Top 7 DUMB Things I did when I Remodeled my House

hey guys guess where I am my house now this is not the real rebuild you've seen me work on that's my new house under construction this is a 1970s house that I remodeled and have lived in for 14 years now in today's video I'm gonna go a little behind the scenes at my house to give you a tour I'm gonna show you some dumb things I did 14 years ago some smart things that have really held up over the years and quite a few things that I've changed out because they didn't work for me today's video from my house sponsored by christy Reisinger m.d. that's my wife's youtube channel and by the way she has no idea I'm making this video today give her some love go over to her channel to hit that subscribe button today's video for my house let's get going all right so 1970s house I did a full house remodel a lot has happened I've had several babies born into this house and now two puppies two dogs that lived here so the house has taken a lot of abuse but let me show you what I did I really opened up this 70s house it had a ton of walls this was a rental house when I bought it so it wasn't cared for very well but there was a huge wall across here separating the entry from this family room space and then there was a huge wall across here and back that was separating the formal living room from the formal dining room and then another wall separating the kitchen from the living room so by opening this up man it's been so wonderful it's it's really allowed us to live as one big space and then we have a great ability to host people to have parties here to have church groups things like that over it's been wonderful the kitchen I love the open concept but let's start here dumb concrete countertops you know I totally fell into this fad this is a I remodeled this in oh five OH six concrete was kind of the cool thing and I totally fell into it I talked my wife into it it's been terrible we've hated it frankly now concrete incredibly porous and that's its downfall you can put the most Baumer most expensive sealer on it it's always going to break down and if you look here this is where we do our cutting board work no matter how much I've sealed it over the years it always needs resealed who wants a countertop that you need to reseal every six months or a year I find that really dumb especially for a family now some people like the patina I am NOT into it and my wife hates it next house my real rebuild we're gonna be using a quartz countertop a Caesar stone probably maybe a Silestone they make some incredibly beautiful countertops that are thoroughly impervious so that when you take that sponge and do a wipe down that countertop looks brand-new and this one no matter how much you wipe it down not good smart cabinets these cabinets have been great I used real ply wood cabinets real plywood boxes I used good hardware and you know what I haven't had to refinish these now they're not perfect they don't look like the day I moved in but if I go to sell this house it'd be really easy to touch these up and they're ready to go for the next homeowner for the next 20 years dumb appliances this is a hard one right because most of America we buy these kind of stainless steel mid-price appliances I think I spent maybe ten thousand dollars on this house for all of my appliances maybe not even quite that much and I got kind of a middle middle upper brand don't stir my eyes I'm gonna try and block those out so you don't see what I've used here but you know what I've had to cook tops I've had two refrigerators the oven micro is the original but that's it and my washer and dryer have been probably fixed four or five times and this is my second dishwasher it's a hard thing on appliances right because we don't have tons of money to spend like my in-laws for instance they were able to afford a sub-zero in the 80s on their kitchen remodel but that sub-zero is the same one that's in their house thirty five years later they have replaced the compressor once on the refrigerator and once on the freezer but over the course of thirty five years one replacement on a compressor that's pretty good and it still has value there's something to be said there we'll see if this dishwasher lasts this is a Miele which is a German brand it was a lot more expensive than the lower-priced model I have in here when I originally built it which died on me but so far it's been really good I've got a water softener in there there's actually a place where you can pour salts and they're smart about that because now that water softener means that all the seals are not going to break down with the hard water that's a hard one though I realized that a lot of the houses I build my clients have the budget to put a lot more in appliances than $6,500 or whatever most Americans are spending on their appliances I just wish that we weren't so focused on Energy Star labels and we were more focused on long-term durability and could I buy up an appliance that would still be working and would be repairable twenty thirty plus years later smart hardware now I used a bunch of hardware in this house that I spent some money on and has really held up this corner back here is usually a dead corner that most the time we'll use a lazy susan on that's that rolling corner piece but check this out this is from hey fella they call it a magic corner some German ingenuity right there look at that you've got full access to everything back there and it's still almost 15 years later glides perfectly you can hide everything in the corner nice and smooth operation and that sweet magic corner aptly named by a fella dumb switches and lights I've got a bunch of these fancy switch plates I've got kind of snowed by the rep for this company that was like Oh give you 30% off and designed all these fancy ones with some fancy plates I spent a bunch of money thinking oh it's 30% off giving me this discount for my personal house thoroughly dumb I should have just put regular white tokoro rocker switches and maybe a screwless plate I do like screw those plates but I could have saved thousands of dollars and most of these I've ended up replacing because when I built this house in my defense I was trying to be really cautious about electrical use I put a lot of compact fluorescent fixtures in which as you all know are gone these days and when you upgrade to LED a bunch of these switches do not work with the newer LEDs so this is one bank of switches I haven't replaced that's because I've kept my original halogen lights in the kitchen but in other places I've switched out to some halo where I had original halo cans in and it was really easy to pull that trim and that bulb out and change that with an LED like why my front door my outdoor lights my hallway and those have been fantastic that's what I'll be doing on the new house smart hidden door you know I love my hidden doors of my clients houses I had to do one at this house now this is an original of the house this originally was actually my home office my company was based in this room in 2006 and I moved in here we turned it into a kid's bedroom when I had an extra baby born and then now it's actually my kind of homeschool room for my kiddos and I think in 2015 we did this check that out this was just a recess and the wall and my covers did a fantastic job we've got a Rickson pivot door here this door is just a slab stave corridor we added some container store shelving in there and then to dress it up I did some exposed Russian birch plywood I really like that expose that and this room has functioned really well for us besides that hardware which by the way this touch latch in here that you push and has ten pounds of throw that's a great piece suka suni now makes one and speaking of those guys I used their hardware on all these lifts stays now these are books and I'm not at every day but in that nice that if you wanted a book you could just lift that up and see what you've got in one spot my guys made these cabinets basically in the driveway and again I use that exposed ply and man this has been super durable with a Formica countertop on there anything that happens we can wipe it right off this has been a terrific room and again the hardware is awesome one thing I do want to mention I just saw this I've got a son who's a lot like his dad he's a real entrepreneur he's got a power washing business he's got a trash service really take the neighbors trash cans out and return them after the trash man's come and he's got a lawn mowing service I did all those things as a kid plus I threw papers and look at his wish list this totally cracked me up I hope you don't mind me will show in the world off of what you're trying to buy this summer he got a new fishing boat from his grandpa that was under the deck for 20 years this little small John boat and he saved up the money to buy a trolling motor for it anyways good stuff dumb vinyl windows when I remodeled this house almost 15 years ago there weren't many options besides vinyl and wood when you really wanted to custom size down to the let's say eighth inch and I couldn't afford the fiberglass window that I wanted to let alone they didn't customize back then so I did a bunch of these vinyl I do not like them and this is one reason why I don't recommend them because I've lived with them here's the issue especially in Texas the windows of mine on the front of the house that were bigger sizes they would actually warp in even change so much so that in my daughter's bedroom which is a pretty big single hung window I couldn't get the lock to always work cuz the vinyl kind of bowed with the heat now I ended up replacing almost all the windows in the front of my house with Marvin integrity which now they've changed their name I think it's more of an essential line but that's a fiber glass window they've taken the heat no problem now they'll customize down to the gnats tail end for you a much better window for not a whole lot more money these were a bargain basement price and you know what I've gotten when I paid for here smart fiber glass windows I spend a little bit more for these and funny enough actually did a video on this several years ago so you can go back and see how it replace these in my brick opening but I went from single Hung's here to casements and that's a great upgrade now I've got a nice big piece of glass no dividers it really kind of modernized this single-story ranch house of mine more efficient but especially more airtight when you get a casement and you lock it down you're locking against the bulb seal whereas if you have a single or a double hung it usually has a brush seal and you're moving against that brush seal so it's naturally not as tight of a window these have been really nice dumb pull oming Hurley went kind of bargain on my plumbing to make my budget and these fixtures are what I would consider like production builder or spec house fixtures they work from fine for the first you know three four years and then I started having problems and in fact these are a replacement of those when I don't know maybe ten years ago I replace them and these are dumb I made the same mistake again can you believe it from ten years ago Plumbing's a big deal guys Plumbing's gonna last a long time you're kind of use it it's gonna have a ton of actuations you have cartridges in there at my house I have hard water and my wife doesn't want a water softener so as a result my plumbing fixtures have been a mess because I used kind of bargain basement price fixtures had I used better fixtures number one I would have been able to get parts much easier and I wouldn't have ad problems here's an example right now this actually went bad on me last week the cartridge in here which is my diverter between my showerheads I've two showerheads in here stopped working and I couldn't get my shower to turn on I had to get the plumber in here we've kind of got it rigged I left the handle off so no one would move it and I've got to try and get the part that I need I really should have gone smarter on this concrete countertops in my bath actually have done just fine I mean this section right here looks like the day I installed him fifteen years ago I think it's because I don't have lemon juice or acids or things like that the toothpaste will wipe off here just fine the other thing I did in here was I did just a real basic China sink these have been fine I've had no problems with that now here's an interesting thing like concrete being fatty this is a little bit faddish at the time this is a ply boo I think is the brand name it's a plywood made from bamboo and I've always liked that exposed edge so I did my bath vanities in here and my kids bath and I did this awesome medicine cabinet out of ply boo and cow this has been so durable in my kids bath I made when they were younger and now they're older but when they were younger they made a step still a lot of plywood and they would bang that against this ply boo day after day and you know what 15 years later it still looks like the day I installed it you can't see any dents or dings very interesting all right now here's something that I've also learned in time I've got a standard mud set shower this is a fairly porous natural material this is travertine but because it's a mud set and the travertine is porous I've got this real thick kind of porous base in my shower it never dries and it's really hard to get the mold out of the cracks in the corner I'm gonna be doing a Schluter system in my new house which is kind of a hard to explain in a short method but basically it's a dimpled mat type material that doesn't have this thick base underneath it to stay wet and I'm gonna use a tile that's not porous so my shower is gonna stay cleaner it's not gonna have the mold it's funny how much you learned when your remodel isn't it smart the one thing I did write in my house foaming why's this Kohler kitchen sink stainless steel single bowl don't tell anybody Kohler actually gave this to me as a freebie it was awesome but i cheaped out and put a crappy faucet in that I had to promptly replace now I did replace it with a Kohler though and check this out they have this really cool feature that when it's on just wave your hand right here and it turns it off a pretty awesome feature now that we're washing our hands 13 times during the course of the day and I showed you this earlier my cycle finished look at that but Miele automatically pushes out lets all that steam out and it ends up being very very dry dishes I like this a lot and the last smart feature I want to mention on my house my hardwood floors you know this section of hardwood floors between my kitchen sink and my refrige think about how many times I've walked across this in the last you know 14 15 years it's got to be thousands multiple thousands of times these are true 3/4 thick hardwoods I've had two dogs now in this house I've had four kids in this house and yet when I went on vacation three years ago all I had to do is do a quick sand and finish and these floors looked brand new again that's the ultimate sustainable floor 3/4 thick hardwoods I've seen it a once in 15 years and refinished them I changed the color I changed the finish that is an ultimate smart feature dumb my HVAC system in my house you know I never modeled this and oh five OH six the furnace that was in here the air conditioner had just been replaced the year prior and I hesitated to replace it I also hesitated to re-insulate in a different way to bring the insulation to the roof line as a result this has been fine but I kind of say my energy bills and my comfort to have gone way higher than I would have liked I typically spend in the summertime 200 plus maybe 250 dollars in electricity for this house plus I've got a gas furnace I've got gas hot water a gas dryer which means I'm using a ton of electricity this is not a very efficient house and it wasn't very comfortable when I first moved in either I had to add a dehumidifier to the house now if you've been watching my videos you know that I'm a big fan of dehumidification so I'm always checking my humidity in my house I just have this separate hygrometer I'll put a link to this like ten bucks on Amazon I love this and i added i'll show you in a second an ultra air dehumidifier to my attic huge difference in comfort and i also since I moved in realized that my daughter is asthmatic this thing just has a pleated one-inch filter but this over here is giving me some extra filtration now I only typically run it at night I've got a hallway return right down there on the bottom and this guy this field controls trio has basically just a big pleated filter in there and is getting me kind of near HEPA quality filtration but only air that goes through it is getting filtered so I run it all night long you know I'm trying to run it like 12 hours a day let's say and it's giving me some extra filtration before that air gets sucked into the furnace and gets distributed through my house but let's end the video up in the attic alright so my attic this is probably my biggest disappointment in my 2006 Matt Reisinger you know I left this attic traditionally insulated at the floor level which means I'm in a vented roof cavity here what a bummer I should have changed this at the time it was hard to do cuz I've got an attached garage I would have had to separate the attic space from the garage space I would have had to use some type of spray foam at the roofline let's say but all of these ducts up here in the attic man that's a huge disappointment to me these these ducts are you know are eight ducts let's say but this attic easily gets to 120 plus degrees 130 degrees maybe on a typical summer day which means I've got 55 degree air running through these little thin insulated ducts with almost a hundred degrees Delta that's super inefficient and that's part of why my bills are so expensive now I went back and did insulation 2.0 up here in the attic where I added some baffles I made a video on that irie blue I made sure that I could air seal as best as possible my condition space in my unconditioned space and then back here on this pop-out I've got on my family room where I had batt insulation I pulled that out and I used closed cell spray foam to help increase the efficiency but ultimately the way that I insulated this and having this ductwork up in this hot space super inefficient that's my one disappointment guys thanks for joining me on this personal build show I'd love to know what resonates with you on my either my dumb things or my smart things what you've done on your house pop a comment below and I'll try and respond to as many of those as possible because I really appreciate your sport also go check out my wife's channel she didn't know I was filming this ahead of time hopefully I won't be in the dog house after filming this video but if you're not currently subscriber hit that subscribe button below I've got new content every Tuesday and every Friday follow me on Twitter Instagram all the ones we'll see you next time on the build show [Music] [Music]

Channel: Matt Risinger

Views: 921,629

Rating: 4.8989239 out of 5

Keywords: matt risinger, build show, build show network, remodeling, hvac, lighting residential, alex penrose, best windows, plumbing, hvac system

Id: 4HYROAFgp7Y

Length: 19min 48sec (1188 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 26 2020