Attention Basement Shoppers

 
Pacowy
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Post by Pacowy » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 7:28 pm

Scouring the classifieds can often turn up good-looking deals on used heating equipment, though, as discussed in a number of other threads, the buyer generally is taking on all of the risk. I was reminded of that today while we were out looking at a few local options for "downsizing" our current house as our varmints, uhhh, kids scatter into the real world.

We called about one house built in the 1940's that looked to be very solid and reasonably maintained. Though it is not currently occupied, it is under the care of a property management company. After walking through the living area, it was time to check the basement. At first glance, it was a bit of a surprise, because we thought there was a full basement, but the thick poured concrete foundation visible from the outside seemed to function only as a frostwall surrounding pole-type construction over a crawl space:
Basement Steps 1.jpg
.JPG | 231.9KB | Basement Steps 1.jpg
Wait a sec. Turn the light on please? Man, some water got into the crawl space, and what I thought was dirt was actually ice:
Basement Steps 2.jpg
.JPG | 275.4KB | Basement Steps 2.jpg
Then I looked to the left and realized that there was a full basement, but the ice (and whatever water may have been under it) was actually over 4' thick, and had completely immersed the boiler:
Boiler.jpg
.JPG | 311KB | Boiler.jpg
I understand the management company is sending a crew to clean up the mess, so the future owners may never even know this happened. But it did.

Mike


 
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freetown fred
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Post by freetown fred » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 7:32 pm

Yep, it was solid all right!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL

 
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lsayre
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Post by lsayre » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 7:37 pm

So what kind of boiler was it?

 
Pacowy
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Post by Pacowy » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 7:42 pm

Sorry, Larry, I couldn't tell for sure from the smoke pipe.

Mike

 
lincolnmania
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Post by lincolnmania » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 7:48 pm

wow ice skating for dwarfs!

 
Qtown1835
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Post by Qtown1835 » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 8:12 pm

How does that much water make it into a basement?!

 
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freetown fred
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Post by freetown fred » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 8:38 pm

Hopefully, you'll never have to find out!!! LOL Ask SMITTY! :)


 
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coalkirk
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Post by coalkirk » Thu. Feb. 01, 2018 9:37 pm

Nice property management company!

 
titleist1
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Post by titleist1 » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 12:06 am

Dang.....Some realtor will list it as a feature, especially in MA, having an indoor ice rink for hockey practice. :baby:

 
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Rob R.
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Post by Rob R. » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 6:26 am

Wow! I assume the rest of the house was frozen also?

 
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coalkirk
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Post by coalkirk » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 7:42 am

Rob R. wrote:
Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 6:26 am
Wow! I assume the rest of the house was frozen also?
I'm going to go out on a limb and say if the boiler was incased in ice 4' deep the rest of the house was frozen. Of course I'm a home inspector so I just took an educated guess. I've never seen anything like that before. I certainly have seen basements with 4' of water in them but never frozen solid. That's really amazing.

 
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franpipeman
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Post by franpipeman » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 7:59 am

The left their feed water valve on !!!

 
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Rob R.
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Post by Rob R. » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 8:01 am

coalkirk wrote:
Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 7:42 am
I'm going to go out on a limb and say if the boiler was incased in ice 4' deep the rest of the house was frozen. Of course I'm a home inspector so I just took an educated guess. I've never seen anything like that before. I certainly have seen basements with 4' of water in them but never frozen solid. That's really amazing.
I meant to say flooded, not frozen. I was curious of the water originated in the basement, or if a pipe burst upstairs.

 
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coalkirk
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Post by coalkirk » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 8:52 am

While it’s certainly possible that this water was from penetration from the exterior it’s far more likely to be from a burst pipe. It’s something I see quite often unfortunately.

 
Pacowy
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Post by Pacowy » Fri. Feb. 02, 2018 8:58 am

Didn't notice any signs of pipes breaking upstairs, but also no signs of winterization. Maybe they were trying to get by with the thermostat set low. Agree with ck that the water pretty much had to be from a broken pipe somewhere, plus blockage/failure of whatever was used for a basement drain. Still haven't figured out for sure who shut the water off, or how they did it. Best guess is a neighbor saw water flowing into the yard from the house, and the town shut it off at the road.

Mike


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