Monday Clean & Organize it: A New Water Heater

We had quit the ordeal the other day in our house, it was 11PM the night before we were leaving to go on a short trip to Miami, Saturday night to boot. I had appointments in Miami, that had to be kept and weren’t easy to get.  I was finishing up a few blog posts when I heard a pop and water gushing into the PC room. Our water heater busted.  Special, what to do now?

Well, we turned off the power and the water to the water heater and cleaned up the mess, we had to leave and with the power off, we knew it would be okay. I hated leaving like this, but what’s a  girl to do. Things like this always break at the wrong time, nothing ever is perfect timing.

When we came back from Miami a few days later, we knew we had to get the Water Heater replaced. The cheap and frugal gal that I’m, I instructed Hubby to grab the phone and make some calls to our local Home Depot, Lowes and a handful of plumbers to get the best price in town.

Boy was I glad we called around, the plumbers in town started their installation fee $500 and up, that did not include any parts, just labor!!! I was floored, a simple installation that would maybe take them an hour maybe 2, $500 and up.. wow… Lowes was somewhat a better option at least they quoted us the entire installation with the price of the parts and warranty.

We ended up going through Home Depot, they had a price guarantee, their price included the parts, labor and even ANY addl items that were required for plumbing and what not, everyone else said this would have been extra. In a perfect world, everything should be there since we had an existing water heater in place, but we all know… This Crazy Mom’s house is no ordinary house….lol.

We agreed to the low price guarantee from Home Depot and the guy came out the very next day, all seemed like a perfect day in paradise once we get out hot water running again.. installation seemed smooth ………….UNTIL… the water gushed into the PC room again.

I’m running to tell my installer STOP… water is running; he was stun and had no idea WHY I have water in my PC room, until he looked and saw that the drain was in the room… he was irate to call it the least, he immediately stopped any installation and called his home office, he was so mad that he cussed in Spanish for a good 30 minutes, good thing I couldn’t understand a word he was saying, BUT I knew it wasn’t good .

At this time I’m in tears, worried what will happen next and how much this will cost me to get fixed… I had no idea that the PC room isn’t allowed where it is and that the drain was in the room….. Live and learn I guess.

After 30 minutes my very nice installer stopped and went back to work came up with a simple solution to run a new pipe through the outside wall, which was next to the water heater; we are back in business and we now have HOT water!!!!!

I’m very impressed with how the Home Depot installer handled the situation ( minus the cussing, but it was Spanish, so let’s say he was just singing along…lol.) and we are now almost a week later and my credit card was charged the exact amount I was told, and not a penny more!!  They went above and beyond their duty to get me up and running.

This Crazy Mom’s house has HOT water again and let’s say, after a 1980’s water heater, I’m glad we are now in the new century and hope to save a little extra money along the way. We love the new water heater, we get quick hot water; the installer mentioned that I had a good 5inches of dirt in my water heater and suggested I drain/clean it twice a year; he mentioned that it will save on electric coast if I keep it clean.. who would have known.

So, if you have a water heater in the laundry room, garage or wherever in your house, hook up a water hose twice a year, let the water run out for like 15-20 min and that will clean the settlement and dirt out of your water heater, saving you not only energy but also avoids replacing the water heater within a few years.

As everything, this are my experiences and yours may differ, but so far so good.. I’m very happy with my new water heater and loved the service we received… .

If your water heater isn’t performing to it’s fullest or is very old, call around and see if you may need to replace it. Don’t wait till it busts… that was no fun .

Happy Cleaning…..

P.s. I was not asked to write this post, I received no compensation but I wanted to give credit where credit was due and hope this helps some one else out in the future