Adventures in Owning a Home

My husband and I just bought a new home. We were starting to out-grow the "starter home" (not because of kids, just because of my obsession with furniture)...and we wanted the space to start a family...and the old house had a pool that we used about 6 times a year but cost us a small fortune...so we upgraded. It is a fantastic house, well...except for the air conditioner that has gone out 3 times in 4 weeks (in Texas where it is currently averaging 101 degrees...at midnight). Why is it that when something goes wrong 1) it happens over the weekend when it would cost almost as much as the new house to get a repairman out there - or you have to suffer through until Monday...at which time you have to wait 3 days until they have an opening 2) it always "works just fine" when the over-priced repairman shows up?? Mr. Repairman better watch out...I am about ready to kick him in the teeth.

Here are the Top Ten Worst House Repair Experiences my husband and I have had in our 5 years of marriage:

1) Having the laterals and sand changed out of our sand filter on our pool. The kicker was that Frick and Frack that did the work dumped the old sand on my flower bed and killed all my flowers.

2) Having the tube to the Polaris (pool vac) repaired after aforementioned Frick and Frack punctured it while fixing the sand filter. Guess what they used to fix it! DUCK TAPE!! Yeah, we pitched quite a fit over that and never used the company again.

3) Having the sewer system back up and break the cleanout cap off of the outlet in the front yard. The neighbors came to tell us that we had pooh in the front yard. Nice.

4) The fridge went out and we had to wait 4 days for the warranty company to come fix it (and of course I had JUST bought groceries the day before). When they finally did come out, the guy burned holes in my kitchen floor with the solder. Nope, he didn't use a drop cloth.

5) The main water pipe in our front yard burst - quickly filling the yard and street (and of course it was a Sunday). We had to call the emergency line to the plumber and they sent out a man with one arm that wasn't able to do the job, plus he wanted to go to his son's going away party and only had about 20 minutes to help us. HELLO!!! We had to fix it ourselves. By the way, I have nothing against one-armed plumbers.

6) We had a leaky shower...the plumber came out 5 times...yes, 5...before he finally fixed it. Here is how it went:
-visit 1: thought it was fixed
-visit 2: a week later, after finding mildew growing on the floor under the cabinets (while the cabinets themselves were dry), we realized there was a leak in the wall
-visit 3: bathroom flooded after one shower, obviously not fixed yet
-visit 4: now the cold water handle is on backwards and, you guessed it, shower is STILL LEAKING!
-visit 5: FIXED! Finally!

7) While trying to re-open our pool in the spring - the swimming pool pump went out, we were on the waiting list for 3 weeks to get it fixed. In the meantime frogs took up residence in the pool and kept us up nights while they sang their little love songs to each other. (One frisky little frog chased us to the back door one night after we tried to get him to shut-up. It freaked me out a little bit!)

8) Here I am going to count all the other times our pool pump went out...I think 3 times in 5 years - which included 2 brand new pumps.

9) The head was broken off of one of our sprinklers and flooded the backyard.

10) We had a "pool house" bathroom (so that people didn't track water into the house) located next to the pool - and we didn't realize that the toilet was constantly running and not shutting off. It went on like that for an entire month...when we got the water bill it was $450. My husband almost had a heart attack.

So, now begins the adventure in the new house!!