Join John and Larry Unger as they share essential tips on preparing your home for senior accessibility. This episode addresses common challenges faced when accommodating elderly family members and provides actionable advice to create a safer, more welcoming environment. Whether it’s addressing trip hazards, installing handrails, or considering a single-level layout, they provide a comprehensive guide for proactive home adjustments. Additionally, they discuss the importance of considering future technology needs, such as installing a level-2 charger for electric vehicles, ensuring your home remains functional and appealing for years to come.
SPEAKER 14 :
Walter? Upstairs! Are you alright?
SPEAKER 04 :
In the floor behind the chair.
SPEAKER 08 :
This is America.
SPEAKER 02 :
Does everybody know what time it is? Fix It Radio.
SPEAKER 07 :
And it is that time, Fix It Radio. Appreciate you all joining us today. We have a live program December the 21st as we kind of head down the stretch into Christmas. All the same token, if you’re listening to a replay of this show, which this will play again for sure on Christmas Eve. So appreciate you all listening. And we’re going to talk about some things today that you may not think affect you now. But let me tell you, at some point, it will. Larry Unger with me this morning as well. So, hello, Larry. Good morning, John. Doing all right? I’m doing very well. Charlie Unger, our engineer, of course. And as I talk about this… No, that’s not Charlie Unger.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s Charlie Grimes.
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, Charlie Grimes. Yes, sorry.
SPEAKER 06 :
Why did I say Charlie Unger?
SPEAKER 07 :
Larry Unger, Charlie Grimes. I’ll get it right. It’s been a long year. Let’s just say that, guys. Yes, it is. We’re winding things down. Now, this particular topic today… Some of you may want to add some things too because you may have even more experience with this than even Larry and I, although we’ve got a fair amount of experience in this particular area and myself just because of some of the things I’ve gone through this past summer with my own folks. And some of you know some of that story. I don’t want to get into all the details of, but as our selves grow older and as our family members around us do, things can change. And so as we especially gather for the holidays, you know, Christmas, New Year’s and beyond, there’s always different things that are happening. One of the things, and I could have done an interview on this, but I decided I don’t really need to. I think we can handle this one on our own. We’re going to talk about how to make your home or it could even be the person’s home that is now have some different things that have changed in their life health wise but how do we make your home this is titled senior friendly but really folks it doesn’t even have to be senior friendly i mean you could find yourself in a predicament where you’re not a senior and you still need to make some changes inside the home to make things more uh… more workable for that particular individual in your home. Accidents, things along those lines. And again, these are things that, I’ll just tell you straight up, no one thinks about until you have yourself or someone there that is now in need of things that you never thought of prior. Am I right, Larry?
SPEAKER 06 :
Oh, absolutely. Things happen that you don’t expect, and it doesn’t have to be anything serious, just a minor situation, and it changes how you do things, how you reach for your dishes, how you reach to clean your house, how you walk in and out. I mean, it just goes on and on and on.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, so I think what we’re going to do is I’m going to take a similar approach to this. I did Ready Radio yesterday, and we talked about home defense and some things along those lines. And in that case, we started from the outside of the home and then worked our way in. And I think we’re going to do the exact same thing today during Fix-It Radio when it comes to getting your house prepped, and whether it’s house, apartment, whatever the case may be, but getting it, and I’m not going to use the term ADA because, frankly, I think there’s some things even outside of ADA where we’re going to talk about things that make things more comfortable for certain individuals. Now, there’s a lot of things, ADA, related to this that are in a lot of public buildings and things like that, and, frankly, homes don’t have to be that way unless you’ve got somebody living with you or you’re yourself need some of these things. But just a reminder that, especially for some of you, where you might have some family members, mom, dad, aunt, uncle, whatever, where age is starting to creep up, and they may be in great health today. you may be thinking yeah i don’t need to worry about that um let me just say this that can change in the blink of an eye overnight yeah i’m not trying to you know scare anybody or or you know or or be rude or anything but uh you know don’t don’t be so confident in that because you know be happy that it’s that way feel blessed that it’s that way but that can change in the blink of an eye it did for me i mean i was healthy wealthy and wise and all of a sudden one night
SPEAKER 06 :
dislocated my shoulder and has been downhill for the last year. So, yeah, it can happen.
SPEAKER 07 :
Is that old saying, stuff happens? Mm-hmm. So we’ll talk about some of these things. So first things first, and this is with anything. Again, as I talked yesterday during Ready Radio, let’s start from the outside looking in. So first things first, take an approach from the outside of your home and look at it and say, okay, if – somebody were coming to visit or you know i’ve got you know x person that i know is going to be staying with me how does everything from the outside of the house in look in regards to getting somebody that’s not as agile as you are so what i mean by that is do you have you know some sunken concrete where there’s now an inch you know, an inch step, quote unquote, you know, a ledge, I guess you could say, where there’s now a trip hazard that, yeah, might not be a big deal for you, but somebody that is in a walker or a wheelchair or even just with a cane, you know, what kind of, you know, quote unquote, trip hazards do you have on the outside of your house, inside of the garage? And again, we’ll get to the inside of the house in just a little bit here, but from the outside in, look at all of those things and And I say this all the time. This is maybe another subject for another day. But a lot of you have garages. And a lot of people have garages they can’t pull into for obvious reasons because we as Americans collect stuff. We have too much stuff at times. And, again, I say this all the time because I look at different things in the summertime when doors are open and so on and you drive past and it’s like – You’ve got a three-car garage you’re lucky to get one car in because you’ve got nothing but junk in it. And reality is, do you even need all of that stuff? In this particular case, all of that stuff is now a hindrance to aiding what we’re talking about in regards to having folks that maybe aren’t as mobile, don’t have the agility. that you have. They can’t walk around certain things. And keep in mind, too, that other things that happen as time goes by, and this was happening to my dad, is eyesight can change. My dad ended up with monocular degeneration to where you can’t see certain things. So things that would not be a trip hazard to any one of the three of us, myself, Charlie, or Larry, to him would be a major trip hazard. I mean, I’m talking just little things, a mat on the floor. Where for us, we wouldn’t think anything about it. You just kind of look down, you step in or out of it and off you go and it’s not a big deal. But when you’re, you know, not able to see and maybe sliding your feet a little bit more than you once were because you don’t have that agility, you don’t have the ability to pick your feet up like you once did. Even a floor mat in a garage or the front step can become an issue for some people. These are the things that I’m trying to get everybody to think about, Larry.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, exactly, and it’s just, like you said, it doesn’t have to be anything major, just a minor little, every one of us has some kind of a floor mat to go in the front door.
SPEAKER 07 :
Usually, usually there’s some sort of a front porch mat, I mean, most, you look at most houses, most have them, and again, I’m not, you know, each person has to do, you know, you do you, and I understand that, but I also think it depends on who do you have in your home, who’s coming, who’s visiting, and so on. Because some of those mats, by the way, I’ve seen some of them, they can get to be almost an inch thick all on their own just from the mat. And for the individuals I’m talking about right now, that’s a trip hazard.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yes, because they don’t walk with their toes up. They kind of shuffle a little bit.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, they’re shuffling at that point. And again, folks, trust me, I’m not being critical in any way, shape, or form. These are some things that I personally have experienced here of late, or our family has experienced as of late, and the reality is, trust me, I’m one of those. You don’t think about these things prior to these things happening in your own little world, because really it’s kind of, you know, that old saying, Larry, out of sight, out of mind. Exactly. You just don’t think about this stuff until these things start to take place.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, and then you don’t experience it until you have to actually do things. And once you start doing them, that’s when you go, wait a minute, I can’t do this no more, or I can’t go here no more.
SPEAKER 07 :
for that person in my life that always did can’t yep exactly I think it starts to happen in folks and I’m talking even even things as small as door thresholds where you don’t think anything about it you walk right over or you walk on it and kids walk past it in nobody thinks twice about it well when you start having somebody in your life where they can’t see as well and to Larry’s point they start to shuffle a little bit they don’t have the ability to really pick up their feet Even something as small as a half-inch threshold can become an issue. And again, I’m not saying that you can change any of that. I mean, it is what it is. It’s hard to make those kinds of changes. But those are things to remember. And in the case of my dad, for example, we had to, in some certain cases, you take some of the bright yellow tape, for example, and you may find yourself putting on the front rung of some of those things. some bright yellow tape to be able to help that person identify that hey there’s something here that I need to be aware of where the rest of us wouldn’t think twice about it because it’s again out of sight out of mind you just don’t have to think about it
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, and the other side of that is if you’re going into the house, how heavy is your glass door when you open the front door to get in the house? If you have a lot of pressure on that so it closes properly and so on and so forth, for somebody that’s got a shoulder issue or doesn’t have the strength.
SPEAKER 07 :
Knee issues, shoulder issues, hip issues, Larry, we can go down the list.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yes. it can be a challenge. Absolutely.
SPEAKER 07 :
That’s one I hadn’t even thought of, but yeah, you are correct. Just how things even open and close, you know, how much pressure is required or how much strength is required in some of those situations. And again, folks, I understand you can’t, you know, you can’t take care of every little aspect of your own home when you’ve got people that are coming to visit. But, you know, there are things you probably can do to at least help when those folks come to visit. And what I’m getting at here is in a lot of ways, take what we’re talking about, You either bookmark this particular episode and save it as a podcast or however you want to do that. Once we’re done, that’s exactly how this works. You can go save this, download this whole recording if you’d like, take some notes. You may not have this as a need today, but you might six months, a year, or five years from now. Who knows? And hopefully for some of you, you never have to worry about some of this. But most of us will. Most of us will.
SPEAKER 06 :
And the other side of that is, John, and this is what I found interesting, think about the people around you that may need a little assistance coming in or going out or sitting down or standing up. I mean, just simple things that we take for granted.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. So again, looking at the outside of the house, looking in first thing to do is again, identify any of these areas where there may be a trip hazard some things are easier to fix than others i will tell you that if you got a big trip hazard in the driveway for example or the driveway to the sidewalk that’s where some of the heaving in colorado of course movement can happen there are companies out there that can help you with that concrete situation. In some cases, and I know this isn’t the preference, but you see it happen a lot even on the retail end of things with retail centers and so on. If you don’t have the ability, time, money, et cetera, to lift a pad per se, you can grind a certain portion of the of the high spot right sidewalk driveway whatever it is there’s guys that can you know crews that can come out companies that can come out you can do it yourself by the way you can look up what tools you need the grinding wheels and so on if you’ve got the ability to on your own you can you can grind that concrete down to where you make more of a slope in that to where it’s not an abrupt sharp edge right you know 90 degree edge so these are just some things that you guys should be looking at on the outside and typically this is going to be stuff from the front in so front walk up in some of you have steps even getting in do you have railings that would help somebody get up some homes uh you know i don’t know what the code is i’ve never looked this up some homes will have railings some will not if you’re if you have a home where maybe you’ve got a front porch and there’s two steps up and there’s no railing and you get somebody in your in your life like what we’re talking about you may want to add a railing you know some things along those lines so My point is, if you’re finding yourself in this situation or you know you’re not that far from this situation, because some of you just can sense what’s going on with certain individuals in your family, and you may be thinking, yeah, you know, I probably need to start looking at some of these things and be more prepared on the front side than on the back side because, again, you just don’t know when these things are going to happen.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, and the other side of that is if you check with your town where you live, there’s organizations within that town that are addressing senior citizen needs. They can help you either financially, help you come up with a plan and everything, whether it be something in the bathroom, something outside on the porch like a handrail, all those kind of different things.
SPEAKER 07 :
Okay, good to know. I did not know that, Larry. Thank you for that. Mike, you’re up. Go ahead, sir. Hey, John. How’s it going? Good, sir.
SPEAKER 03 :
Two things real quick. I mean, if you’re getting into the mindset that this is your final house, you should think about a single level.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yes, I agree. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER 03 :
I mean, even when I was in my 40s. I started regretting having to go up two flights of stairs.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yep. No, Mike, you are that you are you kind of I was going to say this a little bit later, but no, we did that with my folks this past summer, actually. And and of course, my mom ended up passing away shortly thereafter, which is not what we had planned, by the way. But we put them in a single level house for the very reason that you’re talking about. Single-level house, by the way, that had none of what we just got done talking about in regards to trip hazards and things like that. So, Mike, not only do we want a single-level house, but no sunken family rooms, none of that nonsense either. We just want a nice, flat, level house.
SPEAKER 03 :
Something you might get down in Texas or something where they don’t have where they don’t put in the garage or put in the basement.
SPEAKER 07 :
Right.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, you would also consider whether you put carpeting down or or hardwood floors type of thing.
SPEAKER 07 :
Great point. And and even Larry, to your point, we’ll get to the inside in a moment. But Mike’s bringing it up. So we’ll talk about it now. Even Mike, that Mike and Larry, that transition between one surface to another. What is that like?
SPEAKER 06 :
Exactly.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, absolutely. No, Mike, you bring up a great point, though. As some of us start to age and you kind of start looking down the road, it’s like, okay, if I’ve got a lot of stairs, this probably isn’t my forever home. Now, really quick, Mike, because this is another thing, and I’ve talked to some people that have done this of late. I’ve got a few friends that have actually had to do this for family members and so on. They do make the chair lifts where you can actually do a chair lift and go up and down stairs and so on, but I will tell all of you listening, number one, they’re not as cheap as they seem, and they are actually a pain in the rear to use. Yes. And they’re slow. And they’re slow. They are not as convenient as everybody makes them sound. Let’s just say it that way, Mike. can i ask a question real quick for something else there absolutely uh… level two charging how much more juice do you have in your main power do you need in your main power panel if you’ve got like say you know two hundred fifty amps coming in two hundred amps coming in some might have less than that but if you’ve got that coming in you wouldn’t have any problems put in uh… it because the way that works for all the listing a level two charger uh… depending upon what amp charger you buy there are 30 40 and 50 amp chargers so let’s say mike you’re kind of on the edge and you don’t know if you really have enough juice and even electrician might say well you’re kind of on the edge well then buy a 30 amp charger it still will work fine it’ll charge the car no problem at all and just use a 30 amp instead of a 50 amp and some of them by the way will be automatic they’ll know based upon the breaker and so on and you can set through typically an app what amp do we want this thing to be operating at
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I’m getting ready to build a garage, and I just want to make sure that I have enough power in the garage.
SPEAKER 07 :
You build enough power to run a welder. You’ve got enough to run a level two charger. Welder, compressor, anything like that, you can run a charger, no problem, Mike.
SPEAKER 03 :
I can understand that.
SPEAKER 07 :
Because they’ll be using less even than what you’ll use with a welder or a compressor firing up or anything along those lines.
SPEAKER 03 :
So 150 amp in the garage should be fine.
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, you’d be fine. Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER 03 :
All righty. Well, thank you, sir.
SPEAKER 07 :
You probably can get by even with a 100-amp mic and be fine. Again, you can even tone down a level 2 charger to 30 amps if you need to, so not a huge issue.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, you have to remember, just like a toolbox, you never have enough room in a toolbox.
SPEAKER 07 :
Nope. That is a fact. Absolutely. No, and you know me, I’m always one where if you’ve got an option to go up, go up.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s all I’m looking at is when I leave this planet, who knows what’s going to be mandated by then.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, well, I think just this is kind of a side note, but you’re bringing up a great point, Mike. If you’re building anything, knowing where things are headed and just kind of the shift in certain directions, I wouldn’t build anything that doesn’t have the ability to have this in it. And even in your case, Mike, I would even drop a plug near a place where you would think somebody might even hang a charger on the wall. It’ll be added sale. It’ll help your sale down the road. Whether that person wants it or not, it’s still an added value. that’s the whole point is for down the road absolutely because i i will be in the grave before i take electric yeah and you’re no different than a lot of people but the next person coming in um which by the way there’s even supercars and things like that that are going that direction so it’s not even for uh how should i say it isn’t because it’s not green anyways but you know there’s a lot of people buying them because they think it’s green but there’s a lot of people buying them because they’re fast true has nothing to do with the green side whatsoever
SPEAKER 03 :
Or they just want to get the latest and the greatest regardless of what they do.
SPEAKER 07 :
The latest and the greatest. But, you know, there’s a lot of what we call, you know, hybrids, supercars that are plug-in that are utilizing that in a way to make that car super fast. So, you know, you sell the home down the road to somebody along those lines, well, they’re going to want that ability to charge.
SPEAKER 03 :
And how many trucks or vehicles in general have the little motor added to the gas?
SPEAKER 07 :
Going to be more and more. And as you know, the hybrid thing is going to continue to just keep growing and growing as well.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yep. All right.
SPEAKER 07 :
But no, I’ve got a bad idea at all, Mike. Great question, by the way. Thank you for that. Guys, let’s take a quick break. We’ll get plenty of time that way when we come back. Wally, John, you guys hang tight. We’ll come right back. This is Fix It Radio. FixItRadio.com is our website. KLZ Radio is where we’re at.
SPEAKER 08 :
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SPEAKER 07 :
All right, we are back. Fix It Radio, KLZ 560. Thank you all for joining us. I got a text message from somebody a moment ago that said, hey, you don’t have to be super old to have these things that you’re talking about have an effect. This particular person said, I’m in my early 40s, had both hips replaced. Yeah. So a lot of what you’re talking about. And he says, I refuse to live in a home now that doesn’t have a main floor master. So, yeah, you don’t you don’t have to be, you know, even as old as I am. I’m 60. You don’t have to be that old to be thinking about some of these things. There’s a lot of folks out there that are a lot younger that have had other things go on to where they’re thinking about the very things that we’re talking about. So thank you, by the way, for that. And that person is listening all the way from Ohio. So thank you for listening all the way in Ohio this morning. We appreciate that. Wally in Tennessee, what’s going on?
SPEAKER 15 :
Yeah, I’m a little bit further than Ohio. Yes, you are. So when we moved down here, John, and we made our trips down here to look for a house, builders just are not thinking about people like me with a back injury that could possibly end up in a wheelchair. And I was shocked at the houses where you’d have a main floor, but there was just a ranch there. But you had six or eight or ten stairs to get from the garage into the house.
SPEAKER 07 :
Right. Right. Absolutely.
SPEAKER 15 :
Garage is a little bit lower. Or in a lot of cases down here, your garages are underneath the house because of the hilly country. You can always build where you excavate out. But I was fortunate to find a lot that was pretty flat. We did put a crawl space in because I didn’t want to do a slab on grade. But the stairs that I have to my house are to our 500-square-foot guest room that’s over the garage. And if I never have to go up there again, it would not hurt me one bit. But, you know, everything in my house is straight roll-in or walk-in with zero… anything over the thresholds other than the built-in thresholds themselves, from the garage out onto either porches. And the big thing for me, and I think you could go along with this one, I even am in the process of building my workshop right at the end of the driveway so that if I do end up in a wheelchair, I can roll out one garage right down the driveway. Nice.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. Great idea. Yep. Great idea, Wally. And again, what I’m trying to get people to think about is this stuff, as you know, Wally, can happen to almost anybody at any time. Maybe if you’re in your early 20s, you might be out of the realm of this. But as we all age and have family members that age, this becomes a bigger and bigger deal.
SPEAKER 15 :
Well… But it can also happen overnight, as it was in my case.
SPEAKER 12 :
You’re right.
SPEAKER 15 :
With a ladder that slid out from under me, and I ended up 12 foot backwards, landed on top of the ladder. I’ve got a permanent spinal cord injury now. And that’s the reason that I’m planning that I may end up in a wheelchair. By the grace of God, that won’t happen. But the other things that I plan for on my house… when I built the house was I pre-wired to a junction box on the outside of the house so that I could easily, and we just did it, attach electricity to my wood shop outbuilding. I pre-wired and pre-gas lined and put in the automatic transfer switch for a backup generator, which we have not added yet, but all I got to do is buy it, set it, and literally plug it in and hook up the gas. And I also pre-wired, and I may not ever use it for a hot tub.
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, good idea. Yeah, great idea. Next person, Mike.
SPEAKER 15 :
Yeah, now the one thing, as with your last caller, I’ll die before I ever buy an EV, but as far as I’m concerned, once I’m dead, it’s not my issue. It’s my kid’s issue to sell the house, but I did not pre-wire the garage for a possible EV charger. It just was not even in my thinking because I just won’t ever own one. I might do a hybrid someday, but I just won’t do these things.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, and all my recommendation to folks is, especially if you know we’re all going to sell a house at some point in time, Wally, it’ll come no matter what. I mean, that’s one of the other guarantees, death, and you’re going to sell that house at some point or somebody will, doubtful somebody will move in and live there until, they pass so i’m just i’m just you’re trying to think ahead for people where when it comes to some of these things is it enough added value to make some difference in some cases yes there’s enough other people out there like you where it’s not an issue but while you’re building and if you have that option and it’s not super expensive at the time my recommendation is at least put a plug on the wall but yeah and i i got no issue with that it was just something that i didn’t think about because um It wasn’t really quick to the other reason for doing that Wally is not only can you use it for an EV charger? But you could plug a welder you could plug a compressor I mean all sorts of other things by the way that can run off of that same Outlet that if you’re gonna do it might as well put a you know 240 outlet on the wall and call it good Well now what you haven’t said that the way I built my workshop right at the end of the garage so I haven’t I have a three car attached garage and
SPEAKER 15 :
plus an extra bay that doesn’t have a garage door. But my building that’s right at the end of the driveway literally has two more sets of doors, which I’m building the barn doors for it as we speak. But it’s a 24 by 24 building, and it’s got four 240 plugs in it.
SPEAKER 07 :
Nice. You can run a level two charger off of that, no problem.
SPEAKER 15 :
Absolutely.
SPEAKER 07 :
So you’re okay. You’re set as far as that goes. You’re good.
SPEAKER 15 :
Yeah, somebody else might…
SPEAKER 07 :
decided they want to put an EV in there, but… The point is you’ve got options, and that way it’s covered, and somebody could, you know, as the house is listed down the road, the nice little EV capable, you know, is just another little added bullet point on the house, Wally. It doesn’t hurt anything at all.
SPEAKER 15 :
Yeah. Can I ask, I don’t get a lot of the news regarding what’s been going on in Aurora, but have they gotten that Trend Day, Aragua issue under control?
SPEAKER 07 :
Not really. I mean, they arrested 16 people earlier in the week after they kidnapped two people, pistol-whipped them, pulled the fingernails off of the lady, stabbed the man. Yeah, they ended up arresting 16 people over that, but I will tell you that, no, it is far from being taken care of, in my opinion.
SPEAKER 15 :
Okay. Well, I guess that’s one reason I came to Tennessee, because we’re open carry down here, if you wish. Don’t see it a lot, but I have seen it. But we probably have more people running around that are concealed carriers.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, meaning you’re going to have less issues like what we just went through this week here in Aurora. Yeah, no, absolutely.
SPEAKER 15 :
Yeah, so anyway.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. No, I appreciate the question, Wally. Thank you, and have a great holiday. We appreciate you very much. Jeff in Montana, you’re up, sir.
SPEAKER 13 :
Hey, good morning, guys. Good morning. I’m sorry, you caught me with a frog in my throat.
SPEAKER 07 :
That’s all right. yeah when we uh we moved up here we rented for a year and spent a year looking for the right house for us because we were in our 60s great idea and uh but by the way everybody is everybody really quick jeff what you did something we’ve really never talked about on this program but if you’re somebody out there you’re getting up there you’re kind of trying to decide where you’re going to settle and retire and so on You just made a great point, Jeff. Go there, rent something for six months to a year to where you really know the area and where you want to be and so on. That’s great advice.
SPEAKER 13 :
Okay. I didn’t even mean that, but thank you. And my wife’s issue was a kitchen. She wanted a nice big kitchen. She loves to cook, and that was her point. Mine, besides not having a north-facing garage, which we’ve owned three houses, and each one of them has had a north-facing garage, but mine was adamantly to have everything that we needed as we aged on one level, and that’s what we have. We have our kitchen, our living room, TV room, bedroom is all on one level. Now, it’s a three-level house, a regular house with a walkout, two-story with a walkout.
SPEAKER 07 :
But everything you need to do is on one level.
SPEAKER 13 :
That’s it.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely.
SPEAKER 13 :
You never have to go up or down unless we choose to.
SPEAKER 07 :
There you go.
SPEAKER 13 :
And as I was thinking about the whole north-facing garage thing, too, it struck me that that’s one of those things that I had never thought until today about as you’re aging. But, you know, having a south or southwest-facing driveway is means that your snow removal requirements, especially in Colorado, even up here, way less because the sun does a lot of the work for you.
SPEAKER 07 :
You are correct. Yeah, transplants don’t really understand that. And a lot of folks that maybe have lived here for a while, Jeff, but they lived in a townhouse, condo, apartment, something like that, where somebody else took care of all of that, don’t think about those things either. And by the way, you’ll hear some realtors, because I’ve heard this myself, you’ll hear some realtors when it comes to north-facing driveways say, well, yeah, but the good side is it’s always nice in the backyard. Yeah, well, yeah, that’s great, but I want it to be nice in the front yard.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yeah, you don’t have to shovel the back porch. Thank you.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thank you. Yes, that’s usually my secondary answer. Yeah, I’m not shoveling the back porch as much as I am the driveway.
SPEAKER 13 :
That’s right. There. Yeah, there you go. And little things like an east-west road. Our road is about, our house sits about a mile and a quarter off the main highway, Highway 93. And it’s an east-west road. And there’s one section that has a whole bunch of really tall trees. And you can go down that road and it’ll be clear everywhere except under the shade of those trees because the sun never gets to that snow and ice and it never melts. I’ve noticed the same thing in Colorado that, you know, when you’re driving up in the mountains, if it’s something where the sun never hits, You better be really careful because the road can be nice and clear where you’re driving, but you go around a bend and all of a sudden you’re hitting something.
SPEAKER 07 :
Which, by the way, even goes into when you’re looking at a house, especially if you’re looking in the summer months and it may have some of those shade things that would happen in the winter months. Just be aware of all of those things because, to your point, Jeff, any of those shaded areas are not going to melt.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yep. But when we bought the house, my wife called it the million-dollar house with a million-dollar view. And I spent today – happy solstice, by the way.
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, yes. Yes. Thank you.
SPEAKER 13 :
It was the longest night of the year, and now every day is getting longer.
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, it’ll get a little longer. Thank you. In fact, I anticipate this day because I hate those short daylight days.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yep. But I got up early enough to take a picture of the sunrise with the sky brightening over the mountains. Very nice. Yeah, it, you know, the views are nice, and accoutrements are nice, but those little conveniences, I had, I encountered, I say I started growing old in 1960, when I turned 68, because that’s the year I needed to have some back surgery. And right after that, I had my son come in, and together we installed grab bars in the shower and right there by the commode, because… I didn’t need them absolutely by the commode, but in the shower sometimes you need to stand on one foot and you need something to hold on to when you do that. And I could see that things were starting to happen that we needed to help with. Yeah. It’s little things.
SPEAKER 07 :
It is, and that’s why I was trying to just, you know, with today’s program, Jeff, just bring some awareness to folks that may not be in that situation yet, but they may be very fit and have the ability to do some things so that when that time does come, it’s not as burdensome or costly even. So be looking at some of these things now while you can.
SPEAKER 06 :
And if you can plan ahead.
SPEAKER 07 :
Right, do it.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yep. And don’t be afraid. I’m going to start hiring a lawn service this coming summer to do some things around the yard because there’s just too much work.
SPEAKER 07 :
No shame in that, Jeff.
SPEAKER 13 :
By one person.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, no shame in that.
SPEAKER 13 :
So, again, start thinking of things like that. Well, I can mow the lawn and weed all the beds and get all the gardening and everything. Maybe not. And even if you can now, maybe not.
SPEAKER 07 :
Maybe not down the road. Absolutely. No, great points, Jeff.
SPEAKER 13 :
Don’t be too ashamed or too proud to say, hey, can I get some help?
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. Great point. Jeff, I appreciate you. You bet. No, thank you very much. I appreciate it. Let’s squeeze one more in here before we go to break. And then, Joe, I’ll have you right after the break. But, John, go ahead.
SPEAKER 04 :
Hey, John. So for Mike that was calling about adding the garage, the easiest way for him to make sure he can handle the load if he’s not adding, call the utility company. Because one of the bad things…
SPEAKER 07 :
We lost you. One of the bad things… What, John? Say that again. Oh, we lost you. Can you say that again, John? And then he could calculate… We lost you at one of the bad things and then you broke up. Say that again.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, I’m sorry. Yeah. He could call his local utility and find out what his peak demand is to make sure that the meter that he’s going to tie into is big enough to supply the power for the outbuilding. Got it. Great advice. And if it’s his electrician… Usually, the utility will try to give the electricians that data, but he might have to call himself. But it should also be available on most larger utilities’ websites, even on your bill now, because the new metering systems that we’re using today calculate KW for everybody. And just remember, if you have a 240 service and a 200 amp service, your max KW is 48. just to let you know because we’ve had people that have added hot tubs and electric heaters for the water heater those on-demand electrics and stuff and they’re overloading the system not realizing that you got to upgrade your electric service to like a 400 amp service at that point okay so Just wanted to throw that out there for him is to make sure whoever’s going to tie his electric in calculates the demand. Got it. Good advice. Before you do it because that’s a big one. Yep. The other thing, John, I don’t know if you got inside yet. I don’t think you did. No, we haven’t got inside yet.
SPEAKER 07 :
No, that’s fine. Go ahead. We’re fine. Go ahead, John.
SPEAKER 04 :
The other thing I would recommend real quick is they sell them. They’re not that expensive. Motion sensor light switches for the overhead lights. So if you walk into a room in the dark, a light will come on, and you can set them for like 10 minutes or turn it automatically off, or you can push the button to leave it on permanently. But those help as you’re getting on in years that you’re not trying to fumble around in the dark because that’s when people usually get hurt.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. Great idea, John. Absolutely.
SPEAKER 04 :
John, have a great day, bud.
SPEAKER 07 :
You too, man. Appreciate you very much. All right, myself, Larry Unger. We’ll be right back. This is Fix It Radio, KLZ 560.
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SPEAKER 07 :
all right we are back fix it radio kills e five sixty website fix it radio dot com itself uh… larry younger and didn’t realize this would be as popular of a topic as it is in fact i won’t get through everything today so we’ll do a second part of this on fix it radio when it comes to you know getting your home ready for uh… those folks in your family might even be you where there’s some just different needs that you have in mobility and so on, and just making people think about these things, especially when you’ve got the ability to handle some of these things versus waiting for it to actually happen. Joe in Jersey, what’s up?
SPEAKER 05 :
John, just to tell you my story, and it’s actually more of a process. One of the reasons I left Colorado and moved back to New Jersey is my folks were getting up there. They were, I think, 85 when I moved back here. They could no longer travel, so they couldn’t come out to see us. Right, right. And they were living out in the Poconos on a very rural property. It was formerly, my mother had horses, and their nearest neighbor was a quarter mile away. But still, they were still an hour and a half, two hour drive from where we were. So they got to the point where neither one of them could drive, 86, 87 years old. So we started with a part-time home health care worker. You know, we’d come in in the morning, you know, make them breakfast and, you know, put a dinner on. And if they had a doctor’s appointment, you know, take them to the doctor’s appointment, do the… Do the grocery shopping, and that was fine. Then we had to do the other things like, you know, put in the chair height toilets and put in the grab bars, you know, the toilet grab bars. And little by little, we had to change out the door locks so that, like, when the home health care aide came, they didn’t have to get up and unlock the door or anything. The home health care aide could let themselves in. So that was part of it. and as long as they were both there, and of course the home health care aide, unless they had an afternoon doctor, would be gone by, you know, 12, 1 o’clock, so they were on their own, say, from 1 o’clock till the next morning, and as long as both of them were there, it was kind of okay, because if something happened to one of them, and two occasions something did, where the other one had to call the rescue squad, you know, because one of them had fallen down and broken a bone or something, but the other one was there to, you know, get to the phone and say, hey, you know, my husband and my wife has fallen down, and Um, so as long as there was two, but then, uh, when it was actually my stepfather, when he, uh, he was hostile, he, he broke a leg and went into the hospital and never came home. And at that point, and my mother had, uh, one of those, uh, life alert necklaces, you know, which, you know, which kind of, it was good, but it was still a stop gap. And at that point, because she, uh, couldn’t really walk, she had to use a wheelchair to get around the house. Um, we said, you know, if this house caught fire, you’re dead. You can’t get out of this. You can’t get out of this house. You cannot stay in this house any longer. Um, and that was kind of the, again, as long as they were both in the home, it was okay. One could back up the other, but once it became just one, it was just not safe to have my mother there alone, uh, 16 hours a day. So at that point we had to move her to an assisted living facility. which was fortunately within a 10-minute drive of my sister’s house in Rhode Island. But it was a progressive process. It didn’t happen all at once. It was little by little by little. And we did everything we could, you know, with the chair high toilets and the grab bars and home health gate to extend, you know, to allow them to continue to live in their home as long as it was viable. And, yes, they did have a ground floor master bedroom. But you can only stretch that out so long, and there comes a point where you can say, This isn’t working anymore.
SPEAKER 07 :
Right. You’re right. A lot of what you’re saying is not exactly what our family went through this past summer, but similar things along those lines, Joe. And point being, and I’m not sure what it’s like for you guys, but for us, when that progression starts, it’s not a slow progression.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, this one, I think it went from, okay, they’re okay, they’re doing okay on their own, to… you know, mom has to go to assisted living. I think that transpired over about a three-year period. Well, maybe two and a half, three-year period. But once he was hospitalized, that was kind of, that was it. That was the… That was the trigger. That was the trigger. Because up until then, we could compensate, you know, do all these other things. But again, there is a bunch of other things that you’re going to wind up doing up until you get that inflection point. And at that point, No sense delaying it. And you might want to start looking ahead of time, by the way, because some of these places have a long wait time.
SPEAKER 07 :
I’m glad you said that. In fact, I could probably, and maybe I will here in early 2025, Joe, just do an entire show, an hour on what you’re talking about. Because, again, I don’t think a lot of folks really understand that whole process because it’s not as simple as everybody thinks.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right. In fact, we had to, until we could get my mother a spot in the assisted living, we actually had to pay for the home health care worker to be there almost 24-7. She was actually sleeping there.
SPEAKER 07 :
That’s not cheap, by the way, as you know.
SPEAKER 05 :
No, not cheap at all. But we had to do that for about a month because we just couldn’t leave her alone 16 hours a day. So it was a month wait to get her into assisted living. So the sooner you start looking, you’re going to save yourself a bunch of money.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, and the other thing too that I’ll try to tie into that, Joe, this next year, I’ll just do it at some point, is the financial sides of things is also a whole other topic in getting people ready for those things. It’s very, as you know, it’s very cut and dried Medicare, Medicaid-wise as to what will get paid for and not paid for based upon assets of the individuals and so on and so forth. And there’s just a lot of things there that, again, most people have no idea how that works.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right. And a quick one on that, John. Medicaid, you know, if you are, you know, let’s say broke.
SPEAKER 07 :
No assets left.
SPEAKER 05 :
Medicaid, no assets left. Medicaid will pay for it. But they’re going to do a five-year look back. And some things, Joe, it’s 10. Yeah, so if your folks have a lot of money, they own a million, three-quarter million at home and whatnot, and they think, well, next year we’ll sell them, then we’ll get them into a system. Yeah, that ain’t going to work. That ain’t going to happen.
SPEAKER 07 :
That ain’t going to work. Yeah, no, that ain’t happening. So my point there, and again, I’ll do a show on this, Joe, is those are things that folks need to think about and plan ahead for because the last thing you want to do is, you know, well, depends on the family, what you want to do and so on, but you really don’t want to have all your assets eaten up on things along those lines if there’s other options.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right, including putting those assets in a trust now. If you put them in a trust today,
SPEAKER 07 :
um you know outside of that look back then you’re then you’re going to be okay yeah the other thing too for a lot of folks is just a side note again i’ll do a show on this in the future but for some of you that maybe are in your 40s or 50s it gets a little tougher as you get older but you may think about buying some long-term care insurance because when you’re young it’s not very expensive on a monthly basis joe and it eliminates some of what you and i are talking about
SPEAKER 05 :
Exactly. Yeah. But it’s again, you and I have both gone through this, John. Yep. It’s not easy. So not easy. And again, it doesn’t happen. It doesn’t happen all at once. It starts to sneak up on you. That’s right. And one day, boom, you know.
SPEAKER 07 :
And again, for everybody listening, not looking for any kind of sympathy. And Joe, you know what this takes. But the amount of time, effort, mental acuity, you know, all the things that you’re doing now to make all of this happen. Trust me, it’s draining, isn’t it, Joe?
SPEAKER 05 :
It really is, John. It was a very stressful time for all the members of the family. In fact, my stepdad, he had family, too, who also lived in New Jersey. So we were kind of coordinating every other weekend. One of us would go out there. There were things around the house that would get broken that would need to be fixed. By the way, his son was an electrician, by the way, so we would take turns going out there doing plumbing repairs, electrical repairs, stove repairs, refrigerator repairs. So we were kind of tag-teaming, you know, who’s going out this weekend. You were big.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. I fully understand, Joe. And believe me, I can sympathize very much so.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right.
SPEAKER 07 :
John, that’s all I got. Thanks, Joe. Appreciate you. And, yeah, we will not get into all of the things today that I wanted to cover in regards to this. We really started on the outside, and then a lot of you calling in, I didn’t realize. Honestly, I guess I should have known. Yeah. This is becoming more of a prevalency throughout a lot of our lives, society-wise, I should say. People are living longer. In a lot of cases, they’ve acquired some things through the years. So they, by the way, don’t necessarily want to move or or get away from some of the things that they have acquired over all the years. And that’s, by the way, a whole nother conversation in and of itself. And again, folks, I’ll just tell you straight up, these are not easy family things to do. Been doing, you know, been going through this for literally not all of 2024, but a good portion of. And so I can very much relate to not only Joe, but others that find themselves in this situation and I will also say this you know we you guys all know me I like to look ahead and plan ahead as much as possible but you never can plan for enough things and that’s why I wanted to do the program today and I’ll back this up with a second program where you you try to be as prepared as you possibly can but you don’t think of everything because sometimes you don’t know It’s not that you didn’t try to prepare. You just didn’t know. And I’ll be also honest with a lot of you, and I think Joe will attest to this. This is almost one of those things where unless you know somebody that’s been through this, you’re learning on your own because there’s not a lot of people out there that are willing to come alongside and say, you’ve got to do all of these other things. And part of that’s because each situation is unique, and I understand that. But there’s some general things, and we’ve talked about some of those even today. today that frankly no one will sit down and really explain to you that these are the things that you probably should be thinking about as you know you and your family move ahead these are not things that are you know it’s not common knowledge i guess is what i should say and i think a lot of folks just think that well you’ll address it when you get there well i’m you guys know me why can’t we address this prior to getting there so that when you do get there, it’s a whole lot easier. It’s an old saying of when you work on the front side versus the back side, it’s always easier to work on the front side and your pain is always less on the front side than it is the back side. So in this case, it’s not any different. So what I’m trying to get people to realize today is number one, look either at your home or the home of the family member that you know is kind of entering into this stage of their lives. what sort of things need to be addressed and for some of you and this is where it gets hard as well trust me i went through this this last year this is where it gets really hard your family members may be in a home joe talked about this a moment ago maybe in a home this is not conducive for them to even stay in right They loved it. They bought it. It was going to be their forever home, but they didn’t think through some of these things that we’ve now come up against or they’ve now come up against, and so they never really thought about those things. I’ll give you an example. So my folks, and I think my dad thought it would be his forever home. Downside is it had a sunken kind of nook area off of the kitchen and a sunken family room. which as again, folks start to get older and my dad’s eyesight started to get worse and those are not a good combination. Because you’re now not on, even though it’s a ranch house, you’re not really on a flat plane all the way through. You’ve got these different steps going on all over the place and it becomes very difficult for those types of individuals to handle. So again, my point is you really have to be open-minded and really walk through a lot of these things to even decide, is this even gonna be a home that they can stay in forever? Because if not, you probably ought to do something sooner than later. trust me again that’s the voice of experience talking do it sooner than later because when you do it down the road it isn’t any fun so again going back to what we started with take a look around the outside not only of your house because they’re going to come and visit at times but also the house of whoever’s you know whatever the family member is you’re trying to assist with and look at all of the different things outside. And we didn’t even get around to the backside of the house. Jeff called in, though, from Montana, even talked about the vegetation side. OK, what is that like? How is that going to get taken care of? You know, is it one of those things where, you know, mom and dad, for example, you know, love doing flowers and planting this and planting that, but as they age, those things just can’t happen anymore, meaning now you’ve got all of this stuff that doesn’t get cared for moving forward, and then becomes kind of an eyesore because nobody’s there to take care of it. Now, you can, to Jeff’s point, hire some people to come in and do that, but these are things, again, that you’ve got to think about on the front side, and in some cases, you may be better off just not having them there at all and putting them into, you know, having them move into a different location when it’s all said and done. Again, these are things, again, I don’t think most families think through. And in a lot of cases, I’ll just say it this way, using mom and dads as an example, they don’t want to admit they’re getting older.
SPEAKER 06 :
Never.
SPEAKER 07 :
They all think they’re still in their 20s. Yep. They’re not, and so you have to have some very frank, this is where things are at, and these are the things that we can observe, and you have to be very careful, and it’s a delicate situation. It’s never fun to have these conversations, but in regards to some of the things that we’re talking about, in making your home more quote-unquote senior-friendly. In some cases, the home they’re living in might not be senior-friendly, period, and it may take so many modifications to make it that way, you may decide that it’s best to just do something completely different with that home and have them move somewhere. And again, these are not… Easy discussions to have, and I don’t envy anybody in these particular situations because, again, they are not fun. But it’s necessary because ultimately, at least it was this way for our family, we want what’s best for them. We want them to live as long as they possibly can and have a fulfilled life and so on and make things as easy as possible. And in doing so, it involves some of these other hard decisions that, frankly, at times, most don’t want to make. So I’ll do a second part of this, folks. I apologize we didn’t get to much of the inside of the house, but we will. Bigger topic than I thought it would be. Larry, thank you as always. Thank you. Appreciate it very much. If you’re listening to the replay of this program, you can always go to the website, fixitradio.com. More to come. Don’t go anywhere. This is Fix It Radio, KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 10 :
The views and opinions expressed on KLZ 560 are those of the speaker, commentators, hosts, their guests, and callers. They are not necessarily the views and opinions of Crawford Broadcasting or KLZ management, employees, associates, or advertisers. KLZ 560 is a Crawford Broadcasting God and country station.
