October 26, 2024 • 31 mins
Dean continues to let listeners guide the show with their questions and concerns. He further explains the distinction between designers and builders for a caller from the previous hour. Dean helps a listener diagnose a methane smell in an unused bathroom, identifying the sink as the likely source due to trapped gases. He offers advice on concealing washer and dryer hoses, optimizing appliance placement, and ensuring vent pipes are correctly positioned. Finally, Dean addresses a caller's issue with excessive soil moisture causing mold on wires, providing solutions to prevent future problems.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six fortyf.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I am six forty Live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
I am Dean Sharp, the house Whisperer, custom home builder,
custom home Designer. It's an all calls weekend. I love
these weekends. I love taking your calls, talking with you
about what's going on with your home, and you know,
hoping out if I can.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
So let's do it all right, Let's talk to Tom. Tom.
Welcome home, Dean.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Yes, sir, okay. I live on a hillside lot. My
house is on the upper portion of the hill with
a yard created by retaining the old style retaining wall
with concrete about two hundred and forty feet front to back.
And I want to get down to that lower pad
(00:59):
to build an AD and I got to put in
a driveway. If I bulldoze straight down the slope, I'm
going to be over twenty percent. And I don't even
want to be twenty percent. I'd like to be twelve percent.
And I'm thinking, rather than try to stretch the driveway
along the ridge to lengthen it and reduce my slope,
(01:22):
is there some way like like an elevated boardwalk a
driveway built on piers that somebody does. I mean, obviously
it could be done, but you know, it cost a fortune.
And I'm just wondering if if anybody does anything prefab
like that.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Oh gosh, yeah, you know what if somebody does, I
have not heard of them. You know, we've had some
tricky driveway grating scenarios before, and you know, it's not
uncommon to have to get the structural engineers out and say, okay,
we got to bring this driveway in on an estate
property across this creek bed or across this gully, or
(02:00):
you know, we've got an elevated portion of it and
essentially build a bridge or an elevated platform for a
portion of the driveway. But I know of no one
out there, and I'm not saying that there isn't, but
I personally don't have knowledge of anybody out there who
has prefab systems that are just ready to go. And
the problem is the problem with the reason is is
because it's all site specific, it has to do with
(02:23):
your you know, geological situation, your soil quality. Because it's
not so much the structure itself, it's what it's bearing
on and how much of a seismic and lateral load
it has to withhold as well as the dead load itself.
So geological engineer and structural engineer, those are going to
be unavoidable in your situation. Doesn't necessarily have to be concrete.
(02:45):
I've seen them. We've actually successfully built some some bridges
over gullies out of wood, out of you know, kind
of like the old covered wood bridges. We've successfully done
it out of wood and steel and or concrete. But
it's going to have to be one of those formats,
and it's gonna be h it's gonna be site specific,
(03:07):
and so you're just gonna, unfortunately have to price that out. Tom,
Thanks for the call. It was super interesting question. I
wish I could help more on that. I want to
talk to Shannon. Hey, Shannon, welcome home.
Speaker 5 (03:19):
Hi, thanks for taking my calls. Well, I have a
pervasive gopher problem in my yards in my back and
my strint, which has prevented me hard planting anything, and
mostly weeds are popping up and weeds die, and I
have all these hills and mounds and holes, and so
I wanted to do a native garden, but I don't
(03:43):
know where to begin and how to get rid of
the gophers.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Gophers Nature's annoying, adorable rodent. Okay, so Shannon, here's the thing.
Here's what I don't want you to do. Please do
not poison your gophers with a rat poison blood thinning
rat poison, because it is not only doing damage to them,
and yes it will, you know, knock out your gophers
(04:10):
in general, but it will end up damaging the entire
ecosystem around you. I'm not going to get on my
soapbox and talk about that. I'm just going to say,
don't do it. Blood thinners end up in all the
predators that eat the gophers as well, and it affects
everything well beyond the edge of your house. Now, you
can live trap gophers, or you can just kill them
dead with the mechanical traps, but that doesn't solve the
(04:34):
problem because you know, it's just an ongoing war. So
in your situation and for everybody who has a gopher issue,
what I'm about to suggest may sound extreme, but in
reality it is actually the easiest, most stress free, permanent
way to deal with gophers in your yard, and that
(04:56):
is simply to not allow them in in the first place. Now,
how do you do that? Well, you do that by
again having a strong commitment we don't want gophers in
this yard. What it means is this, let's take your lawn,
your planterbed areas wherever it is that you are planning
(05:16):
on planting and don't want gophers coming up. You're going
to remove some soil okay, two, three, sometimes as much
as four inches of soil in an area, and you're
going to stake down and bury gopher cloth. And what
do I mean by gopher cloth? I mean either a
(05:38):
nylon cloth that is, and I say cloth, it's actually
full of holes.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Okay, it's more like a.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Mesh, but basically think of chicken wire, but on a
much much smaller scale opening so that a gopher can't
get through a layer of chicken wire essentially, And please
forgive me for using it. I just want everybody to
picture what it is that I'm saying, a layer of
chicken wire buried a couple of inches underneath the soil
of everywhere in your yard.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
The simple truth of the matter is the gophers can
tunnel underneath your house all they want and all around,
but they're not going to be popping up and they're
not going to be doing as much, if any, damage
to the roots of everything that's going down. Now, will
they occasionally gnaw on a deeper root, sure, but not
to the extent that they're going to destroy anything. So
(06:29):
without question, the once and for all solution for gophers
is actually to just put a fence in between them
and being able to pop up in your yard.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
Awesome that.
Speaker 6 (06:45):
It is simple.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
I mean simple for me to say.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
It's like, oh yeah, just to dig up all the
dirt in your whole backyard and completely cover it over
with seamless fencing. It's a it's a task, it's a chore.
But honestly, when you think about, well, do we want
to do that or do we want to forever have
gophers making holes in the backyard. So this way, the
gophers don't die, your plans don't die, your yard stays lovely,
(07:10):
and you just have a barrier.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
So it's a gopher bear.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
If you go online, you're gonna find all sorts of
options in that regard subterranean buried gopher barriers. You're gonna
find them. You can price them out, you can make
your own decisions. But they work.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
I know they work.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
We've seen them work and at the end of the day, boom.
You do it once, you do it right, and you
don't have to worry about it again. So Shannon, thank you.
Good luck on that. Thanks for the call. When we
come back, more of your calls. I'm so glad you
joined me this morning. Hang tight, so much more to come.
You are Home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 7 (07:47):
Kay if I.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Am six forty and live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app,
you are home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
That's me.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
Hey.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
We are doing a all weekend here on the program.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Every few weeks. We lay every.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Topic aside so that we can concentrate on just the
things that are on your mind regarding your home, be
it a design issue, or a construction question, or a
DIY concerned whatever, all of the above and anything in between.
Anything you want to talk to me about your home today,
that's what we're doing. It's time to go back to
(08:25):
the phones to do it. I want to talk to Jane. Hey, Jane,
welcome home.
Speaker 6 (08:30):
Thanks for taking my call.
Speaker 5 (08:32):
I have a quick question. We're looking to remodel our
house and open.
Speaker 6 (08:36):
Up some of the walls and we're not sure if
we should get a designer first to work out.
Speaker 7 (08:41):
The layout and the design, or if we should.
Speaker 5 (08:43):
Speak with a structural engineer to actually let us know
which walls we can open up.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Excellent question, a procedural question on how you get started
with this kind of thing. The answer is a bit nuanced, Jane.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
Number one.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
The first call that you always make, that everyone should
always make when they're thinking about remodeling or doing something
different with their.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
House, is you call a designer. All right.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
You start with the creativity, you start with the art.
You start with somebody who knows what they're doing in
order to help you come with the absolute best possible
design that works for you, that customizes your home, that
expresses you. Because, as I say here on the program
all the time, as you know, design matters most. We
(09:30):
start with design. However, sometimes design choices end up leading
towards Wow, we're going to move that wall, or we're
going to eliminate that wall, and we want to change
those windows, or we want to put in a much
bigger door. Things that infringe and touch now upon structural issues.
So this is why I say it's nuanced. What you
(09:51):
want is you want to call the designer first, and
you want to start having that conversation. What you don't
want is to pay a designer for a th on,
full blown finished design when you don't know what the
structural ramifications are. Okay, So you call a designer and
you begin to work with them in what we call
(10:14):
rough design mode or rough sketch mode, in which we
haven't you know, we haven't sold the farm yet for
this design.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
But we get to the point.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Where now we sense like, wow, we're really liking where
this is going. And the big question now looms what
about that wall? And that is when you call in
a structural engineer for a consultation and it's a couple
three hundred dollars, most structural engineers will show up and
help you figure out what's going on. Sometimes it's pretty
(10:46):
simple to do expect that they will. In order to
make the most of a consult like that, that you're
going to want to invest a little of a demo,
and by demo, I just mean a forensic opening up.
You know, if it's a wall in question, you don't
know if it's a bearing wall, or if you don't
know if it's a sheer wall, that's critical for the
(11:06):
seismic strength of the house, then you.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
Want to pull some drywall off.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Drywall is inexpensive to replace, Okay, it's just cost of
getting ready for your remodel.
Speaker 3 (11:16):
A little bit of forensic analysis. So in other words, if.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
We're talking about you know, if we were talking about
the house in terms of let's say the metaphor of
a patient going in for some surgical procedure and there
are some things that we don't quite know about, then
we would call this exploratory surgery, in which we open
things up just a little bit to take a look
around and to verify what it is that we're dealing
(11:42):
with there.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
So open up a little.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Section of drywall on a wall, open up some drywall
on the ceiling right next to the top of that wall,
if we want to figure out what direction the ceiling
joysts are going, what's bearing on that wall or not,
that kind of stuff, and then have the structural engineer
come out and give you an evaluation of like okay, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I see this. They might just say listen, hey, thanks
(12:05):
for paying for the console. I think you're good to go.
That's not a baring wall. That thing can be removed
and you don't have to worry about it. Or they
may say, yeah, now some engineering is going to be
required here and it's a major deal, or some engineering.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Is required and it's not that big of a deal.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
So that's the information you need, you need at that juncture,
and then you return to the design process with that
information under your arm in order to finish out the design.
You may decide to abandon that design because you don't
want to touch that wall, or it may be full
steam ahead, so it's designer engineer, back to the designer.
(12:45):
And then as you commit to a remodel, especially assuming
that you're going to be pulling permits and doing it
the right way, then once the designer is then committing
to plans, the engineer is going to get involved again
and put in their structural notes and pages in plans
that you'll submit to the city. And that's kind of
the hopscotch or leap frogging that happens. So don't pay
(13:06):
a designer everything up front to do a complete design
when you don't know the ramification structurally on the house.
And just to let you know, just as a little topper,
I'll tell you how Tina and I actually do even
when we have been hired to do a full design
on a home, we will still tell our clients listen,
we are going to take you to rough design in
(13:28):
which you're thrilled with the way everything's looking, and then
we're going to get an engineer involved to spec out
rough engineering specifications not even finished yet, but rough specifications,
because only then do you have with our drawing down
on the page and the engineering specifications. Only then do
(13:49):
you have the information you need to turn around and
hand it to two or three contractors to give you
what's called a rom a rough order of magnitude or
really rough estimate, and so you're not holding them to it,
but these are contractors that you're vetting and you're thinking
about using, and they give you a rough estimate, so
(14:09):
you get an idea like, ah, and this is what
our project probably is going to cost in the ballpark.
At that point you may find out m Yeah, all right,
that's in our budget, or no, that's too much, and
then you go back to the design and tweak it again.
So there's this interplay and this collaboration and that's generally
(14:29):
how it works.
Speaker 6 (14:30):
Does that help, yes, Thank you so much?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
All right, Jane good luck on that project. All right,
y'all when we come back, let's try and take a
couple more before we are done today. Yeah, you are home?
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Who is this? Oh yeah, it's Dean Sharp, the House Whisper.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
You are Home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper. Hey,
thanks for joining us on the program this morning. All
right to the phones, Eric, Welcome home.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
Hello Dean. How are you doing?
Speaker 3 (15:10):
I am well, sir. How can I help you?
Speaker 2 (15:12):
So?
Speaker 6 (15:12):
I'm planning on taking carpet out and putting new wood
floors in the room.
Speaker 4 (15:17):
I just put these new moldings in like maybe two
years ago, so I know there's going to be a gap,
and I'm wondering what you think I should do replace
the moldings or do like a pillar or something like that.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Okay, So by moldings, you're talking about your baseboards. Okay,
baseboards in the room and baseboards. Just so everybody can
get caught up to speed here, when we install baseboards,
knowing that carpeting is going in a room, the baseboard
is actually we leave it off the ground. We leave
it up above the floor about yeah, depending on the
(15:48):
carpenter you talk to, anywhere from a quarter of an
inch all the way up to about three eighths of
an inch. So if Eric is going to yank all
the carpet in the pad out of a room and
put hardwood down in its place, then it's the chances
that the hardwood is going to actually touch the bottom
of those baseboards is unlikely. That means we got a
(16:10):
little gap underneath. Two ways to handle it, Eric, just
straight out you're either well, okah, yeah too realistically. Two
ways you could You could try and remove the baseboards
carefully and reinstall them, but.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
That never works out.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
So I'm not even gonna tell you that one because
you know you're gonna end up tracking something and messing
it up and messing up the wall. So number one,
you pull the baseboards. You're just like, well, okay, fine,
I'm gonna sacrifice this.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Room full of baseboards.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
You pull the baseboards, you leave the walls bare, get
the floor installed, and then nicest, best, absolute cleanest looking job.
Once the floor is down, you install new baseboards, bump
right on top of the hardwood, nice and tight, clean line,
clean corner done. The other way to do it, if
you really really want to save those baseboards is you
(16:59):
simply use a base shoe, which is just a secondary molding.
You don't want to fill in underneath the baseboard because
that never ends up looking right. You try and glue
it or try and nail it in, you're always going
to see the seam. Even if you don't see it
right away, you'll end up seeing a seam. So the
traditional way, the conventional way is to use a base shoe,
which is kind of like a quarter round, kind of
(17:21):
like some people actually use cord around a quarter of
a circle. But base shoe actually, if you get the
right stuff, is actually taller than it is thick as
far as coming out into the room, and so it's
a little bit more just slightly more streamline than QRD around.
And what you'll do is you'll go ahead and lay
the floor, get it underneath the or up to at
(17:42):
least the line of the baseboard, and then cover the
gap with a piece of bass shoe. Now I prefer
as a designer, it says, no, this has nothing to
do with carpentry. I prefer as a designer, that you
would paint that base shoe with your molding so that
the floor stays the floor and the base shoe just
(18:04):
becomes a part of your baseboard. From a design perspective,
I think that's a cleaner, better look. Some people like
to try and buy a base shoe, a base shoe
that's the same material right as the floor. I think
that just makes the floor feel like it's creeping up
onto the wall, and for us, that's not a good look.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
So that's what.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
I'm gonna recommend my friend one of the two. If
you pull out the baseboards, how tall are they?
Speaker 6 (18:27):
By the way, there's like about three inches, So I
got all.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
Right, they're too short.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
They're too short for so no seven seven inches?
Speaker 6 (18:40):
Oh wow?
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Okay, I know right, I know everybody.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Everybody's jaw drops every time I say that. But I'm
just saying, if you've got a traditional house with kind
of a traditional motif, don't hesitate to fill that house
with taller base boards.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
I guarantee you A wall is.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
Visually, whether you've never thought of it this where or not.
A wall is a column. It's like a column that
has been split and laid out flat. So the base
of that wall, you can imagine a big, strong column
that has no base on it whatsoever, like a Greek
column that just kind of runs into the dirt. A base,
the base of a column needs a really nice pediment.
(19:19):
And I guarantee you the general rule is seven is
what we call the seven percent rule, the seven to
ten percent rule. And so that basically means baseboards can
afford to be seven percent of the height of a wall.
That means in an eight foot ceiling they can be
almost seven inches tall. It will look fantastic. So if
you decide to replace the baseboards, all I'm saying is
(19:42):
think about going taller with them.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
You won't regret it.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
And then, of course you can blame me for spending
more money in the rest of the house, because after
you love that room as much as you do, you're like, oh, great,
Dean had me change this room. It's now the best
looking room in the house, and now I have to
replace all the baseba boards everywhere. You are welcome, all right,
thanks study for the call. Do I have time to
(20:07):
sneak another one in here? Let's do it, Ragnar, Welcome home.
Speaker 7 (20:11):
My wife and I just bought a new house in Hawthorne, California.
It's built in nineteen fifty two, and we have retaining
walls are on the outside of the property and from settling.
The soil is clayish, and the settling has created a
wall cracks in the retaining walls, and whether they've been
made a center block but in institution is sick. How
can I stick salibab and replace the walls?
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Okay, So when we say retaining walls, do we mean
that these walls are actually retaining soil or when we
say retaining walls, you just mean like a garden block
wall that's dividing you and the neighbors, well.
Speaker 7 (20:46):
Garden block wall deviding me and the neighbors.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Okay, Yeah, So just to be clear, if it's not
actually holding, if the soil level on the other side
of the wall isn't significantly higher than on your side,
or vice versa, it's not a retaining wall.
Speaker 3 (20:59):
It's it's just a block wall. Okay. So a block wall.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
And if it's got it, if it's settled, uh, and
you know there's and then that happens, you know, because honestly,
a retaining if it were a retaining wall, you probably
wouldn't see any cracks in it, because a retaining wall
gets solid filled with concrete in all of the cells,
in the grouts in between all of that, and there's
steel and there's a significant footing.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
But a block wall can just be a simple garden wall.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
They kind of tend builders tend to minimize the footings
under it. So I totally get it that it's settled some.
If it has settled, then you've got cracking happening. You
can actually you can actually find concrete epoxy patch kits
at like a local hardware store, builder supply home depot,
that kind of thing. It's not going to and that'll
get you patched up so that the cracking doesn't continue,
(21:45):
and it's not hard to use. A lot of it
comes into calking tube form where you can put it
in a calking gun, squirt it in there, fill up
the crack, and then uh and then kind of trial
it smooth. Now it's not gonna look pretty on your side,
just to say not gonna look pretty. So you may
want to consider at some point, once you fix all
the cracks, you may want to consider actually painting the
(22:05):
wall so that it all blends in better. Because there's
no way, unfortunately, to patch that wall unless the cracking
was actually just in the mortar joints. There's no way
to actually crack to fix a cracked cinder block wall
without the patch showing up unfortunately, just as much if
not more visible, once you patch it than the crack
(22:28):
was to begin with. So you get some options in
after you've patched it. If you're going to keep the
wall like that, you know, maybe paint the wall over,
Maybe decide to grow something in front of it, or
let something like a creeping fig kind of ivy sort
of creeping plant cling to the wall and cover it over,
(22:49):
make it more attractive in that sense. Or maybe at
some point you say, you know what, we'll patch it
for now, but let's replace this. Let's replace it with
a fence, a wood fence of our choosing, so that
you get a better architectural look. That's the best I
can tell you. Thank you, Ragnar, and thanks Eric for
your calls. How about some more of your calls when
(23:11):
we return. You are listening to Home with Dean Sharp,
the House Whisper canf i AM six forty and live
streaming in HD everywhere on the iHeart Radio app Hey,
welcome to home, where every week we help you better
understand that place where you live. I am Dean Sharp,
the house whisper, custom home builder, custom home designer, most importantly,
(23:35):
today your guide to turning your ordinary house into something
truly extraordinary. I tell you what we're doing today. It's
an all calls day. It is it you set the agenda.
Anything that is going on with your home, whether it
be construction issues, DIY questions, design concerns, anything at all.
(23:58):
The phone lines are open. I am here to help
you sort it all out. We'll put our heads together
and we'll get it sorted. On that note, how about
we go to it. Hey, Mary, welcome home.
Speaker 6 (24:12):
I have a question about reroofing. I have a small
house about fourteen hundred square feet, was built in nineteen
eighty eight. But it needs the tile lifted and then
the paper lad underneath it. And I'm getting bids on it,
and some of the bids bidders are saying two layers
(24:32):
of paper and others are saying one.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Okay, So your question is is are two layers necessary?
Is that a good idea? Is it too much? Is it?
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Yeah? I have a couple of thoughts about it.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Number one is two layers always better than one when
it comes to roofing paper, especially because roofing paper will age,
it will become brittle eventually over time. And the more
protection you have up there underneath the tie ailes, the
better off you're going to be. A lot of people
(25:03):
don't realize this, but you know, tiles, roofing tiles, any
kind of roofing material. The surface material that we all
look at and say, look, there's the roof. That is
just the top layer, and it is not a guarantee
in and of itself that the roof doesn't leak. What's
really doing the true protection of the home is the underlayment,
(25:23):
that is the building paper underneath the tiles. So I
always tell people, do not shortchange your budget in terms
of the underlayment. Get the best stuff possible. But Mary,
since we're on that subject and you raise the subject,
here is the thing I would prefer. And this is
just me, and it's up to you, and you should
(25:44):
bring this up to the roofers who are bidding your project.
We don't use builder paper anymore, roofing paper anymore in
the homes that we design and specify and in the
homes that we actually participate in building because for so
long now rubber rized membranes have been proven themselves so
(26:05):
far superior to builder of paper. So I would recommend
that you actually go back and say, okay, fine, fine, fine,
two layers of building paper. That's fine, but let's talk
about using a modern membrane underneath my tile. The modern membrane,
they are self sealing. They lap onto each other, they seal.
That's something that builder paper does not do unless the
(26:27):
builders actually tar it all in which on a normal
residential roof rarely happens. So the membrane seal, and as
a result, Number One, when they're all done laying it,
you have essentially, for all practical purposes, one continuous membrane,
not just tiers of paper over the house.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
And two other things about them.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Number one, they're rubberized, they're they're bitimus, they have stretch
and give that they never actually lose, and so as
a result, they do not become brittle and tend to
break down as quickly over time. In fact, they last
a lot lot longer than builder paper. They even go
(27:09):
so far during installation as self ceiling around every single
nail that gets punctured through them when the actual tiles
are put on. So there is no doubt in my mind,
no question in my mind that these new modern membrane
unladed layments are superior to builder paper. Now, do they
(27:32):
cost a little more, Yeah, they do do. A lot
of builders lead with them when they're bidding a job. No,
they don't, because it means that their bid comes in higher,
and then they have to sit there and explain to
you why it's higher, because you know, we're using a
better material, and some homeowners just don't agree or don't
believe them, but you can take it from me. I
(27:52):
would zero in on the roofer that you're thinking about using,
and then talk to them about a continuous, you know,
more advanced underlayment. If you really want this this roof
job to last forever, talk to them about a modern
underlayment instead of the roofing paper.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
And there you go.
Speaker 6 (28:12):
And that's just one layer that they put down with that.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
That's all you need with that stuff is just one
layer because it is thick, and like I said, it's
self seals, seals around the nails and it remains pliable
throughout the years.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
So one layer is.
Speaker 6 (28:26):
All you need and that lasts forever.
Speaker 2 (28:29):
It's gonna last. Yeah, yeah, I mean this is this
is how we do lifetime roofs.
Speaker 3 (28:33):
I'll put it that way.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
Great.
Speaker 6 (28:35):
I really appreciate the help.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
You are so welcome, Mary, and I appreciate the call.
All right, let's talk to Julie.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
Hey, Julie, welcome home.
Speaker 6 (28:44):
Hi Deine. We're looking at getting new windows and I
love the black frame windows, but they're obviously a lot
more expensive. So I was wondering, what are your thoughts. Honestly,
just if someone just adjusted black frame windows in the
back of the house and kept the traditional white frame
ones in.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
The front, I have no general problems with that whatsoever.
In fact, if you hear me talk on the show
quite often, i'll talk about the tech. One of the
techniques for upgrading a house without touching its traditional curb
appeal is to treat the facade of the house differently
than the backside of the house, because from the the
(29:21):
facade of the house is something that is viewed from
outside the house, standing on the curb in the street
looking at the house. Then you move into the house,
you walk in, and once you're past the face of
the house. Now we're inside the house looking out through
windows into the backyard. It's a completely different experience. And
so the idea of using black frame windows for the
(29:45):
backside of the house because you love them and because
they work with the configuration that you're looking for, in
my thinking, in most cases most cases. Don't quote me
on this universally, but in most cases, yeah, your freedom
to mix it up, I would even say, depending on decor.
There are times when you know there are well, actually
(30:06):
you know, I'll tell you this. We just finished designing
from the ground up a new house in Studio City.
Some of those windows are white traditional framed windows, some
of them are dark bronze and black traditional windows. Just
depending on room for room and the effect that we're
looking for, and on some of the elevations of the house,
you can see both at the same time. It all
(30:28):
depends on whether it works with that theme. But as
a general rule, you know, it's kind of the mullet approach, right,
all business up front and party in the back. So
keep your white frame windows facing the street and do
back black towards the back of the house and have
a blast. I think you're completely free to do that
in most cases. Thanks, Julie for the call. Yes, Yes,
(30:51):
it's my mullet theory. My mullet theory.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
Applies to lots of things. All the time.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
You're listening to Home We Dean Sharp, the House Whisper
on KF This has been Home with Dean Sharp, the
House Whisper. Tune into the live broadcast on KFI AM
six forty every Saturday morning from six to eight Pacific time,
and every Sunday morning from nine to noon Pacific time,
or anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six fortyf.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I am six forty Live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
I am Dean Sharp, the house Whisperer, custom home builder,
custom home Designer. It's an all calls weekend. I love
these weekends. I love taking your calls, talking with you
about what's going on with your home, and you know,
hoping out if I can.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
So let's do it all right, Let's talk to Tom. Tom.
Welcome home, Dean.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Yes, sir, okay. I live on a hillside lot. My
house is on the upper portion of the hill with
a yard created by retaining the old style retaining wall
with concrete about two hundred and forty feet front to back.
And I want to get down to that lower pad
(00:59):
to build an AD and I got to put in
a driveway. If I bulldoze straight down the slope, I'm
going to be over twenty percent. And I don't even
want to be twenty percent. I'd like to be twelve percent.
And I'm thinking, rather than try to stretch the driveway
along the ridge to lengthen it and reduce my slope,
(01:22):
is there some way like like an elevated boardwalk a
driveway built on piers that somebody does. I mean, obviously
it could be done, but you know, it cost a fortune.
And I'm just wondering if if anybody does anything prefab
like that.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Oh gosh, yeah, you know what if somebody does, I
have not heard of them. You know, we've had some
tricky driveway grating scenarios before, and you know, it's not
uncommon to have to get the structural engineers out and say, okay,
we got to bring this driveway in on an estate
property across this creek bed or across this gully, or
(02:00):
you know, we've got an elevated portion of it and
essentially build a bridge or an elevated platform for a
portion of the driveway. But I know of no one
out there, and I'm not saying that there isn't, but
I personally don't have knowledge of anybody out there who
has prefab systems that are just ready to go. And
the problem is the problem with the reason is is
because it's all site specific, it has to do with
(02:23):
your you know, geological situation, your soil quality. Because it's
not so much the structure itself, it's what it's bearing
on and how much of a seismic and lateral load
it has to withhold as well as the dead load itself.
So geological engineer and structural engineer, those are going to
be unavoidable in your situation. Doesn't necessarily have to be concrete.
(02:45):
I've seen them. We've actually successfully built some some bridges
over gullies out of wood, out of you know, kind
of like the old covered wood bridges. We've successfully done
it out of wood and steel and or concrete. But
it's going to have to be one of those formats,
and it's gonna be h it's gonna be site specific,
(03:07):
and so you're just gonna, unfortunately have to price that out. Tom,
Thanks for the call. It was super interesting question. I
wish I could help more on that. I want to
talk to Shannon. Hey, Shannon, welcome home.
Speaker 5 (03:19):
Hi, thanks for taking my calls. Well, I have a
pervasive gopher problem in my yards in my back and
my strint, which has prevented me hard planting anything, and
mostly weeds are popping up and weeds die, and I
have all these hills and mounds and holes, and so
I wanted to do a native garden, but I don't
(03:43):
know where to begin and how to get rid of
the gophers.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Gophers Nature's annoying, adorable rodent. Okay, so Shannon, here's the thing.
Here's what I don't want you to do. Please do
not poison your gophers with a rat poison blood thinning
rat poison, because it is not only doing damage to them,
and yes it will, you know, knock out your gophers
(04:10):
in general, but it will end up damaging the entire
ecosystem around you. I'm not going to get on my
soapbox and talk about that. I'm just going to say,
don't do it. Blood thinners end up in all the
predators that eat the gophers as well, and it affects
everything well beyond the edge of your house. Now, you
can live trap gophers, or you can just kill them
dead with the mechanical traps, but that doesn't solve the
(04:34):
problem because you know, it's just an ongoing war. So
in your situation and for everybody who has a gopher issue,
what I'm about to suggest may sound extreme, but in
reality it is actually the easiest, most stress free, permanent
way to deal with gophers in your yard, and that
(04:56):
is simply to not allow them in in the first place. Now,
how do you do that? Well, you do that by
again having a strong commitment we don't want gophers in
this yard. What it means is this, let's take your lawn,
your planterbed areas wherever it is that you are planning
(05:16):
on planting and don't want gophers coming up. You're going
to remove some soil okay, two, three, sometimes as much
as four inches of soil in an area, and you're
going to stake down and bury gopher cloth. And what
do I mean by gopher cloth? I mean either a
(05:38):
nylon cloth that is, and I say cloth, it's actually
full of holes.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Okay, it's more like a.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Mesh, but basically think of chicken wire, but on a
much much smaller scale opening so that a gopher can't
get through a layer of chicken wire essentially, And please
forgive me for using it. I just want everybody to
picture what it is that I'm saying, a layer of
chicken wire buried a couple of inches underneath the soil
of everywhere in your yard.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
The simple truth of the matter is the gophers can
tunnel underneath your house all they want and all around,
but they're not going to be popping up and they're
not going to be doing as much, if any, damage
to the roots of everything that's going down. Now, will
they occasionally gnaw on a deeper root, sure, but not
to the extent that they're going to destroy anything. So
(06:29):
without question, the once and for all solution for gophers
is actually to just put a fence in between them
and being able to pop up in your yard.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
Awesome that.
Speaker 6 (06:45):
It is simple.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
I mean simple for me to say.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
It's like, oh yeah, just to dig up all the
dirt in your whole backyard and completely cover it over
with seamless fencing. It's a it's a task, it's a chore.
But honestly, when you think about, well, do we want
to do that or do we want to forever have
gophers making holes in the backyard. So this way, the
gophers don't die, your plans don't die, your yard stays lovely,
(07:10):
and you just have a barrier.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
So it's a gopher bear.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
If you go online, you're gonna find all sorts of
options in that regard subterranean buried gopher barriers. You're gonna
find them. You can price them out, you can make
your own decisions. But they work.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
I know they work.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
We've seen them work and at the end of the day, boom.
You do it once, you do it right, and you
don't have to worry about it again. So Shannon, thank you.
Good luck on that. Thanks for the call. When we
come back, more of your calls. I'm so glad you
joined me this morning. Hang tight, so much more to come.
You are Home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 7 (07:47):
Kay if I.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Am six forty and live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app,
you are home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
That's me.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
Hey.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
We are doing a all weekend here on the program.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Every few weeks. We lay every.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Topic aside so that we can concentrate on just the
things that are on your mind regarding your home, be
it a design issue, or a construction question, or a
DIY concerned whatever, all of the above and anything in between.
Anything you want to talk to me about your home today,
that's what we're doing. It's time to go back to
(08:25):
the phones to do it. I want to talk to Jane. Hey, Jane,
welcome home.
Speaker 6 (08:30):
Thanks for taking my call.
Speaker 5 (08:32):
I have a quick question. We're looking to remodel our
house and open.
Speaker 6 (08:36):
Up some of the walls and we're not sure if
we should get a designer first to work out.
Speaker 7 (08:41):
The layout and the design, or if we should.
Speaker 5 (08:43):
Speak with a structural engineer to actually let us know
which walls we can open up.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Excellent question, a procedural question on how you get started
with this kind of thing. The answer is a bit nuanced, Jane.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
Number one.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
The first call that you always make, that everyone should
always make when they're thinking about remodeling or doing something
different with their.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
House, is you call a designer. All right.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
You start with the creativity, you start with the art.
You start with somebody who knows what they're doing in
order to help you come with the absolute best possible
design that works for you, that customizes your home, that
expresses you. Because, as I say here on the program
all the time, as you know, design matters most. We
(09:30):
start with design. However, sometimes design choices end up leading
towards Wow, we're going to move that wall, or we're
going to eliminate that wall, and we want to change
those windows, or we want to put in a much
bigger door. Things that infringe and touch now upon structural issues.
So this is why I say it's nuanced. What you
(09:51):
want is you want to call the designer first, and
you want to start having that conversation. What you don't
want is to pay a designer for a th on,
full blown finished design when you don't know what the
structural ramifications are. Okay, So you call a designer and
you begin to work with them in what we call
(10:14):
rough design mode or rough sketch mode, in which we
haven't you know, we haven't sold the farm yet for
this design.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
But we get to the point.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Where now we sense like, wow, we're really liking where
this is going. And the big question now looms what
about that wall? And that is when you call in
a structural engineer for a consultation and it's a couple
three hundred dollars, most structural engineers will show up and
help you figure out what's going on. Sometimes it's pretty
(10:46):
simple to do expect that they will. In order to
make the most of a consult like that, that you're
going to want to invest a little of a demo,
and by demo, I just mean a forensic opening up.
You know, if it's a wall in question, you don't
know if it's a bearing wall, or if you don't
know if it's a sheer wall, that's critical for the
(11:06):
seismic strength of the house, then you.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
Want to pull some drywall off.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Drywall is inexpensive to replace, Okay, it's just cost of
getting ready for your remodel.
Speaker 3 (11:16):
A little bit of forensic analysis. So in other words, if.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
We're talking about you know, if we were talking about
the house in terms of let's say the metaphor of
a patient going in for some surgical procedure and there
are some things that we don't quite know about, then
we would call this exploratory surgery, in which we open
things up just a little bit to take a look
around and to verify what it is that we're dealing
(11:42):
with there.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
So open up a little.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Section of drywall on a wall, open up some drywall
on the ceiling right next to the top of that wall,
if we want to figure out what direction the ceiling
joysts are going, what's bearing on that wall or not,
that kind of stuff, and then have the structural engineer
come out and give you an evaluation of like okay, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I see this. They might just say listen, hey, thanks
(12:05):
for paying for the console. I think you're good to go.
That's not a baring wall. That thing can be removed
and you don't have to worry about it. Or they
may say, yeah, now some engineering is going to be
required here and it's a major deal, or some engineering.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Is required and it's not that big of a deal.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
So that's the information you need, you need at that juncture,
and then you return to the design process with that
information under your arm in order to finish out the design.
You may decide to abandon that design because you don't
want to touch that wall, or it may be full
steam ahead, so it's designer engineer, back to the designer.
(12:45):
And then as you commit to a remodel, especially assuming
that you're going to be pulling permits and doing it
the right way, then once the designer is then committing
to plans, the engineer is going to get involved again
and put in their structural notes and pages in plans
that you'll submit to the city. And that's kind of
the hopscotch or leap frogging that happens. So don't pay
(13:06):
a designer everything up front to do a complete design
when you don't know the ramification structurally on the house.
And just to let you know, just as a little topper,
I'll tell you how Tina and I actually do even
when we have been hired to do a full design
on a home, we will still tell our clients listen,
we are going to take you to rough design in
(13:28):
which you're thrilled with the way everything's looking, and then
we're going to get an engineer involved to spec out
rough engineering specifications not even finished yet, but rough specifications,
because only then do you have with our drawing down
on the page and the engineering specifications. Only then do
(13:49):
you have the information you need to turn around and
hand it to two or three contractors to give you
what's called a rom a rough order of magnitude or
really rough estimate, and so you're not holding them to it,
but these are contractors that you're vetting and you're thinking
about using, and they give you a rough estimate, so
(14:09):
you get an idea like, ah, and this is what
our project probably is going to cost in the ballpark.
At that point you may find out m Yeah, all right,
that's in our budget, or no, that's too much, and
then you go back to the design and tweak it again.
So there's this interplay and this collaboration and that's generally
(14:29):
how it works.
Speaker 6 (14:30):
Does that help, yes, Thank you so much?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
All right, Jane good luck on that project. All right,
y'all when we come back, let's try and take a
couple more before we are done today. Yeah, you are home?
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Who is this? Oh yeah, it's Dean Sharp, the House Whisper.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
You are Home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper. Hey,
thanks for joining us on the program this morning. All
right to the phones, Eric, Welcome home.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
Hello Dean. How are you doing?
Speaker 3 (15:10):
I am well, sir. How can I help you?
Speaker 2 (15:12):
So?
Speaker 6 (15:12):
I'm planning on taking carpet out and putting new wood
floors in the room.
Speaker 4 (15:17):
I just put these new moldings in like maybe two
years ago, so I know there's going to be a gap,
and I'm wondering what you think I should do replace
the moldings or do like a pillar or something like that.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Okay, So by moldings, you're talking about your baseboards. Okay,
baseboards in the room and baseboards. Just so everybody can
get caught up to speed here, when we install baseboards,
knowing that carpeting is going in a room, the baseboard
is actually we leave it off the ground. We leave
it up above the floor about yeah, depending on the
(15:48):
carpenter you talk to, anywhere from a quarter of an
inch all the way up to about three eighths of
an inch. So if Eric is going to yank all
the carpet in the pad out of a room and
put hardwood down in its place, then it's the chances
that the hardwood is going to actually touch the bottom
of those baseboards is unlikely. That means we got a
(16:10):
little gap underneath. Two ways to handle it, Eric, just
straight out you're either well, okah, yeah too realistically. Two
ways you could You could try and remove the baseboards
carefully and reinstall them, but.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
That never works out.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
So I'm not even gonna tell you that one because
you know you're gonna end up tracking something and messing
it up and messing up the wall. So number one,
you pull the baseboards. You're just like, well, okay, fine,
I'm gonna sacrifice this.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Room full of baseboards.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
You pull the baseboards, you leave the walls bare, get
the floor installed, and then nicest, best, absolute cleanest looking job.
Once the floor is down, you install new baseboards, bump
right on top of the hardwood, nice and tight, clean line,
clean corner done. The other way to do it, if
you really really want to save those baseboards is you
(16:59):
simply use a base shoe, which is just a secondary molding.
You don't want to fill in underneath the baseboard because
that never ends up looking right. You try and glue
it or try and nail it in, you're always going
to see the seam. Even if you don't see it
right away, you'll end up seeing a seam. So the
traditional way, the conventional way is to use a base shoe,
which is kind of like a quarter round, kind of
(17:21):
like some people actually use cord around a quarter of
a circle. But base shoe actually, if you get the
right stuff, is actually taller than it is thick as
far as coming out into the room, and so it's
a little bit more just slightly more streamline than QRD around.
And what you'll do is you'll go ahead and lay
the floor, get it underneath the or up to at
(17:42):
least the line of the baseboard, and then cover the
gap with a piece of bass shoe. Now I prefer
as a designer, it says, no, this has nothing to
do with carpentry. I prefer as a designer, that you
would paint that base shoe with your molding so that
the floor stays the floor and the base shoe just
(18:04):
becomes a part of your baseboard. From a design perspective,
I think that's a cleaner, better look. Some people like
to try and buy a base shoe, a base shoe
that's the same material right as the floor. I think
that just makes the floor feel like it's creeping up
onto the wall, and for us, that's not a good look.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
So that's what.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
I'm gonna recommend my friend one of the two. If
you pull out the baseboards, how tall are they?
Speaker 6 (18:27):
By the way, there's like about three inches, So I
got all.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
Right, they're too short.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
They're too short for so no seven seven inches?
Speaker 6 (18:40):
Oh wow?
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Okay, I know right, I know everybody.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Everybody's jaw drops every time I say that. But I'm
just saying, if you've got a traditional house with kind
of a traditional motif, don't hesitate to fill that house
with taller base boards.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
I guarantee you A wall is.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
Visually, whether you've never thought of it this where or not.
A wall is a column. It's like a column that
has been split and laid out flat. So the base
of that wall, you can imagine a big, strong column
that has no base on it whatsoever, like a Greek
column that just kind of runs into the dirt. A base,
the base of a column needs a really nice pediment.
(19:19):
And I guarantee you the general rule is seven is
what we call the seven percent rule, the seven to
ten percent rule. And so that basically means baseboards can
afford to be seven percent of the height of a wall.
That means in an eight foot ceiling they can be
almost seven inches tall. It will look fantastic. So if
you decide to replace the baseboards, all I'm saying is
(19:42):
think about going taller with them.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
You won't regret it.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
And then, of course you can blame me for spending
more money in the rest of the house, because after
you love that room as much as you do, you're like, oh, great,
Dean had me change this room. It's now the best
looking room in the house, and now I have to
replace all the baseba boards everywhere. You are welcome, all right,
thanks study for the call. Do I have time to
(20:07):
sneak another one in here? Let's do it, Ragnar, Welcome home.
Speaker 7 (20:11):
My wife and I just bought a new house in Hawthorne, California.
It's built in nineteen fifty two, and we have retaining
walls are on the outside of the property and from settling.
The soil is clayish, and the settling has created a
wall cracks in the retaining walls, and whether they've been
made a center block but in institution is sick. How
can I stick salibab and replace the walls?
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Okay, So when we say retaining walls, do we mean
that these walls are actually retaining soil or when we
say retaining walls, you just mean like a garden block
wall that's dividing you and the neighbors, well.
Speaker 7 (20:46):
Garden block wall deviding me and the neighbors.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Okay, Yeah, So just to be clear, if it's not
actually holding, if the soil level on the other side
of the wall isn't significantly higher than on your side,
or vice versa, it's not a retaining wall.
Speaker 3 (20:59):
It's it's just a block wall. Okay. So a block wall.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
And if it's got it, if it's settled, uh, and
you know there's and then that happens, you know, because honestly,
a retaining if it were a retaining wall, you probably
wouldn't see any cracks in it, because a retaining wall
gets solid filled with concrete in all of the cells,
in the grouts in between all of that, and there's
steel and there's a significant footing.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
But a block wall can just be a simple garden wall.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
They kind of tend builders tend to minimize the footings
under it. So I totally get it that it's settled some.
If it has settled, then you've got cracking happening. You
can actually you can actually find concrete epoxy patch kits
at like a local hardware store, builder supply home depot,
that kind of thing. It's not going to and that'll
get you patched up so that the cracking doesn't continue,
(21:45):
and it's not hard to use. A lot of it
comes into calking tube form where you can put it
in a calking gun, squirt it in there, fill up
the crack, and then uh and then kind of trial
it smooth. Now it's not gonna look pretty on your side,
just to say not gonna look pretty. So you may
want to consider at some point, once you fix all
the cracks, you may want to consider actually painting the
(22:05):
wall so that it all blends in better. Because there's
no way, unfortunately, to patch that wall unless the cracking
was actually just in the mortar joints. There's no way
to actually crack to fix a cracked cinder block wall
without the patch showing up unfortunately, just as much if
not more visible, once you patch it than the crack
(22:28):
was to begin with. So you get some options in
after you've patched it. If you're going to keep the
wall like that, you know, maybe paint the wall over,
Maybe decide to grow something in front of it, or
let something like a creeping fig kind of ivy sort
of creeping plant cling to the wall and cover it over,
(22:49):
make it more attractive in that sense. Or maybe at
some point you say, you know what, we'll patch it
for now, but let's replace this. Let's replace it with
a fence, a wood fence of our choosing, so that
you get a better architectural look. That's the best I
can tell you. Thank you, Ragnar, and thanks Eric for
your calls. How about some more of your calls when
(23:11):
we return. You are listening to Home with Dean Sharp,
the House Whisper canf i AM six forty and live
streaming in HD everywhere on the iHeart Radio app Hey,
welcome to home, where every week we help you better
understand that place where you live. I am Dean Sharp,
the house whisper, custom home builder, custom home designer, most importantly,
(23:35):
today your guide to turning your ordinary house into something
truly extraordinary. I tell you what we're doing today. It's
an all calls day. It is it you set the agenda.
Anything that is going on with your home, whether it
be construction issues, DIY questions, design concerns, anything at all.
(23:58):
The phone lines are open. I am here to help
you sort it all out. We'll put our heads together
and we'll get it sorted. On that note, how about
we go to it. Hey, Mary, welcome home.
Speaker 6 (24:12):
I have a question about reroofing. I have a small
house about fourteen hundred square feet, was built in nineteen
eighty eight. But it needs the tile lifted and then
the paper lad underneath it. And I'm getting bids on it,
and some of the bids bidders are saying two layers
(24:32):
of paper and others are saying one.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Okay, So your question is is are two layers necessary?
Is that a good idea? Is it too much? Is it?
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Yeah? I have a couple of thoughts about it.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Number one is two layers always better than one when
it comes to roofing paper, especially because roofing paper will age,
it will become brittle eventually over time. And the more
protection you have up there underneath the tie ailes, the
better off you're going to be. A lot of people
(25:03):
don't realize this, but you know, tiles, roofing tiles, any
kind of roofing material. The surface material that we all
look at and say, look, there's the roof. That is
just the top layer, and it is not a guarantee
in and of itself that the roof doesn't leak. What's
really doing the true protection of the home is the underlayment,
(25:23):
that is the building paper underneath the tiles. So I
always tell people, do not shortchange your budget in terms
of the underlayment. Get the best stuff possible. But Mary,
since we're on that subject and you raise the subject,
here is the thing I would prefer. And this is
just me, and it's up to you, and you should
(25:44):
bring this up to the roofers who are bidding your project.
We don't use builder paper anymore, roofing paper anymore in
the homes that we design and specify and in the
homes that we actually participate in building because for so
long now rubber rized membranes have been proven themselves so
(26:05):
far superior to builder of paper. So I would recommend
that you actually go back and say, okay, fine, fine, fine,
two layers of building paper. That's fine, but let's talk
about using a modern membrane underneath my tile. The modern membrane,
they are self sealing. They lap onto each other, they seal.
That's something that builder paper does not do unless the
(26:27):
builders actually tar it all in which on a normal
residential roof rarely happens. So the membrane seal, and as
a result, Number One, when they're all done laying it,
you have essentially, for all practical purposes, one continuous membrane,
not just tiers of paper over the house.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
And two other things about them.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Number one, they're rubberized, they're they're bitimus, they have stretch
and give that they never actually lose, and so as
a result, they do not become brittle and tend to
break down as quickly over time. In fact, they last
a lot lot longer than builder paper. They even go
(27:09):
so far during installation as self ceiling around every single
nail that gets punctured through them when the actual tiles
are put on. So there is no doubt in my mind,
no question in my mind that these new modern membrane
unladed layments are superior to builder paper. Now, do they
(27:32):
cost a little more, Yeah, they do do. A lot
of builders lead with them when they're bidding a job. No,
they don't, because it means that their bid comes in higher,
and then they have to sit there and explain to
you why it's higher, because you know, we're using a
better material, and some homeowners just don't agree or don't
believe them, but you can take it from me. I
(27:52):
would zero in on the roofer that you're thinking about using,
and then talk to them about a continuous, you know,
more advanced underlayment. If you really want this this roof
job to last forever, talk to them about a modern
underlayment instead of the roofing paper.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
And there you go.
Speaker 6 (28:12):
And that's just one layer that they put down with that.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
That's all you need with that stuff is just one
layer because it is thick, and like I said, it's
self seals, seals around the nails and it remains pliable
throughout the years.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
So one layer is.
Speaker 6 (28:26):
All you need and that lasts forever.
Speaker 2 (28:29):
It's gonna last. Yeah, yeah, I mean this is this
is how we do lifetime roofs.
Speaker 3 (28:33):
I'll put it that way.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
Great.
Speaker 6 (28:35):
I really appreciate the help.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
You are so welcome, Mary, and I appreciate the call.
All right, let's talk to Julie.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
Hey, Julie, welcome home.
Speaker 6 (28:44):
Hi Deine. We're looking at getting new windows and I
love the black frame windows, but they're obviously a lot
more expensive. So I was wondering, what are your thoughts. Honestly,
just if someone just adjusted black frame windows in the
back of the house and kept the traditional white frame
ones in.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
The front, I have no general problems with that whatsoever.
In fact, if you hear me talk on the show
quite often, i'll talk about the tech. One of the
techniques for upgrading a house without touching its traditional curb
appeal is to treat the facade of the house differently
than the backside of the house, because from the the
(29:21):
facade of the house is something that is viewed from
outside the house, standing on the curb in the street
looking at the house. Then you move into the house,
you walk in, and once you're past the face of
the house. Now we're inside the house looking out through
windows into the backyard. It's a completely different experience. And
so the idea of using black frame windows for the
(29:45):
backside of the house because you love them and because
they work with the configuration that you're looking for, in
my thinking, in most cases most cases. Don't quote me
on this universally, but in most cases, yeah, your freedom
to mix it up, I would even say, depending on decor.
There are times when you know there are well, actually
(30:06):
you know, I'll tell you this. We just finished designing
from the ground up a new house in Studio City.
Some of those windows are white traditional framed windows, some
of them are dark bronze and black traditional windows. Just
depending on room for room and the effect that we're
looking for, and on some of the elevations of the house,
you can see both at the same time. It all
(30:28):
depends on whether it works with that theme. But as
a general rule, you know, it's kind of the mullet approach, right,
all business up front and party in the back. So
keep your white frame windows facing the street and do
back black towards the back of the house and have
a blast. I think you're completely free to do that
in most cases. Thanks, Julie for the call. Yes, Yes,
(30:51):
it's my mullet theory. My mullet theory.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
Applies to lots of things. All the time.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
You're listening to Home We Dean Sharp, the House Whisper
on KF This has been Home with Dean Sharp, the
House Whisper. Tune into the live broadcast on KFI AM
six forty every Saturday morning from six to eight Pacific time,
and every Sunday morning from nine to noon Pacific time,
or anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
Home with Dean Sharp News
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.