Show Notes: Looking Out For Your Home – On the House
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Show Notes: Looking Out For Your Home

By on March 30, 2019
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Looking out for your home starts with you!

Whether it’s picking out your home or making sure that it’s inhabitants are safe from pests like snakes, looking out for your home is up to you. Learn more about how you can look out for your home here at On The House with The Carey Brothers’ show notes!

Entry Level, One Piece at a Time  

Module’s innovative home designs have buyers and cities thinking differently about more attainable options.  

by JENNIFER CASTENSON 

 

Mortgage rates are up, though backing off from recent highs, and construction materials costs and labor are escalating, all resulting in higher home prices. Some builders and developers are combating the costs that their buyers will need to cover with new technologies or organizational changes. 

  

What about a completely new way to think about the design?

light bulb

What if you were able to get your house one piece at a time?

puzzle pieces

A home has forever been a long term investment that is probably the biggest purchase most people make in their lifetime, so why not break it down into more manageable bites? 

 Module Design is doing just that.

Module Design has created a new home design that can flex and change depending on budget, starting small for an affordable starter home with the ability to easily add rooms at a later date. 

 It’s the first project is underway now in Pittsburgh, Pa., a companion house that will be the new home to a couple’s parents alongside their residence. Not only is the home right-sized to the physical needs of the aging parents, but it also is right-sized to their budget, finally putting them in very close proximity of caretakers. 

How is it so much cheaper?

The home also went up in two days with offsite construction, which helps Module Housing lower labor costs and deliver at a budget that fits the buyer. 

 The public-private partnership brought extra scrutiny to the zoning process along with the design review, so getting it kicked off wasn’t easy, though it can work as a case study for other parts of Pittsburgh and beyond to offer more attainable housing to a broader population.  

Projects like this bring visibility with the right stakeholders that can make mean progress for regulations in the future, and also pave a path for more diverse housing options. 

  

What to Look for When Buying a Home Security Camera System: The Essentials 

 cameras

First things first: Establish what exactly you want from your security camera system. 

Of course, it goes without saying that you want them to help make your home more secure. Consider some of the following factors before shopping.

  • Video quality
  • Alert features
  • Number of cameras
  • Durability

Image and Video Quality 

We’ve mentioned above that you’d want clear feedback from your security cameras. However, image and video quality are so important they deserve a separate section in this post. 

Many of the best security cameras in the market today deliver HD recording boasting 60 frames per second (FPS). Majority comes with a 1280×720-pixel resolution. This is clear enough, but if you want even better feedback, then opt for cameras with 1920×1080-pixel resolution. 

 

Enough Space, Please 

How much is enough space when it comes to security camera storage? 

The answer depends on the set-up you aim for and invest in, as well as the actual footage you want it to cover. The larger the coverage, the more gigabytes – even up to hundreds – you’d need. 

As such, you should also consider going for cameras with additional SD card features. Many of today’s high-quality camera systems record videos only when they pick up movements or noises that otherwise shouldn’t occur. 

Since these devices run on motion- or sound-sensors, then you can save a lot of storage and money on them. 

 

Monitoring the Inside of Your Home 

You can use security cameras for more than watching what’s happening outside your home’s doors. They can also serve as a useful tool for your home’s fire-prevention and risk-assessment program. 

For instance, kitchen cameras allow you to check up on your stove and other gas-, fuel-, and electricity-powered appliances. 

Remember, the United States sees one burglary happen every eighteen seconds. 

So, the sooner you get these security devices, the sooner you can bring your risks down. 

 

Catch It, Kill It, or Leave It Alone?  

 So what do you do when you’ve found a snake in your yard, garage, or even inside your home? First, identify it. Knowing what you are dealing with will determine the next step. 

The best thing to do is learn the venomous snakes in your area before you need to know. That way, you’ll know exactly what you are dealing with so you can take appropriate measures. 

 Resources: 

There are a number of good resources on the internet, including state-specific snake identification pages, state herpetological society pages, and naturalist society websites. Several field guides, including Peterson’s Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians, can help you figure out what you are looking at. 

Learn more about repelling snakes here.  

What are the appropriate measures?

While some will never kill snakes, even venomous ones, it might be better to kill a copperhead or rattlesnake instead of attempting to capture it to relocate it. Just make sure it’s actually a venomous snake and not a harmless one.  

Nine times out of 10, a snake in someone’s house is a rat snake, it’s almost never a venomous snake.  

 How do you remove it?

Removing a nonvenomous snake from your home is as simple as sweeping it into a trash can and then carrying it outside. Small snakes can be picked up with a pair of tongs. If it’s already outside, just leave it alone. 

  If you are positive it is a venomous snake, call a professional. They will get it out of your house so you don’t have to worry about it. 

 

De-snake Your Property 

If the thought of snakes living around your home makes you queasy, there might be no alternative when you choose country living. No matter how much you try, you’ll never rid the rural landscape of snakes. They are as much a part of the ecosystem as birds, frogs, and mice. There are, however, a number of ways you can reduce the frequency of snake visits to your property. 

  When you put out bird food, you get birds, and when you attract snake food, you get snakes. In other words, you want to make your yard and home as unattractive to mice and other rodents as possible.

If you have a lot of mice, there’s a chance you’ll get a lot of snakes. 

First, don’t feed birds during warmer months when snakes are active. Birdseed attracts mice. Remove piles of old lumber and other debris. Mice thrive in decaying stacks of firewood, piles of discarded metal, and lumber and other debris. Abandoned buildings are also prime rodent homes. Remove as many of those potential snake hotspots as possible or at least move them as far away from your house as possible.  

Eliminate places snakes like to hide.

Trim shrubs up off the ground several inches, replace the mulch in your flowerbeds, and reduce the thickness of pine straw used in landscaping. Mow brushy areas close to your home.  

Check out the video James and Morris watched and talked about on air below!

 

PSA: You’ve Only Tapped 1/15th of Sandpaper’s Full Potential  

After you’ve refinished all the furniture and sanded all the paint, hold onto smaller pieces and scraps for these 14 clever reasons. 

  • Open Jars
  •  Maintain Old Wooden Cutting Boards
  •  Clean Cast Iron
  •  Make Shoes Anti-Slip
  •  Remove Sweater Pills
  •  Restore Suede
  •  Hone Scissors
  • Remove Rust
  • Sharpen Pencils
  • Get Rid of Stains
  •  Repel Slugs
  •  Deter Cats

Learn more about those clever uses here.  

Mentioned Links

Thanks

A very special thank you to all of our callers! We live to answer your questions, so keep them coming!

Thank you to our Technical Support:

  • Danny Bringer – Chief Engineer
  • Carol Carey – Executive Producer
  • Sam Reed – Associate Producer

 

#onepieceatatime #moduledesign #starterhome #aginginplace #homesecurity #securitycameras #homesecuritysystems #doorsecurity#snakerepellant #snakesafety #raccoon #raccoons #sandpaper #sandpapertips # #onthehousewiththecareybros

Thank you for tuning in to learn how to look out for your home and it’s inhabitants! And check in next week for more cool tips!

“Looking Out For Your Home” Show Notes for On The House with the Carey Brothers aired March 30, 2019.

Missed our live show? Don’t worry! Because we have a podcast of the show. It’s the same thing we aired on the radio, but ready for you whenever and wherever you are! Check it out here.

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