Advice, and only where we have something to say
Eight articles. Each one answers a question we get asked on the phone, in the order somebody actually needs to know it. None of them publishes a price, including the ones about cost — a chimney is quoted after somebody has looked at it.
Why New Jersey chimneys leak — crown, cap, flashing, freeze-thaw
The stain on the ceiling is never where the leak is. Water travels before it drops, and a chimney gives it four separate ways in — each with a different fix and a different cost.
Read it
When air duct cleaning is worth it — and when it is not
This is the one service in the trade where the honest answer is often "you do not need this". Here is how to work out whether you are one of the people who does.
Read it
The signs your dryer vent is blocked, and why it matters
You empty the lint trap every load. The trap is not the problem. The problem is the run behind it, which is not built to be opened by the person using the machine.
Read it
Level 1 vs Level 2 inspection: which one you actually need
Two words that sound like a sales upgrade and are not. They are defined in a national standard, and the standard also says which one your situation calls for.
Read it
How often a chimney really needs sweeping in New Jersey
Once a year is the answer everybody gives, and it is right often enough to be useful and wrong often enough to be worth understanding.
Read itGetting an older North Jersey fireplace ready for winter
Everybody in the county calls on the first genuinely cold weekend. Everything worth doing to a fireplace can be done in September, at a time you chose, by somebody who is not booked out.
Read it
Creosote: the three stages and what each one costs you
Creosote does not build at one speed and it does not all come off the same way. There are three recognizable stages, and the one you have decides what the visit costs and what it can achieve.
Read it
What a chimney liner does, and when an old NJ house needs one
Relining is the repair people are most suspicious of, because it is invisible and it is not cheap. It is also the one that most often turns an unusable old chimney back into a working one.
Read it
Rather ask somebody?
Every article here describes how this kind of work usually goes. It is not an assessment of your chimney, because nobody has seen it. We cover 19 towns and the phone is answered from 7:00 AM to 9:00 PM, every day.