Home Tip: Don’t do what I do

This may not be home tip for everyone because I assume most homes are built properly but this one has directly affected me so here we go.

If anything this goes out to anyone who’s just moving into a new build. I urge you to grab a ladder and take a peak in your attic while it’s cold and frosty outside. Ill preface this by saying that your attic IS supposed to be cold, and it IS supposed to have a thin layer of frost. It’s unavoidable, there’s a ton of snow on your roof and there’s no insulation between that and the inside of your attic.

What’s not supposed to happen is your attic looking like a chest freezer in your basement that hasn’t been defrosted in 20 years. This is what I’m currently dealing with. This is an issue that stems from 2019, 1 year after my home was built and I moved in. That wasn’t an issue for me. Sure there was a ton of damage but my house was warrantied and it wasn’t my bank account funding the repairs. What was my issue and I now know this is not calling for a second opinion when the builder (who will remain nameless, but I reeeeeallly want to name them) sent out a roofer to take a look at the underlying issue and chalked it up to “ice damming”. They went up there, they chipped the ice off my roof, fixed the damage and bailed.

This is my first ever home, I was uneducated, but more importantly I was too confident in my new home warranty that I thought “Whatever, if this happens again it’s the builders problem, this is a new home surely they are liable” What I failed to realize is that water penetration in your home is only covered for 2 years under my warranty and (the builder) essentially remedied the issue in the moment and prayed to god it didn’t happen again until my warranty was up and now I’m left with a bunch of repairs because it most certainly was not ice damming.

Here’s the other kicker….. your home insurance. You know the people you pay money to every month to fix your home in case something super messed up happens, don’t cover “poor workmanship or faulty materials”. So I had a real roofer come in to take look for my home insurance to see if I have a claim.

My bathroom fan vents – Not insulated all the way to the roof. They stop about a foot before and then they just taped them.

My Baffles – Completely blocked my insulation, the ones that aren’t (only because they constructed a contraption to ensure they worked) are far and few between and there aren’t enough of them to vent my attic fully.

My Vents – Insufficient amount of them (2) probably should be 3 by the sounds of it but they also installed them side by side (less than 2 feet apart) They’re supposed to be at least 10 feet apart so instead of cycling air out of my attic they are just cycling the air between each other.

Pro tip: If your roofer stands in your attic, shaking his head and saying this is super common for these older houses of 14-16 years and you have to inform him it’s a 4 year old house. That’s a red flag.

So now I have to contract the roofer to come in and fix all this which I’m not sure can be done in the winter so I may have to wait for the spring thaw which might completely ruin the inside of my home from water damage which as you guessed isn’t covered under my insurance because faulty workmanship is at play.

So do yourself a favor.

If you have a new build, get up there and take a look. If it looks like somethings wrong, call someone immediately, spend the money and use a roofer that’s not brought out by your builder.

If you have a home you just bought, also do the same just for the sake of it. I know it’s not covered under warranty most likely but you may be able to save yourself some damage to the home if you spot something.

Also one last thing. Do some research on your builder before you buy and make sure you stay on them about any and all repairs or things you don’t deem acceptable in your eyes right out of the gate. Don’t let things sit, these warranties expire quicker than you can imagine and they are happy to delay and deflect until you tire or forget.

I’m also just realizing now that I don’t have my own account on here.  Steve if your reading this, make me an account 😉

-Adam