other, which is
Speaker 2: what I have. I like the ones I talk to
Speaker 2: each other. So the basement talks to the first floor,
Speaker 2: first four talks to the second floor, so if there's
Speaker 2: something happening on every level, it'll say, hey fire, first
Speaker 2: floor fire, fire, fire, and then everyone has a panic
Speaker 2: attack and they run out. I like those the ones
Speaker 2: with the batteries you put in. I'm not a fan
Speaker 2: of that. Don't get that the ones that have a
Speaker 2: ten year life buy those. You just install it, put
Speaker 2: the date on it, and move on from there.
Speaker 1: So just a shout out to women everywhere. I don't
Speaker 1: know how I did it, but I went five years
Speaker 1: without a smoke detector in my house because every time
Speaker 1: I made pizza it just went off. And then my
Speaker 1: wife moved in, was like, are you an idiot? Like
Speaker 1: do you want to die? And now she cleaned my oven,
Speaker 1: which is why I was going off all the time.
Speaker 1: And she saved my life every day. So and she
Speaker 1: didn't move out, she totally could have. She somehow is
Speaker 1: still here.
Speaker 2: It's a good woman. Keep her.
Speaker 1: I try every day.
Speaker 2: One thing we didn't touch based on really quick. Let's
Speaker 2: say you live in a house like mine. It's a cape,
Speaker 2: so upstairs, I have one way up, one way out.
Speaker 2: If there's ever a fire on my first floor and
Speaker 2: it goes up, let's say and I can't get down
Speaker 2: my stairs, I have ladder. It's one time you sladder?
Speaker 2: Did I throw out the window? Now? If your five
Speaker 2: stories up, make sure it's a five story ladder, because
Speaker 2: mine is for two stories. So it's a one time use,
Speaker 2: you throw it out the window, and you know, we
Speaker 2: have it in one of the rooms upstairs, and I
Speaker 2: told my daughter, my wife, this thanking God forbid ever happens.
Speaker 2: This is how it latches on and you throw it
Speaker 2: out and you climbed out.
Speaker 1: One question that I want to go back to, just
Speaker 1: so the pretext to this question is, my wife and
Speaker 1: I just were taking out like a child safety class
Speaker 1: and one of the things that they had us watch
Speaker 1: was like grease fires and like why you'd want to
Speaker 1: have like a fire extinguisher in your kitchen. And they
Speaker 1: specifically said to get a chemical fire extinguisher, which like
Speaker 1: helps grease fires. So the question that I'd ask you,
Speaker 1: they're like, what are some of the most common fire
Speaker 1: risks you see in everyday homes? And what kind of
Speaker 1: fire extinguisher would you recommend people have on hand.
Speaker 2: So for the stove, what we bought was a fire blanket.
Speaker 2: Look into fire blankets first, the fire extinguishers. Because you
Speaker 2: have a fire extinguisher, I'm like, good, good. I go,
Speaker 2: do you know how to use it? And I test
Speaker 2: people show me how to use it, and they like
Speaker 2: like this, I'm like, you're doing it wrong. You're spraying
Speaker 2: through the flames, you have to step back six feet back,
Speaker 2: spray it at the base of the flame versus through
Speaker 2: the flame, because you're just wasting your time. So a
Speaker 2: lot of people don't know how to use a fire extinguisher,
Speaker 2: but fire blankets for like a grease fire. It's a
Speaker 2: very good option. And I'm not gonna lie. That was
Speaker 2: not my idea. I came home and my wife bought it. So, Matt,
Speaker 2: your wife saved you.
Speaker 1: My wife is saving us, just saving lives.
Speaker 2: Why as you're saving lives?
Speaker 1: Oh like that?
Speaker 2: Why love that? Now? Things that cause fires that we
Speaker 2: see all the time, extension cords. Stop using extension chords
Speaker 2: all over the place. It's mind boggling. Some of these
Speaker 2: houses I go to that just have extension chords to
Speaker 2: space heaters, have space heaters all over the place. I
Speaker 2: did win this winter. They had extension chords going to
Speaker 2: a space heater and they were using a space heater
Speaker 2: to dry their clothes and clothes on top of the
Speaker 2: space heater. And I call them all in and I go,
Speaker 2: what are you doing. They're like, we're drying our clothes.
Speaker 2: I'm like, dude, you're going to burn your house down.
Speaker 2: And kill everyone in your like, you cannot do that.
Speaker 2: So extension cords space heaters are huge. These are big issues.
Speaker 2: If you're not electrician, don't be an electrician, don't do
Speaker 2: anything electrical.
Speaker 1: And for those of us who are not electricians, I
Speaker 1: am someone who owns extension cords and space heaters, not
Speaker 1: that they're I'm using them in that conjunction right now,
Speaker 1: I'm not. What is it specifically about the extension cords
Speaker 1: and the space heaters that pose a fire risk.
Speaker 2: Extension cords people don't buy the right one. They'll use
Speaker 2: like a cheap one.
Speaker 1: Basically people are buying whatever off of Amazon, or they
Speaker 1: go to home depot and to power something like a
Speaker 1: space heater, which takes a lot more power and that's
Speaker 1: just causing kind of like maybe it's sparking or it's
Speaker 1: overheating or.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and put them on a GFCI ground full
Speaker 2: circuit interruptor if there's a surge, it's going to say
Speaker 2: oh oh, and it shuts itself off. That's your added
Speaker 2: protection on it. And never leave a house or don't
Speaker 2: even leave a room. What a space heater running? Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know. The better ones that people use are the
Speaker 2: oil filled ones, the ones with the red coils, and
Speaker 2: those cheap ones. Please don't like the worst. Use them
Speaker 2: outside in the backyard on concrete to warm your feet. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's it.
Speaker 1: Some redemption for me. I do have an oil so
Speaker 1: that's really great to hear.
Speaker 4: Fire safety is one of those things people feel like
Speaker 4: they've already handled. It's easy to write like, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: we have a smoke detector somewhere, but the reality is
Speaker 4: a lot of them aren't even working. Three out of
Speaker 4: five home fire deaths happen in homes without working smoke alarms,
Speaker 4: not missing, just not working. So that's dead batteries, disconnected units,
Speaker 4: or ones that are just too old.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And then there's the stuff that Joe mentioned, like
Speaker 1: extension cords, overloaded outlets, space heaters, the things that you know,
Speaker 1: we don't even think about. They're everyday things. They don't
Speaker 1: feel like they're dangerous until they really really are. It's
Speaker 1: kind of wild to hear how many risks come down
Speaker 1: to convenience, like oh, I'll just plug one more thing in,
Speaker 1: or it's okay to dry clothes near this space heater.
Speaker 3: Yeah not so much, Okay.
Speaker 1: Carbon monoxide is one of the few dangers in your homes.
Speaker 1: That gives you absolutely nothing to work with. Right, there's
Speaker 1: no smell, there's no color, there's no warning signs. So, Joe,
Speaker 1: I want to come back to CO two detectors. Is
Speaker 1: there a way to place them specifically that ups their efficacy?
Speaker 1: And if so, where exactly should we place them?
Speaker 2: Not on the floor five feet up? I have one
Speaker 2: on the mid wall. I have one on the ceiling.
Speaker 2: You know, it's a little bit lighter than air, so
Speaker 2: it's going to go up, it's going to rise a
Speaker 2: little bit. Listen, it's better than nothing. They work. They
Speaker 2: work perfectly fine, the ones that plug in on the wall.
Speaker 2: As long as you have them in your house, it's important,
Speaker 2: especially the garage. Yeah, you really should have one in
Speaker 2: the garage. And your garage door should be a fire
Speaker 2: rated self closing door on top of all of that.
Speaker 1: So obviously the cars are one example of where COE
Speaker 1: two can come from. Where else in our house can
Speaker 1: see you two come from? And how can we just
Speaker 1: like make sure we're mitigating it at every point in
Speaker 1: addition to detecting it when it does arise.
Speaker 2: Yeah, your heating system, you know, most are in the basement.
Speaker 2: Depends on your house. Wherever the heating system is, put
Speaker 2: a smoke in carbonoxide detector in that room. That's going
Speaker 2: to produce it. That's it right there. If the flu
Speaker 2: is clogged where the exhaust go out, it's going to
Speaker 2: back into your home right there, that'll go off and
Speaker 2: give you heads up if you have it in your attic,
Speaker 2: if a furnace in your attic, put one in you're attic.
Speaker 2: Those are the two main spots. And fireplace in your
Speaker 2: firepolice room that can produce carbon monoxide as well.
Speaker 4: We'll be right back after a quick.
Speaker 1: Break, and we're back with more grown up stuff.
Speaker 2: How do adult?
Speaker 1: This is scary stuff. The CDC reports hundreds of deaths
Speaker 1: every year from carbon monoxide poisoning, tens of thousands of
Speaker 1: ur visits. And it's usually not some rare scenario like
Speaker 1: it's furnaces and garages, fireplaces, especially in the colder months
Speaker 1: when everything's closed up.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this is.
Speaker 4: One of those risks where detection is the only defense.
Speaker 4: Like not to be all smoky the bear about it,
Speaker 4: but truly the only thing that's going to make me
Speaker 4: feel less anxious about this is actually being prepared. So
Speaker 4: that brings me to another colorless, odorless gas rate on.
Speaker 4: It feels like one of those things that people vaguely
Speaker 4: know about but not enough to.
Speaker 3: Really act on. I'm certainly one of those people.
Speaker 4: So we asked Joe, what is it exactly?
Speaker 3: Who needs to test for it?
Speaker 4: And if we should all be as worried about it
Speaker 4: as I am.
Speaker 1: Only you can prevent radon.
Speaker 3: Just let my neurosis fly.
Speaker 2: Right on breakdown of uranium in the ground, so when
Speaker 2: you walk outside, you're inhaling it, you're spelling it this
Speaker 2: and that, but it's dissipated into the atmosphere right on.
Speaker 2: Is a colorless, orderless guess. You can't see it, can't
Speaker 2: smell it. It seeps into your foundation, into your lowest
Speaker 2: livable space, and it just hang out there. How to
Speaker 2: mitigate it in a natural way without putting a system
Speaker 2: in open a window, airflow, let it go out of
Speaker 2: the house itself. Right there, They say, second leading cause
Speaker 2: of lung cancer long term exposure. Everyone should test for it, period.
Speaker 2: I've had houses that were ten times a limit. I
Speaker 2: mean just through the roof where I walked out if
Speaker 2: I was glowing. But everyone should test for it. That's
Speaker 2: it really be on a safe side. And I always
Speaker 2: tell people too, when I go to your house if
Speaker 2: it's an unfinished basement, and I go, look, your levels
Speaker 2: were so and so they were just below the threshold
Speaker 2: of four point zero, where the EPA says they want
Speaker 2: to have a reduction system put in. A mitigation system
Speaker 2: put in that costs about two thousand bucks, give or take,
Speaker 2: depending on where you live. I said, do you plan
Speaker 2: on finishing your basement? And they said, yeah, we're going
Speaker 2: to finish it. And I go, when you're done finishing it,
Speaker 2: I want you to call me back. I'm going to
Speaker 2: come over here. I'm going to do another test, because
Speaker 2: now you just major basement completely air tight. I said
Speaker 2: that to thousands of people, and that one person called
Speaker 2: me back to do one. I threw it out there.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, I mean you did your part out of curiosity.
Speaker 4: How do you test for it too? Is it like
Speaker 4: a special machine or something?
Speaker 2: There are machines. I have two canisters that I bring okay,
Speaker 2: and I just take a sticker off of that, leave
Speaker 2: them there and go back, you know, two days up
Speaker 2: to seven days max, close them up, bring them to
Speaker 2: the lab, and I get the results.
Speaker 4: Okay, is this something I can go to the hardware
Speaker 4: store and buy myself, or do I need somebody like
Speaker 4: you to come and do it for me.
Speaker 2: You could buy them online. Oh okay, the ones from
Speaker 2: the lab are a lot better.
Speaker 4: I mean, I trust you. Let's be very clear, I
Speaker 4: would trust you much more than I trust myself.
Speaker 2: And don't forget. Like, if you're in a building, don't
Speaker 2: even worry about it, you know, because your upper levels
Speaker 2: once it gets up, like if you're on the third
Speaker 2: floor or second floor, once it gets there, you know,
Speaker 2: it's kind of out of there.
Speaker 1: So I really only thought that houses with basements had
Speaker 1: to worry about rad on, So I'm glad that we
Speaker 1: cleared that up.
Speaker 3: I had no idea.
Speaker 4: But also we learned that levels can vary house by house,
Speaker 4: so just because your neighbor is fine doesn't mean that
Speaker 4: you are. I think, just to be safe, I'm going
Speaker 4: to open the windows in my apartment even.
Speaker 3: More often, just in case if there's.
Speaker 4: Any rate on, it'll just get to vent right out
Speaker 4: and be out in the world and not in this apartment.
Speaker 1: Or to give Lee a little bit more peace of mind,
Speaker 1: you could all so test for it.
Speaker 3: I don't love a test.
Speaker 1: In the same kind of vein as like Leah was
Speaker 1: asking about, can I go to home depot or something
Speaker 1: and buy a radon test kit? Can you do the
Speaker 1: same thing with mold.
Speaker 2: Have somebody come in and do it.
Speaker 1: Have somebody come in.
Speaker 2: You could buy the surface sample tests. You can do
Speaker 2: that there, But if you're gonna do it, bring someone
Speaker 2: in to really test for it the air where it's
Speaker 2: going to a professional lab. It's really getting analyzed. When
Speaker 2: you do mold testing, you need your baseline, and your
Speaker 2: baseline is outside. So you're gonna do your test outside
Speaker 2: in the air, five minutes, ten minutes. However you're gonna
Speaker 2: run it. You know, there's different tests. Then you come
Speaker 2: inside and you're doing Now you're controlled one on the inside,
Speaker 2: on all the levels and whatnot. You want those two
Speaker 2: to be different. If the outside is hide or low,
Speaker 2: you want them to be different. If you're way higher
Speaker 2: than the outside, you got a big problem. Yeah, So
Speaker 2: that's why I tell people you have to clean the
Speaker 2: filters for your furnaces and your central air systems and
Speaker 2: even the wall use if you're renting an apartment and whatnot,
Speaker 2: you have to clean those vents. That's your first line
Speaker 2: of defence. On nastiness coming in your house. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: the duckworks that have the panting on the inside. It's like,
Speaker 2: whoever invented that should be just sent to an island
Speaker 2: and left there for dead with sharks and spiders, the
Speaker 2: whole nine.
Speaker 1: And that leads me to my next question, which is, Leah,
Speaker 1: do you know what the most common insurance claim in
Speaker 1: the United States is?
Speaker 4: I obviously do not, but I'm glad that you do,
Speaker 4: because I know you're about to tell me. So, Matt,
Speaker 4: I want what is the most common insurance claim in
Speaker 4: the US.
Speaker 3: It's water, that sneaky devil.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: And you know what.
Speaker 4: Water, She's the kind of thing that, like, doesn't just
Speaker 4: start a problem because of a big disaster, something like
Speaker 4: Hurricane Sandy. No, no, no, she's sneaky. Problems are going
Speaker 4: to start as something small, like a clogged gutter or
Speaker 4: a bad slope in your yard, or a broken sump pump.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then one day it rains just hard enough
Speaker 1: and suddenly it's not so small a problem anymore. So
Speaker 1: we asked Joe what someone should know about the perils
Speaker 1: of water, particularly if you live in a flood zone.
Speaker 2: If you're in a flood zone, leave, move, get the
Speaker 2: heck out of Dodge. Water is the worst. I actually
Speaker 2: told the client, don't buy this house, and right away
Speaker 2: I put it right into my agreement. I told Ding
Speaker 2: Dong not to buy this house. He bought the house.
Speaker 2: He goes, why I go. I grew up here, dude,
Speaker 2: I grew up on the top of the hill. You're
Speaker 2: at the bottom. You are going to have water on
Speaker 2: your second floor. I guarantee you that there's a major,
Speaker 2: major storm. He goes, that's impossible. You don't believe me. Fine,
Speaker 2: I do the inspection, ida happens. The news comes on
Speaker 2: his area. Forget it. Two days later, my wife's like,
Speaker 2: where you go? And I go, I'm going to the flats.
Speaker 2: She goes, why I go? Because I want to go
Speaker 2: see that house that I said don't buy. The water
Speaker 2: was in his second floor bedroom. His house was de
Speaker 2: roid gone. They had to demolish it. It was done.
Speaker 1: And obviously there's not much you can do about a
Speaker 1: river that's gonna flood the second floor of your home.
Speaker 1: But let's just say, you know, what are some things
Speaker 1: you could do preventative?
Speaker 2: Yeah, some pumps, drainage on the outside, and drainage on
Speaker 2: the inside, hands down across the board. If you're getting water,
Speaker 2: you're not getting water. Put a sum pump into your
Speaker 2: house to make sure you're not going to have a situation.
Speaker 2: If your basement is wide open and you plan on
Speaker 2: finishing it, put perimeter drainage on the inside to a
Speaker 2: some pump or two, just to be preventive, because water
Speaker 2: will find its path and decide to come in at
Speaker 2: anyone given time. If the land on the outside of
Speaker 2: your house is pitched too, if you have negative grade
Speaker 2: and it's pitched to the home, put drainage at the
Speaker 2: base of that going all the way around and figure
Speaker 2: out a spot where you can put a dry well
Speaker 2: in or divert it to your neighbor's backyard or your
Speaker 2: neighbor's basement. Give it to them figure out Just getting joking, joking,
Speaker 2: but yeah, getting some pumps in the basement is a
Speaker 2: solid investment to protect your big investment of the home
Speaker 2: and get leak detectors.
Speaker 1: So a lot of what Joe is talking about is
Speaker 1: controlling where water goes before it decides for you. Water
Speaker 1: damage and mold. It's a costly problem, not only to
Speaker 1: your wallet, but your health, which is why so much
Speaker 1: of what he talked about isn't just reaction, it's prevention.
Speaker 4: I want to ask about another element, which is electricity.
Speaker 4: What are things that we should actually be paying attention
Speaker 4: to when it comes to potential electrical problems.
Speaker 2: If you see a spark ar, core electrician right away, Yeah, bedrooms, kitchen,
Speaker 2: laundry room, garage, outside ground fault, circul interruptor. So if
Speaker 2: something does hit it, that's water related, or there's a
Speaker 2: surge and automatically trips and shuts it off. So that's
Speaker 2: your first line of defense right there. If your light's
Speaker 2: dim they go on, they're dimming, they're constantly doing that.
Speaker 2: You're pulling too much power. A lot of houses do that.
Speaker 2: You have to be careful with that because it happened
Speaker 2: here where the lights were going in and out, going
Speaker 2: in and out, and that's your house talking to you.
Speaker 2: Your house will talk to you and you have to
Speaker 2: answer it. It might sound weird, but you have to
Speaker 2: answer it. So I came downstairs and I was like,
Speaker 2: let me go to my electrical panel and just have
Speaker 2: a look inside. Now. Number one rule, whenever you go
Speaker 2: to the electrical panel, never grab the door because it's
Speaker 2: a metal door. With live wires inside. If it is live,
Speaker 2: you're stuck and done right. So I just do you
Speaker 2: give it a tap with the back of your hand.
Speaker 2: I tapped it with the back of my hand and
Speaker 2: the whole panel was live. It just blasted me back
Speaker 2: water was getting it to the electrical panel.
Speaker 3: Wow, whoa, Oh my god.
Speaker 1: So obviously, when you're buying a home, you want to
Speaker 1: do a full home inspection. But are there other moments
Speaker 1: in your life you know that people might want to
Speaker 1: consider doing reassessment.
Speaker 2: Yeah, five years in is a good time to do it.
Speaker 2: And it's not a full home inspection. I don't even
Speaker 2: need to give them a report. It's a walk and talk,
Speaker 2: you know. I said, grab your coffee, grab your pad
Speaker 2: and your phone, let's go for a walk and talk.
Speaker 2: I'll do all the major components in the house, the roof,
Speaker 2: the attic, the heating, the cooling, the hot warder heater,
Speaker 2: the basement, look for any mold, this and that, make
Speaker 2: sure everything's operating properly the outside of the house, and
Speaker 2: that's it.
Speaker 4: I want to ask just about renters as well, because
Speaker 4: I mean, one of the perks I would say of
Speaker 4: being a renter is like, well, I don't own this,
Speaker 4: so this is someone else's problem, but actually I do
Speaker 4: live here, so it is my problem. So is there
Speaker 4: something that like renters should do be thinking about, like
Speaker 4: what are the things that they should know about their
Speaker 4: living space.
Speaker 2: I've never had a renter come to me and say, hey, Joe,
Speaker 2: I'm going to rent this place, can you do a
Speaker 2: home inspection on it? And it's a good question. Actually,
Speaker 2: it should be in a contract for every house that's
Speaker 2: being rented that they have to have it inspected. No
Speaker 2: one ever does it.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad of having this conversation because I've lived
Speaker 1: in this apartment for fourteen years and my wife and
Speaker 1: I are expecting our first kid soon congrats. And there
Speaker 1: has been water damage in different units and stuff, and
Speaker 1: I haven't had any serious health of anything, but I'm
Speaker 1: like part of it. There's a nagging like is there
Speaker 1: mold like just in the air, And I guess that
Speaker 1: My answer is we're having a kid. I shouldn't have
Speaker 1: someone come out here because I don't think the building's
Speaker 1: not going.
Speaker 2: To do it. Did you have water in your place?
Speaker 1: We had some?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well how they fix it?
Speaker 1: They kind of didn't really, I mean it was it
Speaker 1: was leaking a lot more.
Speaker 4: Inspector Joe doesn't even have to come there to know, just.
Speaker 1: Like I can smell them mold through the screen.
Speaker 2: I see it behind you all over. Yeah, you can't
Speaker 2: just flap a quote of paint on mold. If mold
Speaker 2: hits sheet rock, you got to get behind her, take
Speaker 2: the sheet rock down, you got to take the insulation out.
Speaker 2: You have to treat it.
Speaker 1: And they have. But I think the thing I'm like,
Speaker 1: I don't think that they fixed the underlying issue.
Speaker 2: I mean, you could have your duck works clean. When
Speaker 2: I what about the filters, I'll often you place them.
Speaker 2: We'll replaced those every six months, all right, drop it
Speaker 2: to three. Okay, it's better for you, better for the
Speaker 2: family of the environment, you know. And if you really
Speaker 2: want to step it up, you're gonna spend money. You
Speaker 2: can get a UV light for your system and that'll
Speaker 2: kill the bacteria and some mold sports that are coming
Speaker 2: through as well.
Speaker 1: For the duck system.
Speaker 2: Yeah okay.
Speaker 1: And then we also like our home is so poorly insulated,
Speaker 1: like I mean, air just comes in through the casement
Speaker 1: windows and because they're all wooded and they're warped, and yeah,
Speaker 1: like get out.
Speaker 2: I told you, Matt, you can have water and it's
Speaker 2: third floor next week. There's really not much you can
Speaker 2: to be able to do with that since you don't
Speaker 2: own it, other than move. But I wouldn't worry about
Speaker 2: that so much. At least you haven't good airflow.
Speaker 1: But Joe, it's rent control is hard to define in Brooklyn.
Speaker 2: Now, if it's rent controlled, then stay there. If you
Speaker 2: have mold, don't worry about it. You'll be fine. Little
Speaker 2: mold and asbestos and lad never killed anyone. There we go,
Speaker 2: just kidding.
Speaker 3: Don't worry, Matt.
Speaker 4: We will all pitch in to help with your move
Speaker 4: before we wrap this up. I think we need Joe
Speaker 4: to give us some homework. Yes, I am that girl
Speaker 4: who always was like, what's our homework for tonight?
Speaker 1: Teacher?
Speaker 3: So here we go.
Speaker 4: I think something like a project management timeline of things
Speaker 4: that we need to keep top of mind that's probably
Speaker 4: going to be helpful, Like what are the things around
Speaker 4: our homes that maybe we put a little reminder in
Speaker 4: our phones or something that we know at this time
Speaker 4: we need to update or check or.
Speaker 3: Call somebody for gutters.
Speaker 2: Make sure your gutters are clean. I say this word
Speaker 2: a lot first line of defence, right, a lot of
Speaker 2: things are your first line of defense against water, mold,
Speaker 2: and whatnot. So if your gutters are dirty, they're going
Speaker 2: to overflow, right, They're gonna eat your foundation wall. Then
Speaker 2: you're gonna go in your basement. If gutters are completely
Speaker 2: clogged up, they're gonna fill up faster with ice. If
Speaker 2: you have an older roof, you're going to get ice
Speaker 2: damming back into your house, and you're gonna get mold.
Speaker 2: So definitely, especially in ra area here in New York,
Speaker 2: you want to clean the gutters at least twice a year.
Speaker 2: You know, after the fall obviously we gotta eight clean
Speaker 2: those gutters because they're going to be clogged up no
Speaker 2: matter what. Outside the house. If you have drains in
Speaker 2: your driveway, that is important to do once a month
Speaker 2: go out there and take a look at the drain
Speaker 2: in your driveway because once again, first line of defensive
Speaker 2: water getting into your basement, into your garage itself. Clean
Speaker 2: those out. Test your some pumps every six months. It
Speaker 2: doesn't hurt to test them out. Have a backup battery
Speaker 2: the some pumps too. If you don't have a full
Speaker 2: house generator, because if you lose power. The some pump
Speaker 2: is not going to work, and then you're gonna have
Speaker 2: water the land on the outside of the home. Look
Speaker 2: for termites, look for pests on the outside. Don't stuff
Speaker 2: mulch dirt up your siding. I mean I see it
Speaker 2: a lot where the siding touches the mulch on the outside.
Speaker 2: They do this in a lot of developments. They think
Speaker 2: more is better. And now that that's just a perfect
Speaker 2: little line, a humid line that's going to go right
Speaker 2: up underneath your siding, and everything's gonna crawl into your
Speaker 2: house soon, into your bed with you at night.
Speaker 4: No thank you, unless I invite you myself. No thank you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you don't want that. Yeah, but that's the
Speaker 2: big one. On the outside. It's drainage and gutters on
Speaker 2: the outside. Trimming back trees from the siding. You can
Speaker 2: do that once a year, depending on how much you
Speaker 2: have going on out there, once twice a year. Keep
Speaker 2: them eighteen inches off the house, at least a foot
Speaker 2: off the house. Let the house breathe once again. Spiders
Speaker 2: and this and that and bugs, they can jump onto
Speaker 2: your house easier that way and get inside. Filters. Replace
Speaker 2: your filters for your heating and cooling system every one
Speaker 2: to three months, depending on the occupants. So how many
Speaker 2: pets you have, how many carpets you have in the house,
Speaker 2: having your heating and cooling system serviced once a year,
Speaker 2: those are the most important things to do.
Speaker 1: So I think we got to we want to close
Speaker 1: it out and ask for everyone listening, what is one
Speaker 1: thing every adult should check in their home tonight after
Speaker 1: listening to.
Speaker 2: This tonight, how can I stress people out? Joey, Joey
Speaker 2: buzzkill tonight, go home. If you're living in a house,
Speaker 2: go into the basement. Look in all the corners of
Speaker 2: the basement with a flashlight. Look to see if there's
Speaker 2: any black spores. Look to see if there's any water
Speaker 2: that could have accumulated there, any effluorescence on the walls,
Speaker 2: which is a powdery substance that comes through the foundation walls.
Speaker 2: It's just water mineral deposits that come through. Do that
Speaker 2: start there.
Speaker 4: You gave us so many amazing tips already, but anything
Speaker 4: we didn't touch on that you do want to stress
Speaker 4: to homeowners, like don't think that this isn't a problem
Speaker 4: now or could be down the road, or just like
Speaker 4: something to be aware of.
Speaker 2: Just don't become complacent with your house. Just because the
Speaker 2: house is operating perfectly fine today doesn't mean it's going
Speaker 2: to be operating perfectly fine tomorrow.
Speaker 3: That's great.
Speaker 1: So as we get ready to say goodbye to Joe,
Speaker 1: I just want to say he's given me a lot
Speaker 1: to think about, along to do, list of things to
Speaker 1: check and test and fixed. So we're so grateful that
Speaker 1: he took the time to share his expertise with us.
Speaker 1: I feel like we made the world a little safer today.
Speaker 1: I don't know about you, Leah, but until I develop
Speaker 1: superhuman abilities of detecting mold by just walking into a room,
Speaker 1: I think I'm going to give Joe a call and
Speaker 1: hire some old professionals to come out and test my apartment.
Speaker 4: If you don't think I spent the weekend doing a
Speaker 4: deep clean of my apartment and immediately texted my super
Speaker 4: about all of the detectors in not only my unit
Speaker 4: but the building. I think you could probably tell my
Speaker 4: anxiety went through the roof.
Speaker 3: But then I did feel better.
Speaker 4: I felt a lot better after, because then I was like, look,
Speaker 4: knowledge is power, and so here we are, and so
Speaker 4: it's just about.
Speaker 3: This is what I apen bes on top of these things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 4: As always, I learned a ton so thank you so
Speaker 4: much to Joe Maza. You can find him online and
Speaker 4: on social media at Joe Maza Home Inspections.
Speaker 1: Joe Maza Inspector to the Stars. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for joining us. Yes, sir, thanks so much.
Speaker 3: Joe join us again.
Speaker 4: In two weeks we'll be talking about all the things
Speaker 4: you need to know about being laid off. Number one,
Speaker 4: You're not alone, But until then, good luck being a
Speaker 4: grown up.
Speaker 1: This is a production of Ruby Studio from iHeartMedia.
Speaker 3: I'm Matt Stillough and I'm Leah Palmery.
Speaker 4: This episode was produced by Pamela Lawrence. Our post producer
Speaker 4: is Sierra Spreen, with additional engineering by Mac Wuido.
Speaker 1: And we want to thank all our teammates at Ruby Studio,
Speaker 1: including Sarah You, Ethan Fixel, Rachus, Wan Krasnov, Ludia kim Em,
Speaker 1: Dylan Harper, Wayne, Deborah Garrett, and Andy Kelly.