Law of Surprise

The roofers came really early today. I was ready. They were tearing off the roof by 6:30am. I think by law they are supposed to wait until 7:00am. However since there is a heat wave, I figure they needed to start early.

Luckily I had pre-negotiated that any sheathing plywood would be covered by my roofing estimate. Normally they charge by the 4x8 sheet. It ranges from $50 to $100 a sheet installed. My contract stipulated that the price for any sheathing replacement was covered. Turns out they roofers decided every existing sheet needed to be replaced on my roof. That could have cost me $3000++ extra.

During the removal of the second layer of existing roof, somebody must have slipped and fell through the roof. It punched a whole in Kat Kat's bedroom ceiling. She was disturbed to say the least. The main roofer was apologetic. He came in and cleaned up the mess from the puncture. They he called a guy to come patch the ceiling.

They color matched the ceiling. But the color would not match exactly. It was close enough for us. I did have to run after the contractor because he took the wood/lumber that we used to cover up and brace the whole temporarily. They offered to give me extra plywood that they will be throwing out. No thank you. I just wanted to keep what I started with.

As an aside, I have made a lot of charges this month with the kids bathroom renovation, plus Momoko's niece coming out to visit for the summer. While I am not at my limit yet, paying the balance on the roofing job would push me over the limit. I was able to call up my bank and get them to give me an instant credit increase. Now I hope we should be good (still have a beach trip to pay for later this month).

Roof Delivery

The roof installers arrived really early this morning. I guess they prepared to be pulling up the old roof prior to 7am. I asked them to not remove the rain gutters. The delivery people had not brought the roofing material the prior day as planned. The installers put in a call with them.

The installers put down tarps everywhere. They asked even the car in the carport to be moved away. The took the grill and black trash enclosure away from the house in the back patio. Ladders were extended up to the roof. Things looked ready to go.

After a while, I heard the ladders being retracted. One truck left. They the last installer told me they would have to come back tomorrow as they had no idea where my roofing materials were. I later got a call from the company that the delivery truck broke down.

In the afternoon, a truck with a huge crane on the back appeared. They dropped of a lot of plywood in the driveway. They also put some ridge venting material on top of it. The real impressive part was that they lifted the shingles right onto the roof. A guy secured a safety harness to the roof as he pulled the shingles off the pallet hoisted by the crane.

Afterwards I parked four cars to box in our materials. Better to hide it and make theft difficult.

Bathroom Redesign

The kids previously had a pink bathroom with a tub. They only took showers in it. Water kept escaping from the tub onto the floor. Not good for the house. I decided to get the tub converted to a shower only. The kids then asked for more updates to their bathroom.

They chose their shower wall and bathroom floor tiles plus colored grout. They chose a square shower handle. They chose a floating vanity with matching sink. They chose a tall medicine cabinet and a modern LED light above it. They also got accessories in brushed nickel. Their shower door was a frosted glass which turned out to only have half of it which would open/move.

With Momoko's niece over for the summer, plus the redesigned bathroom, it was time to get our hot water problem resolved. The water would only remain hot for 10 minutes. Second person taking a shower usually got cold water. After trying a couple fixes, I decided to replace the hot water heater.

Initial estimate for a new 75-gallon gas hot water heater was $4.5k. Went through my handyman to get one installed for less than half of that. Unfortunately the top of the new expansion tank has water coming out of it slowly. Waiting for that to be repaired.