Well, we survived last weekend with all 5 boys. It went better than we expected it to but we were still exhausted and ready to have our house back by Monday morning. Thankfully Aaron and Melissa totally understood how 'done' we were and only stayed for a short visit before they packed up their posse and headed home. Seeing them so tanned made me desperately want to go on a trip. I'll have to work on the Boss for that.
Do any of you have security systems in your house? We have one but the former owners told us it was deactivated and they knew nothing about it. No owners manual or anything. Well, it's been acting up lately. And not just any acting up - more like beeping when I walk into the kitchen and having a complete spaz attack when I open the system control panel. I finally got around to calling the company.
"Hi. We just moved into a new house that has a security system from your company but we weren't given any information on it so I'd like some help. Especially since it seems to be acting up lately and we have no idea how to turn it off."
"Okay. What's your address?"
"458 ________ Drive."
"NO. WAY. I've been trying to get a hold of the owners of that house for ages. Your house is on my short list to get back up and running so we'd be very interested in working out a deal with you."
"Really? What's going on?"
Long story short: two owners before us installed a VERY sophisticated security system (motion detectors, window and door sensors, floor sensors, the works) and signed a 5 year contract for monitoring. They paid one year and then the company never heard from them again. So now the company says we don't own the system and they want it back. We're just waiting for a call from the owner of the company so we can work all this out. Our issue is that we have no interest in paying for monitoring (afterall, we moved to this neighbourhood because it's quiet and peaceful, not so that we could activate some high-tech device in our house) and if they take it, we'll be left with holes in our walls. No freaking way is that happening! Does anyone know real estate law well enough to be able to advise us?
Next on the agenda: the raccoon living under the addition. Yes. Or we thought it was a raccoon. The home inspector noted a spot under the addition that appeared to be dug out and said there was probably a creature living under there. Once we moved in, Craig placed wood in front of the hole and filled it in with stones and such. Every morning he'd go back and check and the wood was moved and the burrow redug. Finally last week, he peed on the spot. You know, animal to animal, he was marking his territory. Then he filled the hole back in and covered it with wood again. There was no movement for about 3 days. Then yesterday morning I woke up around 6 to a bad smell. A skunk had sprayed outside somewhere. Pewww-eee. I tried to go back to sleep but the smell just kept getting worse. It woke Craig up and both the boys. Shaun was hiding his face in his jammies. The smell was nauseating and we just couldn't get away from it.
Then we looked outside. Mr. Raccoon is actually Mr. Skunk. Mr. Skunk's dainty little footprints were all over the backyard, looping around the house and entering and exiting the little burrow at least a couple of times. And he sprayed our house - oh boy, did he spray. We carried the smell in our coats, Shaun brought it to school and it permeated our van. At the grocery store, Craig and I had to find an empty aisle to remove our coats and air out our clothes. I'm positive people around us thought we were rubby-dubs because we smelled so terrible.
The air outside was sweet and fresh when we arrive back home. We had opened the windows before we left and turned off the furnace (no sense in heating the outside, right?) so it would have aired out by now, right? It had been nearly 4 hours. No such luck. The smell inside the house hadn't disspated at all. In fact, it was almost worse than when we had left because we had been away from it for so long. Thankfully it seems to be a bit better this morning - ie. I'm not gagging while I sit here typing this - but I haven't been outside yet. I may just be used to it which is almost worse.
The strategy now: call the City and see if they have some sort of free service to remove animals from private property. I don't want to hurt him (if it is indeed a He) but I certainly don't want him living here. And I don't want to risk it being a She and for her to have babies under there. Ideally he'll leave in the spring because we make too much noise and there would be other options at that time but I'm not sure I want to wait that long. He may spray again in the meantime! Welcome Home Martin Family!
Friday, February 27, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
Oh man...that stinks! LITERALLY!!! We had a raccoon problem last year. They were living in our roof! Our next door neighbours had them under their deck. It was not cheap to remove them! I doubt the city will do anything about it, that's what the pest control people are for. It cost us $150 to get them out of our roof, but the neighbours beside us paid almost $2000 to get them out, and keep them out. And down the street neighbours paid $1200 to get them out of their roof. I initially complained a what a rip-off $150 was for some guy to come and stick a trap on top of our roof, but after hearing what the neighbours paid, then no more griping from me!
OK Michelle, I admit, I really want to sit here and laugh at your misfortune :). I'm not though, and as much as the smell of skunk really doesn't bother me too much, I can't imagine it living under my house! We have a family of racoons that live in the culvert behind our house (about 6 of them at any given time) and their favorite thing to do is hang around our house at night, looking in windows, dancing on my car...etc! Our neighbors on the next street up back up to forest...they actually had a mountain lion living under their deck a few winters back - don't ask me why it was there, they usually like solitude! Oh, and the time last fall where I was about to take the kids for a walk in the afternoon and a bear was just casually walking down the street like it was the most normal thing to do! I love where I live, but sometimes the wildlife really makes me wonder!
Lacia, I said the same exact thing to Craig yesterday morning, "This really stinks," and we both laughed until our sides hurt.
Olivia, the smell of skunk doesn't bother me either. We drive past roadkill all the time and I'll usually resond with "oh, that's stinky," or something. But then you continue down the road and the smell is gone. Or enter your house and the smell is gone. This is an intrusive smell that just isn't going away. It in our bedsheets, the closets, the bathrooms, everywhere. Even the laundry room, which usually smells like clean laundry, reeks of skunk. I want this skunk GONE!
I dont think the security company has the right to come back and take the system out - it will be up to them to go and talk to the people who signed the contract years ago to get their money, you didn't sign with them so don't owe them anything.
When we moved into our house now we had a similar issue with the water softener. We didn't want it and the previous owners were leasing it. The previous owners were refusing to take it out of the house, and insisted that we had to take on the lease. If they had left it in the house after closing we could have kept it and Culligan would have to find the previous owners to get paid.... hope that helps!
Tara, I agree. But AHS Security does not. Grrr. Still waiting to hear from them. We're just hoping they drop the whole thing. Now that we have the code we were able to turn the darn thing off. But I miss the ding-ding when we opened the doors...
Post a Comment