Home Remodel: Do, Don'ts, Advice

[ski-wpk]

My 1971-built midcentury has like 30 beams running front to back through the exterior walls. No sounds from them but we have a T&G ceiling with a standing seam roof, no attic, and wow the metal pops and creaks in the summer when the roof is cooling down at night.

[liv2ski]

Tenant says her HVAC system shit the bed. It is 30 years old and it appears the blower is dead, so time for a new unit.
My usual source gave me an outrageous quote today for a 2.5 ton unit. Looking on the internet I see: https://hvacdirect.com/2-5-ton-14-3-...al-185790.html
I would need to find a HVAC installer. What do you think installation would run in an attic that is ready to go (existing ductwork, etc).
Thanks

[Foggy_Goggles]

What's the price of the quote?

[mcski]

I would imagine there will be some geographic cost variations so maybe give your geo too

[climberevan]

A good friend of mine just asked a similar question. She had a quote for a new small system using existing ductwork. Everything was super easy access, not even in an attic. $10,500. I responded that I couldn't help because HVAC guys are gold-plated and they know it. There is a legitimate labor shortage in that industry and they have all seemingly decided to take maximum advantage of it.

You will likely struggle to find anyone willing to install a unit that they don't provide (and mark up). I understand this sentiment and probably wouldn't do it either. My solution was to acquire the tools and learn to do it myself, like I have done with everything else. I saved at least a couple $k on my first one.

[nickwm21]

No skilled trade is showing up at your house for less than a grand…. it’s not going to be cheap.

The lazy gut check - labor:material ratio is between onene and threene depending on trade. Technical trades with expensive materials are closer to onene, laborious trades with cheaper materials are closer to threene.

Or… figure it out: What would it take? Two humans, two days at hundred an hour. Thats three grand right there….






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[climberevan]

"A hundred an hour"...try at least $200/hr for HVAC. Plumbers here are asking for $190 per man. I honestly don't understand how anyone other than the mega-rich can afford to have work done on their houses. (Not to bring politics into it, but kicking out a substantial portion of the workforce isn't going to help things!)

[jackattack]

"A hundred an hour"...try at least $200/hr for HVAC. Plumbers here are asking for $190 per man. I honestly don't understand how anyone other than the mega-rich can afford to have work done on their houses. (Not to bring politics into it, but kicking out a substantial portion of the workforce isn't going to help things!)

Good chance that furnace is manufactured in MX too.

[I Skied Bandini Mountain]

Changing out a blower motor is pretty cheap/easy compared to r&r of a whole system. A 30 year old furnace is definitely past it's service life but it can buy you some time.

[NBABUCKS1]

liv2ski - No hvac company in their right mind is going to install your unit you buy. Only chance you have is finding a moonlighter off of craigslist (or do it yourself). I'd replace it for greater efficiency and reliability (hopefully new units can be shit) even if you dont pay electric/gas bill (assuming blower is for furnace too) I replaced my old gas furance two springs ago. Its drop in and easy. HVAC/refigeration is a different beast but honestly there's so much good info out there on youtube. I did my own heat pump at my cabin.

[californiagrown]

I am an engineer. I am confident that i can learn and hack together a fix for damn near anything that breaks in my house, or learn and install a new system.

Will it be perfect, or 100% to code? maybe, but unlikely.
Will it function? Yeah.
Will it be cheaper than having a pro do it? Depends on how much i value my time... especially because i will take 3x-4x as much time as a pro to learn, buy tools, fuckup, fix the fuckup go to HD 20 times, and finally patch up the drywall. Nevermind abandoning my wife and kids during the time that i am home creating unneeded tension all while adding additional stress to my life during what is supposed to be my free time to enjoy. So, if i think that my time is cheap, then yes DIYing bigger projects saves me money. But if i highly value my time, most medium-big jobs are "cheaper" to farm out. I ended up in this mindset after buying a home and spending the first 3 years doing everything myself, and the last couple farming out anything that would take longer than half a day.

[liv2ski]

Actually, I did get a quote of 3,800 to do the install and haul away the old unit if I really want to use the system I found on the internet. It seems like the smaller shops will do that.
I was also offered many other hvac system alternatives, so the decision now is very hard. For the AC portion, do I go heat pump or standard AC?

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[dan_pdx]

As far as I know, if you only want AC, just get an AC. Only get the heat pump if you also want to use it for heating.

I just went through this in our house in Portland and we wound up with a ducted heat pump and natural gas furnace as auxiliary heat. I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I think the heat pump was around 30% of that and we would have saved a couple thousand dollars if we had just put in an AC instead. I wanted both because it gives us a little bit of protection if either the electric company or the natural gas company decides to fuck us on our rates. Of course, is a good chance they'll coordinate and both fuck us at the same time, I guess that's when we'll have to get solar panels.

[liv2ski]

Doing more reading I agree, for a rental, skip the heat pump. Thanks Dan

[Foggy_Goggles]

Qualified Tradesman kinda get to name their price. The longer I've been in business (25years-ish), the more I realize that the game is to try and separate rick people from their money whilst having them be happy. If you get the reputation for ripping people off, that's bad for business. I got a bid from a flooring contractor for twice what my regular guy was. That's a no call back no referral situation. The hard part for a homeowner is your not in the game daily so its hard to get a basis for value. I just assume that people expect that it is gonna be half the price that it is. If they want to price shop me, fine. 90%+ of the time, the job never happens.

Many trades, have markup on materials built into the business plan. HVAC does, Carpentry doesn't. If you don't want to use their product, some guys will tell you to pound sand. Other guys will just put that markup onto the labor side and give you no warranty.

I'm not familiar with either your marker or the install so I can't tell you what a fair price is. Good luck.

[BmillsSkier]

In the builder interview phase of doing a an addition/whole home remodel on our house (architectural plans and permits are in process) and the news of the tariff war and its effect on lumber and materials is just super swell.

[liv2ski]

Thanks Foggy, from running a business myself I get all that. IMO for my needs it is the smaller shop that will likely work out best as it is hopefully run by a guy with years of experience that went out on his own and doesn't have the huge overhead of the bigger guys. Finding that person is the challenge, but to save maybe a couple of grand, I will put in the effort of 5 bids.

[Foggy_Goggles]

Those are estimates not bid. My parents have an semi retired GC that is basically their fixer that they pay to just make it happen. The sub trades loves to have vetted customers. An inherent issue with the trades is the customer views it as transactional and the business owner views it as relationship based. For this reason, direct referrals are the way. For the customer, you have some hope that the guy that didn't fuck over your friends isn't gonna fuck you over. For the business, you have some hope that your A grade customer doesn't have D- shit bag friends.

If you get in the circle of trust with the good guys, it gets easy. I get so many txts and VM from customers "hey, do you know any good carpet guys". And then I just group txt the customer and the carpet guy and it all works out.

[Core Shot]

^^^^ this is the way. Old school networking.

Hey, customer X was super chill and easy to work with and paid on time. Bingo. That’s a customer everyone wants.

Pareto optimal.
20% of your customers can be 80% of your problems otherwise.

[liv2ski]

Well, 5 bids later I ended up in a different place than where I started and learned a lot (that I will forget by next week). Received a solid price on good equipment (not Trane quality) for our rental. Should be a solid upgrade for the tenants and much more efficient than the 30 year old Rheem unit that was in there.

[Mazderati]

Do architects bid remodels? How about new homes?

[::: :::]

Do architects bid remodels? How about new homes?

Both

[liv2ski]

They do in my hood.

[old goat]

Fun with electrons. I have a 4 gang box in my laundry room. I plug something in to the GFCI--no juice. I see the red light on and the GFCI won't reset. I flip the breaker off and on--still can't reset but the outlet now works. I notice that when I had the breaker off the other two outlets still worked, so apparently they are on a different circuit. I figure I need to replace the GFCI so I try to turn off the breaker to the other outlet, since I'll be working in the box. None of the breakers turns it off, so apparently that outlet is double fed--I didn't try to figure out which two. The last time the wiring in that part of the house was about 6 years ago when some questionably licensed Romanians remodeled the kitchen. Time for a real electrician.

[Core Shot]

If you can gut a human being you can wire an outlet.

I would have guessed that the other outlets were wired off the gfi circuit. I guess not.

Gfi outlets get old. Just replace it.

As for the other hot outlets. That is odd. But no one has died yet. So either Fred them off the gfi output or leave them be.