After 1 1/2 days of struggle, hubby fixed the leak in the basement toilet so the water could be turned back on to it. Now to those of you who have finished basements fixing the toilet probably seems like an urgent problem.
However we have a house in Atlanta built around 1940 with mostly a dirt floored crawl space except for the furnace and laundry area that is dug out and paved but has dirt walls in many places and is open to the crawl space and outside through vents that stay open. And it has a toilet in a rickety plywood enclosure.
When we bought the house I thought this was strange. Then my neighbors explained. If you have seen the movie Help or read the book, then you know where this story is going. Seems most of the houses in this neighborhood in that era had toilets in the basement for the "help" to use.
Well we find it useless, but too expensive to remove and replace with a utility sink, so we run the dehumidifier hose to it and clean it occasionally. Some time ago it sprung a leak from the tank so hubby just turned the water off. I then refused to clean it as it couldn't be flushed. When I mentioned that it needed cleaning again due to a bit of an odor, he decided to fix it. How hard could it be. Well, lets just say that it must be the original fixture and hubby got well acquainted with the clerk in the plumbing section of our Home Depot through multiple trips to buy parts. Finally they came up with something that held the water in! Whew.
So I've added it to our 2012 House to do list and completed. Fortunately only bathrooms in finished spaces are counted by our appraisers so I don't think we even have to change it out to a low flow model when we sell the house!
Don't you love old houses?
old houses do cost a pretty penny to keep up but so worth the work!!
ReplyDeleteYou are right about costing a lot. I do wish we thought this house was worth it - we aren't in love with it but do love the neighborhood.
DeleteI feel your pain in the pocketbook. So far we have been fortunate but our next big expense will be painting the exterior (no siding allowed in the Historic District). And I am opposite you--I love the house but not the neighborhood so much (it's not bad but just has a mix of well-cared for homes and slummy looking places living side by side). ~~Bliss
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you love your house! We really wanted to sell ours back when the market was hot but couldn't figure out where to move to that would be less expensive but still give us a quality of life in drives, etc. Oh well.
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