Recent comments in /f/jerseycity

bodhipooh t1_j78a1ol wrote

TBH, I never got into the details of how it all worked out in the end. In my mind, the real estate agent/agency should be responsible, but I am pretty sure they would simply deny they left a window open and it could have been done by anyone that visited during a showing. From what I recall, he paid for the repairs to expedite everything and I am assuming (hoping?) he submitted everything to his homeowners insurance for reimbursement. He was DESPERATE to unload the house as they had already moved away down south. Luckily for him, he was able to do so in late 2018 and his accountant then suggested that they refile several years of taxes to claim retroactive losses. I do remember him doing that and getting some chunk of cash from the IRS. That was a win. In his own words, if he knew then what he knows now, he wouldn't have bought the property, in spite of the overall gains after 10 years of ownership. When all is said and done, he cleared 100K in net gains after all the usual and unexpected expenses of homeownership. In his own words, for those 10 years they were "house rich, cash poor" and looking back the 10K / year gain (on average) doesn't feel like it was worth it.

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The_Nomadic_Nerd t1_j782up9 wrote

Do you know where the freeze is? Is there any part of the pipe that’s exposed outside? A part of my pipes that are exposed outside froze in December. I took a pot of warm water and poured it over the exposed part of the pipe. Repeated a few times and it thawed.

Then I went to a hardware store and got a heat cable to wrap around the pipe. I then covered it in pipe insulation. It seemed to handle the cold weather we have.

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BeMadTV t1_j782ml1 wrote

Most of life is learning through experience though. And if you switch cities, climates, or even countries, you have to do it all over again lol

My first apartment I didn't drip and didn't have pipes freeze. It was the top floor of a house in Greenville. $800 a month. Two other units below me.

My second one in a ten unit building on 15th Street by Cast Iron Lofts froze. It was Reason #136 I like having a car.

I have a house now in Bergen Lafayette, let it drip and left the basement at 65 and when I used it for the first time I heard a sputter before it started. It's cold.

I ramble all this to say...it sucks now, but a good memory to keep for the whole age and wisdom thing later. Tomorrow is 50. Leave the cabinets open today for room temp to hit. Could take hours. Hope your LL gets back to you. I would get a good book and a hot toddy/hot boba at your favorite bar/bubble tea spot.

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bodhipooh t1_j77umsw wrote

This thread is reminding me of a situation with my best friend, who moved away several years ago but still had a property in BK he was trying to sell. A real estate agent that was showing the house had left a window open to keep the place aired out (so it wouldn't smell stale during showings) and forgot to close it before winter rolled around and, during a serious cold snap, the pipes on the second floor froze, burst, and the place got flooded. Homeownership can be a bitch at times.

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DryTaker t1_j77plnj wrote

Check it out in person first. Fwiw, the interior of the building feels significantly older than it’s suppose to be. With wallpapers peeling off in the hallway, lounge space looking like some common area in a college dorm building. Definitely not the typical “luxury apartment” people here refer to. That said, the price and location is very hard to beat, so I guess in the end it’s all up to your personal preference.

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BeMadTV t1_j77pjrs wrote

Yeah, I saw those. I've never still had frozen pipes. I feel like that would happen if you let it drip and never turned them on and used them. Just dripping.

They also mentioned it being really cold and dripping not helping. But again, I feel like you'd have to not use your water for a while, just drip, to get to that point.

​

Really feel bad for OP, I wonder what the LL's on this sub would do or think.

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OtherBarry3 t1_j77oq86 wrote

> Did you leave it dripping?

That same thread you linked has multiple people pointing out that dripping the the faucet will still lead to frozen pipes.

Sounds like that would help with preventing the pipes from bursting but hopefully OP does not have that issue (I guess they'll know one the water isn't frozen anymore).

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BeMadTV t1_j77kh62 wrote

Your landlord is probably looking for threads like these.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Landlord/comments/lla42b/landlord_us_ks_frozen_pipes_what_to_do/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Did you leave it dripping? Not trying to victim blame, just curious. Speaks to how cold it is and how insulated the building is.

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ReeseCommaBill t1_j77bva0 wrote

It’s especially bad in Newport because you have a bunch of high rises at the bottom of a hill and immediately next to a whole swath of low lying land, like the Hoboken train yard. It so gets funneled into those buildings. That’s why it’s especially bad where those buildings start, like at the corner of Newport Pkwy and Washington.

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