I would (email HGTV), but I hate Kim Myles. She looks like a dwarf- not the kind that has conventions, but the beard-and-axe kind. I’m terrified of her.
Call around and get price quotes. There isn’t a lot for you to know. They are about the same, except ADT is not to my liking. I used to be a salesman for a local one. Get the cheapest service, because they all use the same equipment: Adco/Tyson, something like that??? Just be sure and get a handfob remote control thrown in for free. If you call around enough, you’ll find one. Get a service agreement, and the service and service agreement should, together, be cheaper than ADT.
good luck,
greatshakes
Congratulations! Now get ready for more stuff to mysteriously break.
Like the compressor for my fridges which burnt out last night and I had repaired this morning, or my bedroom window which I cannot close all the way. There are many, many things that have cropped up in my own place in the past two months. Nothing terribly serious or expensive (well, the compressor cost me $250 to repair) but just a very, very long list of things that crop up. At the moment I’ve got 32 things on my to do list… Everything from deciding that where to hang all the pictures to touching up the paint.
Most companies post manuals somewhere on line. If you can’t find one on the company’s call the 800 number; they’ll be happy to show you where it is.
Your problem will be reading them.
You might think he’s kidding at this point, but let me assure you, this is the truest thing in this thread. If you don’t know where all your local Home Depots/whatever you have in the US for big box do-it-yourself hardware stores are, you will soon. And you’ll find yourself getting excited over a clearance sale of gorgeous light fixtures! 
We already did that! 
:smack:
Get to know Web sites that have instructions for common home repairs and ideas for regular home maintenance. I bought a couple of home maintenance books when I bought my house, but haven’t really used them. It’s more practical to look stuff up on the Web since you’ll find out about the latest products/tools/techniques/code changes, etc.
And congratulations! Hope you really enjoy home ownership.
GT
Or, as in my case, getting really frustrated that no one carries globes of the same size as the one my wife broke. I finally knuckled down and put in a new fixture, but this just goes to show one of the basic rules of home repair - easy jobs aren’t and if you get away with only two trips to the hardware store you’re doing good.
The second time you do a repair takes one trip. By the third time you have so many spare parts stored you don’t need to go at all!
We painted the bedroom today.
By fuck, do I ever hate popcorn ceilings. Also, I hate people who don’t remove outlet covers before they paint. So many layers of paint peeled off with the covers that I actually had to spackle around them before painting.
Part of the painting we’re doing throughout our house is re-touching all the white ceilings where they are all spotted with every colour of paint that was ever painted in here. I know it can be difficult not to touch the ceiling with your roller; after you’re done, you can re-touch your touches. If you care in the slightest about not doing a crappy job.
I’m with you on the outlet covers, too - it takes five seconds to take a cover off. What pisses us of the most, though, is the terrible job somebody at some time did with patching holes in the walls - great, gobby patches that they didn’t bother to sand smooth, then painted over. Jerks.
We just left the top inch of wall, and went around afterward with a half-inch bristle brush. I was a little worried that you’d be able to tell the difference, but apparently not.
I did discover, to my dismay, that if you put painter’s tape on a factory-finished door frame, the laminate-y finish may come off with the tape in patches. Presumably, the doors in the bedroom are all original (the house was built in '91), so maybe that only happens with old ones.
I’m sorry, I wasn’t trying to be nosy :o , I really meant those to be rhetorical questions to to give you something to think about when getting into an arrangement like that. Although I’m not in the real estate business I have read countless articles about people that get into all kinds of tangles down the road in situations like these (“I thought I owned part of the house since I was paying part of the mortgage…”). It’s clear you’ve thought through it; we’ll get back to addressing your fix-up issues.
Oh, I’m not offended or anything. I asked for advice, and that was certainly good advice. I imagine there are at least one or two new (or prospective) homebuyers out there reading this. In my case, there just isn’t any risk, since as I say I’d be paying the same amount in rent otherwise.
After I’ve done some credit-building (advice on that would be handy too!) we’re going to refinance, depending on the state of the credit market (she got a 30-year fixed @ 6% by herself). At that point, we’ll add my name to the deed and put in writing that I own X amount of the house (X being the amount of the mortgage we’ve paid off, divided by two, adjusted to the current appraised value).
Not married? you need a contract-especially calling out what everybody pays for. You also need a contrct to protect you if you…er…break up.
No more than 20 pages should suffice, call a good contrct lawyer ASAT!
Read whole thread.
If we break up right now, she keeps the house, I find a new place to live- and I’m fine with that. Although it’s “our house”, legally it’s “her house”, and since she provided basically all of the down payment and the whole thing is based around her credit, that’s cool with me.
If she doesn’t pay the mortgage, again, doesn’t affect me. I’m essentially in a rent-to-own situation.
Try a Teflon- or silicone-based lubricant, like Elmer’s Slide-All.
Thanks!