Bless His Heart Home Repairs

Blue Palmetto's "Bless His Heart" Home Repair Page!

     One of the fun parts of home inspection is never knowing we'll see next. Quick repair jobs by our do it ourselves friends or relatives. We like to refer to these wacked out quick fixes as a "bless his heart" repair job. So let's have some fun checking out some of these redneck home repairs. Click the images to enlarge into a new window.

This fun photo shows one of those screw in light socket plug in adapters. Only it has a globe over it. So it's not very useful. The more you look at it the funnier it gets. A real head scratcher.

   This novel way of installing an electrical outlet on a dock gets the job done....Only I can't begin to tell you just how dangerous this is. Looks like they broke all the rules....

I've actually seen this a couple of times....Someone put a hose bib in the bath tub in place of the spout cover. I think a normal spout would have been cheaper and easier but this is definitely funnier.

     This person found a quick way to hook up water to his trailer. Just use a garden hose. Bad idea. Most garden hoses have lead in them and are not an approved water supply piping material. Lead is a very toxic and can cause learning disabilities especially in children. No telling how many years this hose was being used for this purpose.

     This is definitely a "bless his heart" moment. This plumbing connection was leaking. Can you guess why. Improper connection method.  PVC is supposed to be solvent glued, however polybutylene is connected using crimped fittings. Looks like they tried to glue the poly and it was leaking.

     Ha Ha....I call this my toilet in distress photo. How do I write this up in a report? It's a toilet on a small concrete pad with drain lines extending into the woods in someones back yard. There's carpet on the ground around the small slab. It appeared to have been a small shed or maybe even a living space for someone.  But wait! You haven't seen everything yet!

     I got to laugh when I see the way this guy installed a light bulb on his utility shed. Of course once you find one wacked out electrical construct then many others are not far behind as was the case here.

     This one amazes me....they ran an extension cord in the same conduit as a garden hose. Of course the outlet it was plugged into was not GFI protected either. It looks like they were trying to get the hose under a sidewalk so they could fill their pool up easier....that's right....the hose was for a pool...I forget what the cord was for but needless to say very dangerous condition and very hilarious.

    This is really a bonehead mistake...installing the crawlspace insulation with the paper facing the wrong way.  The instructions are actually printed on each piece of insulation in several spots!  Maybe they couldn't read. Insulstion and the paper facing needs to be tight to the subfloor. Crawlspace moisture will make a mess of this install in short order.

This photo show two problems (notching the joist too much) and an improper electrical splice.  Amazing as it seems splicing an electrical conductor outside of a box is very common and very wrong. All electrical connections must be in a box properly fastened to framing and with a proper cover.

    The water in these sinks has a choice of which way it wants to go...lol..

    I don't know why someone stuck a wire across these service conductors....maybe they were trying to burn the house down. Fortunately the end of the wire was burned off so it wasn't making contact. Crazy!

Leave your PVC glue at the store....don't worry.....duct tape has a lot of uses....bless his heart...repairing drains just isn't one of them....Also an S trap which is not allowed.

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Duct tape didn't quite cut it on this repair...bless his heart....Yep...this is actually the stuff we home inspectors see on home inspections.... Also note the block of wood holding  the joist up in the background....

If anyone has a wacked out home inspection photo just submit it in the blog section below.....and tell your story. We could all use a laugh.