In today’s episode of Fix It Radio, we discuss the smart approaches to dealing with home insurance and service contracts. The episode kicks off with an engaging discussion about the unsolicited offers from utility companies and how they stack up against taking a more proactive personal finance approach. Drawing from years of industry experience, our hosts provide viable alternatives to these service contracts, emphasizing self-management and savings. Through anecdotal evidence and expert advice, we explore why being diligent with maintenance can often eliminate the need for costly additional contracts. We take calls from audience members sharing their experiences, giving
SPEAKER 05 :
Walter? Yes! Are you all right?
SPEAKER 04 :
In the floor behind the chair.
SPEAKER 06 :
This is America.
SPEAKER 02 :
Does everybody know what time it is? Fix It Radio!
SPEAKER 11 :
It is Fix It Radio, KLZ 560. Thanks for joining us today. Whether you’re listening to a replay, be that on potentially Tuesday or some other time, or live on Saturday morning, it is February. I said that correctly, Charlie. February the 1st. Larry Unger with me today as well, because we don’t have a lot of snow like we did last week.
SPEAKER 13 :
Not only snow, but a lot of… Last week.
SPEAKER 11 :
No apologies needed on that, Larry.
SPEAKER 13 :
I almost wasn’t sure I was going to make it today after I looked at the news and saw there was a crash here at 225 and 70.
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay, that’s why it sent me a different way today. Got it.
SPEAKER 13 :
But it was funny because as soon as I got up to 225, they turned the lights off that said 225 was closed. So I could just zip right on through.
SPEAKER 11 :
So you were good. Yeah. Okay, well, good. Several things I want to talk about today. Don’t forget, lines are always open. You can always call in with a question, something around the house. Weather-wise, and it’s this time of the year where, yeah, we cover some of those things. Today’s going to be absolutely a gorgeous day. It doesn’t look like it outside. It’s about 40 degrees right now, but we’re going to get into the mid-50s. Tomorrow’s going to be super nice, almost 60. And then I think mid-60s for Monday and Tuesday. And then I think after that, it kind of starts to go back the other way and potential for rain. Snow comes in next weekend, and we have a pretty cold weekend next weekend. So if you want to get out and do some things outside, today would be the day to do that. I’ve got several things to talk about along those lines. We’ve got some tips on things that most people never do, and right now, this time of the year, would be a good time to do it. There’s not anything really going on this weekend as far as NFL and all of that. That Super Bowl doesn’t come around until next Sunday. So you’ve got a nice weekend of decent weather and all that to – get out and do some things something that i don’t know that i’ve ever talked about on fix it radio and i had one of my coaching clients i coach other businesses uh throughout the week and so i had one of my coaching clients who was looking at doing some different things on their homeowners insurance and so on and normally we talk you know business things but i help in you know as many areas as i can and the question came up they were you know renewing a policy or no i know what it was they had gotten a flyer in the mail And these come to a lot of you on a regular basis, especially in the Denver metro area. But you’ll get these pretty much anywhere. And that’s the companies that are working with some of the utilities. So you may see this come in your water bill. You may see it come in your XL bill. You may see it just come on its own. And those are folks that are trying to sell you other maintenance things. Outside of the services that that particular company is providing. So, for example, you may get somebody wanting to provide you with a sewer line insurance or an appliance insurance or this, that or the other. And what I will tell you is throw those in the trash. Don’t even look at them. And when it comes to the sewer line especially, go review your own homeowner’s policy and see what it says about said sewer line. You may very well already have some coverage for that. And if not, call your agent and say, hey, I got this thing in the mail. It is something that might be concerning to me or might be interested in. And I’d like to know if I put an additional rider on my policy for my sewer line, what would that look like? chances are you’re going to do that and save a boatload of money over what the other policy would and by the way the other policy typically means they’re working even with specific companies that will come out and even perform said services and it’s almost like an extended warranty you know extended service contracts are not warranties but an extended service contract on your car which i’m very familiar with and have been for decades probably over the last i’m not exaggerating i have Been around extended service contracts on cars for 50 years, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that. I started working in my family’s dealership when I was 9, 10 years of age, and that was about when those started to come out. They weren’t super popular at that point, but it wasn’t but, Larry, probably five years or so later where I was probably 15. And they really started to get popular, and they have been popular ever since. And they figured out, hey, if we can do this on cars, why can’t we do this on all sorts of other things? And so that service contract business started to literally flourish, and you can pretty much buy a service contract for anything you want to today. Even things that, by the way, are not brand new, they will prorate and do different things and so on, and that’s where you’ve got to really be careful. My point on your sewer line and other services that you may have coming into your home where they’re wanting to sell you additional coverage, be careful, read the fine print, and typically you can call your own insurance agent and buy insurance that way and not even have to mess around with the folks that you’ve gotten the flyer from.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yeah, and the sad part with these flyers that you get is you don’t know what they’ll cover or what they won’t cover and what causes a failure. is depending on whether they covered or not.
SPEAKER 11 :
Correct. You’re right, Larry. So again, to Larry’s point, my advice is if that’s something you’re concerned about, then call your agent, find out exactly what you can add to your own policy. It might already be included in your policy. And there’s typically caps on that where they’ll cover the line up to X amount of dollars and To Larry’s point, there may be some stipulations as to why they will cover it. In other words, if somebody is just out digging and they hit the line, yeah, they’re probably not covering that. Now, if all of a sudden a tree root grows in and there’s a problem along those lines, those are some of the things you have to ask. And typically those sorts of things may be covered. But point is, find out. determine if that’s something you’re concerned about, find out how all of that works, make your determinations off of that. And bottom line, in my advice to this particular client of mine was, yeah, toss that thing in the trashola because it’s not something that you really need to be worried about.
SPEAKER 13 :
Well, I know you talked about this a couple weeks ago on insurance, so I don’t want to belay the point. No, go ahead. But this is why you have an insurance agent instead of buying your insurance online. Good point. Because now you have somebody you can talk with, and they can talk with you.
SPEAKER 11 :
And they’re doing this on a literally daily basis. Right. In some cases, some of these guys I know, Paul Leuenberger, who is our guy here, he’s the guy literally that you can pretty much call seven days a week, and he will be there to answer questions for you because that’s just the kind of guy that he is and how he works. handles things and so yeah to your point Larry you know he is he especially is one of those kinds of guys where you could call and say hey Paul I’ve been thinking about this and not sure what I need to be doing and you know what’s your advice and he knows you he knows your policy he knows what’s in it he you know he knows exactly what to do or not do and can advise you on that well and he knows not only his insurance group that he uses
SPEAKER 13 :
But they have different programs for different things. That’s right. And he can steer you in the right direction.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right. So, once again, if any of you listening have any feedback on that or you’ve had experience with some of these situations, maybe you’ve even potentially bought some of these service contracts. Okay, if you did… How did that go? What are your thoughts? And so on. So, again, let me know in our text line, 307-282-22307, 282-22. You can also call in direct and talk to us live during the program. This is on Saturday morning, of course, 303-477-5600, 303-477-5600. And, again, lines are open. Feel free to call in if you’d like to add to this and subscribe. again we we appreciate that some of you have a lot more experience this is one of those items by the way that i’ve never done i’ve never owned or bought this kind of coverage i think for me uh larry it’s more of If you keep things maintained and you watch what’s going on and you pay attention, and in my case, I have septic instead of sewer anyway, so it’s not quite applicable anyways. But if you’re keeping things up and keeping things maintained, typically speaking, having line insurance isn’t something that really is a must, if you ask me.
SPEAKER 13 :
Well, the only thing I would be concerned with is because in some cities, they do not cover the sewer line from your house to the street.
SPEAKER 11 :
That is correct.
SPEAKER 13 :
So there you might want to look at some other coverages. But everything in the house is covered through the House Owners and Policy.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right. And again, in some cases, what Larry just said, you can buy additional coverage for those things. Sometimes those are… you know, going to be included in your policy or can be a rider on your policy. These are things you just have to call and check. But my point is, much like an extended contract on your car that you potentially can buy at that new car dealer, which in a lot of cases you don’t need, and we can talk about during Drive Radio a little bit more in depth, but at the end of the day, typically you don’t need those things and you could budget in whatever the cost of that is. Here’s a thought. let’s say that the cost of coverage is and i don’t know what these things run let’s say it’s 100 bucks a month 50 bucks a month whatever whatever the magic number is take that money instead of adding that insurance or even buying you know that particular you know standalone policy go put that money in a savings account that you don’t touch yeah earmark your uh home repairs just keep piling that up yep chances are that if and when something comes up, A, you’ll have that money, B, you’ll typically have more money in that account than what you would actually need anyway, so at the end of the day, you’re typically gonna be ahead. We talk about that on the car sides of things when it comes to service contracts. If you took the same money, put that into its own account and even kept, you know, whatever that monthly amount is, just keep doing that. And then use that for some of the car maintenance things that you need to do to keep you from having to use the service contract in the first place. You’ll typically be way money ahead when it’s all said and done. Jeff, what’s going on today, sir?
SPEAKER 03 :
Hey, morning. We got a little bit of sunshine here before coming in. Yeah. So still cold, still Montana. I’m going to change, but, uh, They’re all good. Yeah, you’re talking about service contracts and sewer lines in particular. I had to have a sewer line. I had a sewer line issue, and it was right where the city connected to the city junction there in Colorado Springs. And so it was my problem. But the original coupling some 20 or 25 years before hadn’t been tightened down, and so over the years… hydraulic pressure from the ground had kind of caused it to slip an inch or two down. So there was some blockages happening there, and we had to pay for that ourselves. But in the general realm of service contracts, nationally, when you look at them, they are somewhere between 80% to 90% profit. The dealers were selling them because they make money on it. That’s right, Jeff. And so if you want to protect yourself, the best thing to do is take that money that you would have otherwise paid for the service contract, particularly on something that’s new because you’re going to have several years before anything’s going to happen, and then just put it in an S&P 500 phone and watch it grow.
SPEAKER 11 :
Great idea.
SPEAKER 03 :
And if you need it, it’s there. And if you don’t, You’re richer. That’s right. You haven’t given your money away.
SPEAKER 11 :
Somebody just asked, too, and this is while you’re on the line, Jeff, get your opinion, Larry, as well. How about appliance and HVAC coverage from the utility company? Yeah, that’s another one, Jeff, where I would do exactly the same thing you just talked about when it comes to the service line, you know, coming in from the street like Larry was talking about. Most of the time the cities aren’t going to cover that. When it comes to your appliances, HVAC, things like that, Jeff, I’m the same as you. I would not buy anybody’s coverage. Do your maintenance like you should. Your filter changes, taking care of your outside AC unit, making sure that it’s handled. If you can’t do it yourself, we’ve got several HVAC companies, one in particular, that’s more than willing to come out and help you with those things, keep those things maintained. And again, Jeff, as you know, chances of you having a major malfunction if you’re keeping things up to speed is pretty nil.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, I mean, a funny thing just happened this week. I went to get some water out of the ice maker on the refrigerator, and all of a sudden, nothing worked. And I opened the door, and the lights were off. And I went, oh, my God, what’s going on? And so that, you know, if you had a service contract, maybe you would have called somebody out to take care of that. But what it turned out to be was, and I didn’t know this, refrigerators have a Sabbath mode. Have you ever heard of that?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, I have.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, I had not.
SPEAKER 11 :
And it was in that mode.
SPEAKER 03 :
It was in Sabbath mode, so it was not doing anything because on the Sabbath you’re not supposed to do anything.
SPEAKER 11 :
So I found out how to… Well, and that’s one of those too, Jeff, to where if you had a contract on that particular, in this case, refrigerator, freezer, that’s one of those to where because it was a setting and not an actual problem, would they have actually covered that or would you have paid a trip charge?
SPEAKER 03 :
Oh, I would have paid a trip charge.
SPEAKER 11 :
There you go.
SPEAKER 03 :
And so, yeah. And so… just know your stuff, take care of stuff. That fridge has had to have a board replaced because it wasn’t frosting properly. And dishwasher had to have a couple. So I paid for those, paid for those on pocket, but all in all, I’ve paid no more than I would have with a service contract and money that I, that would have gone into it. I have, you know, if I need it, it’s in a, it’s in a God only knows fund. And, uh, It’ll take care of it.
SPEAKER 11 :
And I understand, Jeff, that you are and I, Larry, I mean, a lot of you listening are very disciplined. These things make a lot of sense for those people that are very disciplined with their money. I understand that in some cases people aren’t. as discipline in the service contracts make it easy for them to quote-unquote budget but my feeling on that is is the it money is money you’re still paying it so whether it’s included in something or it’s a separate deduction that you’re doing automatically on your credit card or out of your checking account to your point Jeff get on the investment side Because we do the same thing. You can take a certain amount of money every week, every day, every month, on the 15th, the 25th, however you want to set it up, Jeff. As you know, you can take that money and put it into one of the funds that you just mentioned on a regular basis, just like you were paying a service contract. No different.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right, exactly. And, you know, a fund like that is for long-term. It’s going to go up and down, and if you’re watching it even on a year-to-year basis, I think… Don’t.
SPEAKER 11 :
Just put them into decent long-term funds that have performed well, Jeff, that have, you know, 5% to 8% or even maybe a higher return on average, and put the money in there and forget about it.
SPEAKER 03 :
I mean, I have… Since I retired up here, I have watched my annual growth. And like I said, it’s fluctuated up and down. And 30% is kind of the bounds between which it has fluctuated over the years, both positive and negative. But on average… Just putting in decent funds, like you said, I’ve earned over 12% right now.
SPEAKER 11 :
Nothing wrong with that. And my point with that, Jeff, and I understand this also. I know some people are day traders and understand about a lot of things along those lines. It’s what they do. And Jeff, if that’s your forte and that’s what you’re good at and that’s your expertise, I’m not talking to you. The majority of people, though, Jeff, are not day traders. And honestly, to your point, shouldn’t be looking at where things are day to day and worried about things and moving, you know, money from here to there and so on. Now, I guess if you get some good information on something that potentially might be coming up, for example, had you known, you know, last Sunday that everything was going to take a hit in the tech stock, energy stock world because of, you know, deep seek, you might have moved some things around, you know. before Monday morning. But once again, Jeff, those things came back as the week went on. So was it really worth messing with all of that? In fact, what you should have done is just bought a little bit more when everything was down because it’s going to come back up anyways.
SPEAKER 03 :
I couldn’t agree more. I don’t even, you know, as you were talking, I was thinking, okay, people don’t want to worry about their appliances. So they buy this contract and they pay excessive money so they don’t have to worry about their appliances. But then they try to do day trading and they start worrying about day trading instead of just putting things in to like an S&P 500 account and letting history… make them wealthier.
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, and in those cases, Jeff, as you know, those money managers, which like them or not, it’s what they do daily. It’s like me, you know, being on air or for those of you listening that have expertise in your world, in your career, your job, they are doing what you do. They’re experts at what they do. We’re experts at what we do. And Jeff, I am not an expert and I’ll be the first to admit it. I am not an expert at what they do.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah. Interesting fact, something like 80% of actively managed funds underperform the S&P 500 average. So all those guys out there who tout themselves as experts and knowledgeable, most of them aren’t. Most of them end up doing worse than if you just put your money in. So if that’s something you want as a skill set to learn, by all means, as you said, go ahead and learn it. But I’m sorry, it’s not something I was interested in. I’ve I want my life to be calmer and more peaceful rather than worrying of having, you know, phones ding and say, oh, you got, you know, one second to trade, press a button or not. You know, that to me is just…
SPEAKER 11 :
recipe for anxiety no but you know your point and it’s well taken and those of you listening uh please if you’re somebody that’s interested in i had a text message come in you know as we were even talking jeff about the appliance end of it or hvac some of the things that xcel energy sells and again they’re going to add that to your bill so point being let’s say they’re going to add 29.99 a month to your bill to cover that take the same 29.99 a month and do exactly what you just said jeff And make it automatic. You’re still going to pay it. It’s still going there. You’re still going to have that money. You can retrieve it anytime you want. Just set that up and make it automatic.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, because if you just look at it, raw numbers, $29.99, $30. At the end of the year, you’re going to have $360.
SPEAKER 11 :
There you go.
SPEAKER 03 :
What appliance repair costs more than $360? $360. I don’t think I’ve paid more than that. I think mine have been around $2,250. And I have trip charges out here in Western Montana that are pretty substantial.
SPEAKER 11 :
And that’s just year one, Jeff. If you went three years and didn’t have anything, which, by the way, is what the warranty companies that are working with Excel expect you to do. In fact, they expect you to probably never call them because if you’re doing…
SPEAKER 03 :
certain things correctly the chances of them have you calling them are pretty slim anyways in their banking on that to your point earlier that’s how they all make money they know the ratios and what the actuaries show or they wouldn’t be in that business Jeff that is an excellent point John I mean you just the appliance has a two to three year warranty let’s say three year warranty so you buy a service contract at the beginning your warranty covers that first three years so you paid out 30 bucks a month a thousand dollars
SPEAKER 11 :
to cover something that was already covered right why would you do that right exactly and and for for example this is something that you know a cub creek who’s my sponsor during the week cub creek heating and air conditioning if you go by for example a which they’re a ream authorized installer jeff you go install a ream furnace for example they come with a 10-year warranty already and yeah if you have to have something done they’re going to charge you a trip charge and labor but all the parts and everything in that are included and a lot of folks even like cub creek will sell you a contract by the way they’ll even handle the labor side of it if you feel like that’s something that you want to take care of and you want to pay that on the front side and have everything covered for the entire 10 years well if you want that peace of mind then buy it and be done with it point being though jeff that particular company does a 10-year warranty wow yeah so that’s 360 bucks on the 30 bucks a month model
SPEAKER 03 :
$3,600 that you’re paying for some sort of peace of mind that you already had.
SPEAKER 11 :
Right. Correct.
SPEAKER 03 :
When you start to think about it, how ridiculous is it? And I’m not mocking anybody out there.
SPEAKER 11 :
No, but case in point, Jeff, how many people that in this particular case, using this example where somebody texted in, and this is where you need to go and look and see what you actually have as a brand for a furnace. And all of them have stickers to tell you how old the furnace actually is. If you go look at that and realize, wait a minute, my furnace is only four years old and it’s a ream, meaning at least on the part sides of things for this furnace, I’m covered for another seven years. Well, now, Jeff, what you just said comes into play. And in a lot of cases. What they’re banking on is you don’t do what I just did. You’re just going to go buy, quote, unquote, that peace of mind from Xcel Energy, have it added into your utility bill. Xcel, by the way, for all of you listening, is making a cut of that. The service provider is making a cut of that. And at the end of the day, the one that’s really getting shortchanged is you, the customer.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right, because they’re basically activating your fear response. You feel under threat that your furnace might go out, so you don’t respond to what’s going on, to what they say. You react to the fear, and you go, oh, my God, I’ve got to get covered. Well, stop and think, you know, that the thing that’s crossing your path is you’re hiking there in Colorado and you go, oh, I got a snake. And then you look at him, but no, it’s just a stick.
SPEAKER 11 :
Right.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, right. Don’t treat everything as though it’s a snake. Great point. All your appliances, you know. Great point. Don’t have that fear response. Just, you know. Think about it. Great point. And do it in your best interest.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yep. Great point. So, Jeff, thank you. That was great and fitted right in with the text message we got at the same time. Perfect timing. Super. Thanks. Thanks, man. Appreciate you very much. We’ll take a quick timeout. And, yes, the folks that you’re going to hear here in a moment that advertise with us, yes, they make this show happen on a regular basis. I encourage you to please use them. Find them at fixitradio.com. And when you use them, let them know you heard them here. But we’ll be right back. This is KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 06 :
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SPEAKER 11 :
All right, we are back. Fix-It Radio, KLZ 560. And the person we’re texting back and forth is giving me some great information, by the way. And, yeah, for some of you, too, I do think, and this is a question that came up in our text stream back and forth, the brand of the appliance, I think, does come into play on some of this. And there has been some class action lawsuits even on some brands, Samsung, on their freezers or their ice makers and things like that. So… Yes, I do think that there is something to be said about the type and the brand of appliance that you own. And in some cases, you may have just walked into those brands. In other words, they came with the house that you own. You didn’t have a choice in that particular brand. And that’s one of those to where you may want to look at things a little bit closer, although I still like Jeff’s approach. If you look at, you know, what are they going to charge you for said service contract from Excel or whoever? And by the way, it’ll vary depending upon probably the type of appliance you have, the age and so on. But when it’s all said and done, if you get a quote from them on what that dollar amount is, I still like Jeff’s approach. Take whatever that dollar amount is going to be. And if it’s $30, $60, $100, I don’t know what the dollar amount is. I’ve never bought one of those contracts on appliances, so I don’t know what that magic number is. And if somebody knows you’re either paying for one or you’ve gotten a quote on them, please text me or call in and let me know so we can do that comparison as to what We did with Jeff from Montana a few minutes ago. We used the $30 a month scenario, which I think, by the way, I probably am under. I’m probably under what some of these contracts actually cost. And to Jeff’s comparison or his analysis a moment ago, if that dollar amount is higher than everything Jeff just said goes up, So instead of it being the dollar amount we were talking about with Jeff, the $360 a year, well, do the math. If it’s $50, now it’s $600. You get where I’m going with this. Well, I’m like you, John. Figure that out.
SPEAKER 13 :
I’ve never done the contracts either, but when I’m looking at the automotive side of things, you can get contracts for less money, but it covers less money. uh, repairs. Same thing with your appliances in your house. You can get lesser contracts, but it won’t cover all the appliances in your house. So obviously the more appliances you put on your policy, the more expensive.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. Right. So the, and again, this is one of those things where, and I realized in some cases there are certain brands where there’s not much you can do maintenance wise or anything to keep that, uh, that particular piece of equipment lasting longer and I’m fully aware of that and that’s one of those where you again you just have to do the math and decide okay if a replacement unit costs X And the contract for this one is X. And I get X amount down the road and have to do some sort of a repair. Well, at that point, you’ve got to determine, am I better off just tossing that unit at that point and replacing it, by the way, with something that might have a little bit more quality and less repair? And again, there are multiple sites out there, Consumer Reports being one, but there’s many others that do reviews. on appliances washers dryers refrigerators dishwashers and so on and they will tell you on the front side you know here are the better quality brands just just like the automotive world does they will tell you total cost of ownership you know on average these are the type of repairs that you’re going to find or you’re not going to find and and and and what you’ll learn is It’s like anything else, and it’s not always the case because price doesn’t always guarantee you good quality. In a lot of cases, some of these appliances have so many bells and whistles that they jack the price up because of that. And you might have been better off to have gone and bought a – we’ll use washers and dryers for an example. You could go get one of the fanciest front load. It does everything, steam, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it’s got all the bells and whistles, all the computerization and so on. And it’s the same money as a standard Speed Queen, which, by the way, is a really, really nice brand and doesn’t come with a lot of bells and whistles. But Speed Queen is what you’ll see, by the way, in a lot of commercial and or semi-commercial applications. You’ll see those in hotels and places like that where there’s multiple people using them. And it’s like, OK, wait a minute, if they’re using these, Why? Well, because they don’t break. That’s why. So my point is, on the front side, you may be going to an appliance place and looking at all of the different things that they have. And by the way, most of them don’t have Speed Queen because those are done differently as far as their distribution and that goes. And I would venture to guess that you go buy a fully loaded washer dryer from any of the big box stores that’s got all of the fancy, you know, electronics with it and then go compare that to a Speed Queen. You may find yourself not spending much more money to go buy the Speed Queen, which I can tell you right now, their reliability factor on the products they sell, period, is much better than what you’re going to find with some of the other brands that have all the fancy products. gear and all the fancy you know electronic equipment and when it comes to washing and drying my opinion by the way um at the end of the day do you really need all that stuff no
SPEAKER 13 :
Not as an average homeowner? No.
SPEAKER 11 :
No, I really don’t. Most of those features you’re never going to use. They’re there. The fact of the matter is they do all of that as a selling point to try to sell you their machine versus the one next to it. And at the end of the day, you’re really not going to use the majority of things that are on it. It’s sort of like the infotainment system on your car. And I don’t know what the studies show on this, but I can just tell you driving different new cars that we do with the reviews that we do and so on, the reality is the majority of bells and whistles on a lot of these cars most people never use. A fraction of the people use some of those things that are there.
SPEAKER 13 :
Or can even figure out how to use them.
SPEAKER 11 :
exactly so point being they do all this stuff to try to compete with the next person at the end of the day do you really need all of that probably not and that’s where you just need to do some of your research on the front side and determine what do you need and then go out there and shop and and this is one of those things too that i always say i say this on drive radio constantly i’ll say it here on fix it radio buy when you don’t need exactly when you know that okay my machine is is uh i don’t know 14 years old we’ll throw a number out And you’re thinking, OK, I’m probably getting close to the end of the lifespan. Maybe I am. Maybe I’m not. But I’m going to at least look around. Let’s see what’s out there. Let’s see where I’m at with what I currently have. And you start doing the math on these things and you start looking and budgeting and figuring things out and so on. My point is it’s a lot easier to do that when your current machine is working.
SPEAKER 13 :
Exactly.
SPEAKER 11 :
Than when it hasn’t and a repair person’s come out and has said, yeah, we’re going to kind of give this one the old death wish. Probably not worth putting any money into this. And now you’re out shopping for something new at that point. That is the worst time to be out shopping. You’re always better off shopping on the front side when you don’t need something than when you do and it’s an emergency.
SPEAKER 13 :
Well, and the good thing of shopping when you don’t need it is you can wait for sales to come up and different things of those natures.
SPEAKER 11 :
Absolutely, Larry. You can look for, and frankly, a lot of people, especially when it comes to appliances, there’s a lot of used appliances that come up on places like Facebook Marketplace and other things along those lines where people can do all sorts of things with different machines. They’ve downsized. They’re upsizing. They’re getting rid of one. They’re getting rid of another. They’re moving. They’re doing this. They’re doing that. The person coming in has different machines than they have, so they’re going to go ahead and take theirs and sell them. Point being, there’s a lot of places to buy things besides going new to the big box stores and buying them that way as well. Mark and Wiggins, go ahead. Hey, good morning, guys. Good morning. Good morning.
SPEAKER 04 :
Hey, I heard you guys talking about appliances, and I’ve been trying to think. Every weekend I listen. I’ve been listening for eight years or maybe longer than that. Anyway, I just love all the knowledge you guys have. I feel like I’ve got this stupid question in my head. Never a dumb question. Never a dumb question, right. Well, I remember last year I’ve had to really deal with laundry issues as far as the appliance quality. We had LG washer and dryer, and so you recommended the Speed Queen, which we got the dryer, and I love it. So we still have the old LG washer, but I noticed something, you know, that every now and then when I’m trying to do wash on normal, it will automatically choose, like, warm or semi-warm wash. And then we get like this nasty, chunky, junky water flowing in there. And I thought, okay, you know, let’s clean out the tub or the tank and then flush it and run it again or run, you know, several with bleach and it’ll still come back. And so I’m like, okay, what’s going on here? You know, so I’ll change it from the temperature to cold, like tap cold. and then run the tub clean again, and all that stuff doesn’t come back. So I thought, okay, well, maybe we have something nasty coming from the hot water tank. And I thought that inside the hot water tank itself, it’s a gas, that where the water comes from is the nozzle or the tube on the top of the tank. Is that correct?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, you’ve got cold going in and warm coming out, both at the top of the tank, yes.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yep. Oh, so neither of the tubes go to the bottom of the tank? No. Not that I know of.
SPEAKER 11 :
No, you’ve got water. So the way a gas heater works, of course, is you’ve got a series of tubes inside of the heater itself or inside the tank. Let me say this correctly. Inside the tank that is heating the water. And as we know, heat rises, Mark, so that when that water is being heated in the tank, it literally is being heated from the top down. Think of it that way because the water is going to naturally, the hot water is going to naturally rise to the top. That’s why the outlet. by the way is at the top and of course there’s pressure in that tank so you’ve got cold water coming in and when you turn a faucet on that’s when the tank is going to circulate or remove that hot water from the top first and then of course the cold water is coming in and this is where if you don’t have enough capacity so let’s say you’ve got a 30 gallon tank and you got five kids well no offense, after about a shower and a half is done, that tank has been depleted of the hot water in it. And that’s where if you’ve got multiple family members, and this is where even in my past, you know, I had enough kids that we raised. I had seven kids, Mark. I always, every house I had, I added a secondary hot water heater to our system to where I would either run two 50s having 100 or at least a 50 and a 40 having 90 and And at that point, you’d never run out of hot water because you could put them in series. So it just depends on your circumstances. But that’s essentially how they work.
SPEAKER 04 :
I was actually thinking about that. I looked into, you know, could I add a second one? And I don’t know if that would work with, you know, the venting and everything with the space in that particular mechanical room. But something I’ve looked up because I’ve been trying to.
SPEAKER 11 :
um keep up with the maintenance on this thing because we’ve already had to replace it once because we have hard water right now and as you know that’s always with the with the rod that’s in them that needs to be changed out and so on it’s doing the best it can to try to clean that up but yeah the better quality water you have coming in of course the better quality you have coming out and the less buildup inside of the tank you have
SPEAKER 04 :
Right. So, so my main question would be is, so I’ve, I’ve done flushes myself over the years of homeownership for, you know, 10, 15 years. But recently I saw this YouTube guide that had a little tool that would like a, like a snake that connected to a drill and had a water blaster or something, uh, that would reach inside the tank and beat around. And I thought that’s going to destroy the, your rod and your tank and not really do you any long-term good. So my question is, is there a better way other than just turning on the valve or opening the drain valve
SPEAKER 11 :
and and flushing it out or is that the best way as far as uh flushing the hot water tank out once a year a couple of answers there one if you have to do what the other guy is saying and you’ve got that much build up in your tank you probably need to look at doing something at least prior to that tank in regards to your water quality and trying to get that filtered out and doing some things so that you just don’t have that much buildup in the tank in the first place. After that, Mark, yeah, I would say that, number one, I would not go through and do what this particular person is doing in regards to cleaning the inside of the tank. And again, if you’ve got that much buildup, we have other issues. To your point, just draining the tank and flushing it the way that you’re talking, yes, that would be the way to perform that.
SPEAKER 04 :
Got it. Perfect.
SPEAKER 11 :
And in your case, so I guess, you know, backing up a little bit, Mark, in your case, given that you’ve got, you know, a water quality issue, what are you doing on that end of things to make it better? What kind of system do you have to take care of that?
SPEAKER 04 :
When we first moved here, I knew that the town had some water issues. I didn’t realize until I got to be an elected official on the board, which I never wanted to get into politics. But you’re there. Yeah. Well, I resigned after my mom passed, so I quit doing it because I felt like the town manager was lying to us, and I had no way to prove it. And then once he resigned last year, all these lies that I had… thought were now coming to fruition and truth. And it’s like, oh my gosh, like you gotta be kidding me. And so the water system was really one of my main goals, you know, like why is this so bad? And so we have, you know, in our particular house, well, the town has an RO system. And what I was told was, is because of the RO system, as the water comes towards our house, It actually recollects all the material out of the pipes and then pumps it to our house. And I’m like, oh, that’s fantastic. So we put in these two, you know, massive 10-inch filters that, you know, we have one that’s a scrubber, like a white pre-filter, and then the carbon filter. And that does a pretty good job, but we also triple filter our drinking water with a Berkey, a gravity-fed Berkey. But as far as the tank goes, it goes from the two filters to the water softener and then to the water tank. And when we first moved here, I found out that we were using old wells. The town was doing blending, and it was filling up the filters with this black sooty junk. I mean, it was turning closed black. It was nasty. And so I brought the filter to a meeting with the water. I said, really? Really? This is our drinking water? You’ve got to be kidding me. And shortly after that, the town manager at the time decided to cut those wells off And we haven’t had that problem as much, but there’s still, you know, that sediment that’s, you know, yearly an issue in the tank, in the water tank. And I just don’t know how to do something better.
SPEAKER 11 :
And this is another thing, too, that I’ve learned through the years. all how should i say this all water heaters are not created the same in other words there is a difference between the quality of them some of them have more of a self-cleaning mark ability to them than others i did get a texture in that said that hot water outlet is got a dip tube that goes down to the bottom so that it can get as as hot of water as possible coming off of where the you know where that first heat is if you would but i will also tell you that and this is again from experience because i made the mistake one time mark in trying to save some money on that secondary heater i was telling you that i used to always put in and i was trying to save some money on the heater itself and i bought a non-cleaning i didn’t know there was a difference at that time and i will tell you that even with good water quality coming in you know from the city at that point i think at that point in time we lived over in broomfield and the water there was pretty decent because that’s coming out of left hand like like we all know and reality is water quality is pretty decent and i will tell you mark that i didn’t buy a quote unquote self-cleaning or or more of the you know the higher end heater that has the ability to quote unquote clean itself in the sediment that i had to deal with from that point forward i made a huge mistake and should about the other heater in the first place Now, that was 20, you know, that was 30 years ago. And maybe in today’s world, all they’re selling are, you know, self-cleaning heaters. I haven’t bought a hot water heater, you know, a water heater in quite some time marks. I can’t tell you what’s on the market. Well, you know what? I take that back. I had to buy a little electric one from my shop here not long ago because it had rusted and gone bad for the reasons that we’re talking. And over time, they tend to do that. But, Mark, I haven’t bought an actual gas heater in quite some time.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I got a praise report if we could switch topics. Sure, go right ahead.
SPEAKER 11 :
But, you know, his point being, I think you’re on the right track with everything you’re doing. I would not flush the inside of that tank. I think you might end up, you know, loosening more up and having more issues doing that than if you just do the self-cleaning like what you’re talking about.
SPEAKER 13 :
Well, and the other side of what Mark was initially talking about was if you had a problem with the hot water tank, you’d have it with all your faucets. Correct. Not just the washer. Correct.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay. I haven’t even checked the screens on everything else. Which you should. So because it’s Fix It Radio, recently I have reconnected with somebody I hadn’t talked to in like 25 years who just happened to reach out to me on Facebook. And as a person who has you know, then led to accepting Christ when I was about five years old. You know, I remember kids, when I was going to a Christian school, they were always happy. And I’m like, why are you all happy? And they’re like, you know, it’s because we’re not afraid of where we’re going to go when we die. And this kid led me to Christ right then and there. And I thought that my whole life’s mission was to lead everybody to Christ. And that’s just not the case. you know, it’s, it’s, it’s maybe my job to, uh, to plant the seed, but anyway, so this, this person who, uh, who is actually listening right now, actually accepted Christ within the last two weeks. And I’m just so grateful to have been a part of that.
SPEAKER 11 :
Amen. Mark, no offense, that’s really more of what this, well, not more. That’s what this is all about. All the other things we talk about on air and the things that I do here and even during the week and the politics and the different tips and tricks and drive radio and all of that. And yes, we live life. We have to do things daily. So the things you and I just talked about with Larry, Yeah, all those things are important because it’s what we need to do for our day to day lives. But ultimately, what you just said is really what it’s all about.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I’m just, I’m really grateful to be a part of it. And, uh, I thought, you know, like I said, most of my thought was that, oh, it’s, it’s my job, but it really says in scripture, it’s, it’s not, you know, that, uh, it’s your job to plant the seed and it’s the Lord’s job to, to make it grow, you know, which is why it talks about scattering the seed and some land on the rock and some lands in the soil and some lands in the weeds. And, you know, it’s up to the seed. and the soil and the conditions, basically, the environment to make it work. And so if we’re always listening to this radio show and trying to improve our environment by fix-it radio or drive radio or ready radio, You know, I learned so much from you, John, and I really appreciate your motivation in continuing with this. And I really hope that you get a sponsor to do a second hour of Ready Radio because there’s a lot of information in that.
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, thank you, Mark. I appreciate that and all those kind words on top of all of that. Thank you. I also did look up and so I want to make sure that I was being – accurate in what i was saying earlier with the hot water tanks you know the the water heaters themselves and i did actually find a youtube where this guy cuts apart four different heaters and i am correct some have more self-cleaning capabilities than others and if you look at his his actual cutaways you’ll see the different designs that are there and how different heaters are made and i guess mark what you really can say is when it comes to that you do get what you pay for
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, they did mention that there’s like a, what is it called, like a contractor’s grade and then a pro grade.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
And I hadn’t, you know, when you’re under the pressure cooker because the family’s like, I need hot water.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right.
SPEAKER 04 :
You’ve got to get it done quick.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right. You’re right. Again, Mark, it kind of goes back to even what we were talking earlier with appliances and other things. Buy when you don’t need versus when you’re under the gun because it’s a whole lot easier to do your research and figure out exactly what you need for your particular circumstance versus trying to go out and buy it right now on the spot. The other thing that I’ve found is when you’re trying to buy it on the spot, the one you really want might not even be available.
SPEAKER 04 :
Exactly, yep. Right, right. My stepdad for years, and I don’t know why I would laugh, but he had a spare hot water tank just sitting in his, you know, one of his spares. Wow, now that’s a guy planning ahead. Yeah, so his failed while he was out of town, and I happened to be there when it failed, and I’m like, oh my gosh. And none of the contractors, nobody would help me because I’m technically not the homeowner. So I had to replace this thing. And I’ve never done that. So I thought, you know what, I better do this to like the nth degree. So I bought, you know, gas leak sensors, you know, the soap. And the thing that really bugged me was is that his venting was vented using a dryer flex vent. I’m not even kidding. Yeah, that’s not kosher, as you know. So uncode, I ripped all that out, and I hooked it up with proper… Good. And I thought, you know what, I think I did a pretty good job.
SPEAKER 11 :
Good job, Mark. Good job. I’m going to run. Mark, appreciate you, man, as always. Love you. Thanks for all that you do for us and all your support as well. You’re a great listener. I’ll let you go. Keep listening. I’ll try to get one more call in here as we can as we get back from this break, but I’ll get this in really quick. Guys, don’t go anywhere. We’ll be right back. Fix It Radio, the website again, fixitradio.com.
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SPEAKER 11 :
All right, we are back. We’ve got three minutes or so left of Fix It Radio. Eric, go ahead.
SPEAKER 12 :
Oh, yes, John. Just what you were saying earlier, if you’re really getting that much sediment through, you’re going to find all of your faucets clogging, the aeration screens.
SPEAKER 10 :
Correct.
SPEAKER 12 :
I’ve had to replace all the shower heads. All of that type of stuff at my property just in the last two years.
SPEAKER 11 :
And while we were on break there, I did a little research because I had experienced this. I knew I wasn’t crazy. And yes, there are self-cleaning water heaters that change the way the dip tube works, that swirls the water around, that keeps things agitated, meaning… that even when you do get a little bit of sediment, most likely it’s going to be smaller flakes and it’s probably passing through and you’re never seeing it versus the other type where the flakes are going to be larger because it’s just sitting.
SPEAKER 12 :
And that’s part of the challenge, though, is because that’s what’s getting to those curations.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right.
SPEAKER 12 :
So for me, I’m going to have to somewhere either in the well housing, put in a pre-filter for sediment, and then as I’m doing the renovation on the place, put it, you know, try and negotiate a water software.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yep. Yep. I think you’re, you’re spot on. You’re spot on. And, and, and we also, um, uh, going to be a sponsor here in the not too distant future. So I’ll go ahead and mention his name, uh, water pros, uh, Paul, he’s our water guy. Uh, we’re going to have him on probably even on a segment where you don’t want to on a morning where we can actually talk a lot about this. And he’s the guy, Eric, that could really dial you in on what you need to be doing on those things.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, I’ve heard him on… Paul’s a good guy.
SPEAKER 11 :
Paul’s a great guy. If you have any questions, give him a call. He’s more than happy to help you through some of that. If nothing else, even telling you, hey, you should do this.
SPEAKER 12 :
Right. Right. Yeah, no, just what you had said about you’ll see other filters clogging, and that is exactly what I’ve run into on the range.
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay. Eric, thank you, by the way. I appreciate you very much. And Eric’s a great listener as well. I hear from him quite often, and he’s a guy that I’ve actually had as a guest on Ready Radio, spent some time down in Antarctica. uh south pole so eric thank you by the way for being a part of what we do here on a pretty routine basis and i didn’t realize we were going to get off on the whole you know water heater end of things and and now that we have i tell you what i will do because this is becoming a bigger topic i think for a lot of you that are listening i’ll do some additional research this week Some of you might even have instant heaters, which those are out there as well. And some of you might even have hot water heat systems that is in a whole nother area on its own as well. I will do my best, get some information for you guys this week. I’ll come back next week and kind of recap some of this as well and let you know what I learn and if there’s anybody out there listening. that would like to add to that, by all means, send me a text message or an email. Again, our text line, all of that is listed right on the website. You can even do an email inquiry there as well. Fixitradio.com. This is KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 07 :
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.
