Appliance fatalities!

[Powerstroke]

Man have I had a bad week. Its been nothing but a constant headache with appliances. My wife called me on tuesday to tell me the wash machine was making a really bad grinding noise. I get home and look at it and the tranny in it is shot. Its an old Norge and its the oldest appliance in the house, so what the heck, might as well get a new one now anyway.

So we go and order a new washer dryer combo. Everything is newfangled and High-efficiency and all that. Lots of incentives and energy savings blah blah blah.

I come home today and there is water dripping on the laundry room floor from the ceiling above. My wife says its been doing it for the last week or so......

Apparently thats not important info.

So after being in every attic and crawl space I decide to check something else and now a copper water valve fitting on my dishwasher is leaking and its been soaking through the floor. Fortunately that has a shutoff.

I'll be ordering parts for that tomorrow, but man....if bad things come in three's I don't want to know what else might fail. ::knock on wood::

I think I'm gonna sign up for Home Service Plus tomorrow.

[polarsusd81]

I had a fun one a couple weeks ago. The pressure releif valve on my water heater went out. I was losing about 3 gallons of hot water an hour for a couple days until I could get to the store to get the parts. Wasn't hard or expensive to replace, but you should seen the jimmy rig I figured out for the down time. It included sliced of lawn hose and LOTS of Duct Tape.

Hope nothing else goes south on you.

[mr walleye]

Two years ago on Thanksgiving I had the refrigerator (with all the leftovers) cook top and dishwasher go out all in a 24 hour period then that Monday the hot-water heater and built in oven went out, just over 3 grand in one week

[Tom7227]

Hint - use a dry marker and write the date, price and place you bought it - as you put it in. Then when you have to pull it out to get the wooleyboogers you'll see that it's getting to be old, and maybe you can buy a new one before the old one craps out.

Norge!!! Man that thing had to be an antique. They've been gone for at least 30 years haven't they? Sorry, but I can't feel your pain for that loss, you've been on borrowed time for at least a decade.

[echotrail]

Home ownership is a round robin cycle of repairs and replacements. Dishwasher, Refrigerator, stove, microwave, washing machine, dryer, water heater, water softener, AC, and the grand daddy back breaker of all the furnace. Next one up for me will be the dishwasher.

Powerstroke; here's something to check out regarding Service Plus. My neighbor had a Home Service Plus contract and had a water heater problem. They refused to fix it citing a clause in the contract that says they have the right to refuse if the cost to them is over $100. That was some years ago so I don't know if that $100 dollar threshold has gone up.

[Tom7227]

It's basically an insurance policy, and as with all insurance policies there are more angles than a can of worms. IMO you're better off without, and by keeping track of the age of your various things you'll be able to figure out what's likely to go next. Take the money you'd pay for service plus, put it in a coffee can behind the furnace or the fridge, and you'll likely be ahead of the game.

[BoxMN]

I bought appliances for a cabin, and I was totally surprised at how reasonable pricing you can find if you search around for sales or are not afraid to try "used" or "open box" or "discontinued". It is almost where replacing is cheaper than fixing some things, sad to say.

I also was able to dicker pretty good, and at a very well known and big store. So don't anyone pay sticker even on appliances!

But it stinks when things break down unexpectedly, for sure.

[polarsusd81]

Very good point on not paying sticker price. I bought a new stove and refrigerator when I bought my house so I am pretty good on them. But when I picked them up from a big box store known for electronics, I got list pricing, free delivery, and installation. Saved about 600 bucks, paid about 850 for both. Pretty good deal. They took care of the old stuff too.

[Powerstroke]

I got a great price on the washer/dryer combo cause I argued I only need the one and they were willing to come down. Also the delivery and recycling was free and they placed my nice dryer in the garage for me.

[The Chemist]

Went up fishing Memorial weekend came home to the ktichen floor with water on it and an odd smell in the house opened the freezer and most of the food was partially frozen. Next morning completely thawed. That night went home and stuff was frozen and everything frozen. Threw almost $500 in food out. Cleaned up the mess. Called Serv. Plus, came over and they told me to buy a new one as I had taken the interior back cover of the freezer out that is in front of the coils. I find out that the sevrice guy suggested I may have damaged something as I had the shelves and panel out. Still trying to find a new fridge. Only problem I have a tile floor and the person who installed the tile layed them over hard wood floors so most of the tiles have cracked and some of the water seeped through. Now I have a reason to replace the floor just didn't want to do it this soon.