Just in case you haven’t heard, we got bugs. The bad kind. Here’s a primer. You got yer common wet-wood termites. They live underground, they eat wood quickly, and they are relatively easy to treat. Those are the kind you *want* to have. We don’t have those.
We have dry-wood termites. They eat wood slowly, but they are nearly impossible to treat without tenting your house. Tenting your house sucks. It’s expensive, disruptive, and expensive, as well as being expensive. We got the first quote back from some guys we’ve had to call in from out of town, because evidently the bugs we have are *so rare* that no one it town deals with them. Lucky us. Their quote is on the order of $10,000. I’m not happy.
We could rush this and try and get everything cleaned up before Tyler gets here, but it would be a real rush job, and at $10,000, I'm thinking we should get a few more quotes. Further, it's not *likely* that Jessie would go into labor *while* our house was being tented, but do you really want to take that chance?
On the plus side, it looks like the bugs have actually been nesting in our house for about five years, which means that there is some chance that the previous owners actually knew about this before they sold us the house. Oh, wait, I’m sorry, that’s not good news, that’s more bad news.
It’s been a rough few weeks.
-N
4 comments:
So, whether or not they've been there for a while, recognizing termites does seem to be a bit of a challenge. You didn't recognize it, I didn't recognize it, your first bug guy had to get some confirmation. Rather than stewing about this, I might think you could transfer some negative energy into a public service. If nobody in Austin deals with this, that means the contractors, real estate agents and inspectors are NOT aware and I bet there is a business reporter that could get a good story into the Austin Newspaper that will open some eyes and protect some future buyers. To be honest, the people that let you down are the inspectors that cleared you before sale. But they probably haven't had to think about this in your market or there would be a business opportunity for someone to deal with it who doesn't live in San Antonio. Really. Make a call. It strikes me as impossible that you are in the only house in Austin that has been struck and other folks need to be aware. Maybe you don't want to be famous for bugs but it would be a very public spirited thing to do. If you're just PO'ed, call your real estate agent and inspector and call them on their misstep but anything else is just full employment for lawyers work.
That sucks, Noel. I'm grumpy for you, too. Since you are calling people up from out of town, are there other people you can FIND for another estimate? I suppose for 10K, you can be geographically generous.
I hope a solution that is less onerous comes to the surface soon. Good luck. And take care of Jessi-boo.
We've done some of this already. We let our old real-estate guy know. Not to think that we blame him or the inspector, but just so that they know this is a thing they need to start looking for.
We may also submit an article to our neighborhood newsletter, we've already told a few neighbors, and I've given serious thought to starting my own termite-fumigation business in Austin.
Oh my, at $10K a pop on the geographic leading edge of a progressive termite epidemic, that may be a wonderful way to make Tyler Tuition money accumulate. Are you a little serious or just PO'd enough to contemplate it?? Would you look for Inve$tor$??
Post a Comment