I'm one of those cooks that multi-tasks. So when the smoke alarm started going off, we attributed the deafening noise to my cooking habits. Days later, smoke alarms all over the house began to join in. Truth be told there was a funny smell too. I'll admit, we poked around some but could not figure out what was setting them off.
It did not take much longer for the source to become evident and we hired an expert to check our furnace. Too bad we hadn't hired one of the home inspectors that blog on Active Rain when we bought that little house.
Here is what we found. The clothes dryer had been depositing a fine layer of lint on the surface of the crawl space. Combined with the fact that the furnace had developed rust and flames were beginning to leap out, I was happy we finally paid attention to the smoke alarms.
Since then I've always had great respect for the institution of home inspection. In fact home inspectors are part of my Dream Team for buying a house, right after real estate agents and mortgage lenders.
Mortgage lenders, have you joined the List of Mortgage Companies to promote your business to homeowners and home buyers? Look at this page in the mortgage directory.
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Mrs Kate,
I only wish I had inspected that for you. I would have caught that one for sure. I pride myself on the detail of my inspections. I crawl around so you don't have to.
Nutsy