Full Show Podcast: 23 February 2025

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to The Resident Builder podcast with Peter Wolfcamp
from US talks ed by doing up the house, it's
orning the guard and asked Pete for ahead. The Resident
Builder with Peter wolf Camp Call eight hundred US talks Abby.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
The house sizzle even when it's dares, even when the
grass is overgrown in the yard, even when.

Speaker 3 (00:36):
The dog is too old to bar, and when.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
You're sitting at the table trying not to start ouse scissor.

Speaker 4 (00:46):
Home even when we are benn even when you're therellonel.

Speaker 2 (01:04):
House sizzle, even when there's goals, even when you go
around from the one you love your most, scream broken
pans appearing in fund locals, wesball when they're gone, leaving them.

Speaker 4 (01:23):
Has even when we'll be even when you're in there alone.

Speaker 5 (01:41):
And a very very good morning and welcome to the
Resident Builder on Sunday, your me Pete wolf Camp right
through till nine o'clock this morning, talking all things building construction.
We can talk about the regulations, we can talk about
the actual products, we can talk about some of the
new ideas that are out there. We can talk about
some of the challenges of sort of managing expectation and budget.

(02:05):
You know, how do you Okay, I'd like to do this,
but I've got an X amount of money to do
that project. How am I going to optimize? I guess
the funds that I have. That's partly off the back
of a number of conversations I had yesterday at the
Home and Garden show on in Dunedin at the moment,
so I was down in Dunedin for a couple of

(02:26):
days and spent some time chatting with people. We could
book these little slots. Actually, as it happened, you could
come along with your plans or your ideas, and so
we're talking about, you know, rejigging entrance ways or doing
some landscaping or some of the other things. Oh, re
orientating the house, these sorts of things. And there's always

(02:47):
that challenge, isn't there If we sit down and we go, okay,
this is what I intend to do with my project.
I want to change the layout. Let's say you might
have a laundry and a bathroom and then a separate
toilet next to it, and it's all in the same space,
but the way in which it's orientated, in the way
in which it's laid out, isn't particularly you, so can
I knock through that wall, perhaps bring these two things together,

(03:11):
make that separate, add a new doorway to it, all
within the existing building envelope. Still might require building consents,
but it's a more useful use of the space that
we have, and it's a big part of design, isn't
it as making the most of the space that we have.
So all of these things we can talk about, there's
also legislation. There's the rules and regulations that govern what

(03:33):
you can do when you can do it. I ended
up spending a little bit of time this week having
a look at what exactly triggers the requirement for a
building consent. Also spend a little bit of time, funnily enough,
this week trying to figure out whether or not some
work that had been completed actually should have had a

(03:54):
building consent, and then trying to find the appropriate legislation
to back up that point of view. It's all well
and good having an opinion, And one of the things
that I encountered was a letter from a builder to
a client saying, here's what we've done. But somewhere in
there they didn't say why they thought that this work

(04:14):
could be done without a building consent. My own opinion
is that it probably did need a building consent, and
not getting one is potentially going to leave a problem
for the existing owner. But when that house goes to sale,
it's going to be a bit of a challenge as well.
So we can talk about the legislation, we can talk
about the materials, we can talk about the tools that

(04:35):
you might need, the projects that you've got on. Give
me a call right now. We always get a little
bit busy towards the end of the show, so today
we've got at this stage. You want no guests coming
in or to chat, so it's all yours. It's all
your opportunity. But we always get busy just before we
get to it at around eight thirty this morning, so

(04:56):
now is the perfect time to call. Oh, eight hundred
and eighty ten eighty. You can also text through which
is nine two nine two. It was ZBZB from your mobile.
I own this small fee for that apparently, And if
you'd like to email, I'll get my email sorted out
in the moment. You can email Pete at Newstalk sb
dot co dot NZ. So I trust you've had a

(05:16):
good week. It says something about the current weather conditions.
I'm in Auckland obviously, and I'm kind of hopeful that
we might have a little bit of rain. And so
I've been in Dunedin last couple of days, which has
been fantastic, and I had a quick look at the
weather forecast for the week. I've got a few jobs
that I have to get done this week, and there

(05:37):
was a part of me that just went, oh damn,
there's no rain forecast for Auckland this week. Kind of
desperate to get a little bit of rain so we
can talk about Actually, this is where having some water
tanks at home has made a huge difference. I've been
able to store up and transfer from one storage area
to another that doesn't capture as much water some water,

(05:59):
so I've at least got I think just shy of
two thousand liters that I can use for a bit
of irrigation during the course of the week. But desperate, really,
oh not desperate, pretty keen. Let's say to get a
little bit of water again this week, hopefully, but doesn't
look like anything's coming at the stage. Can I just
say too? Without being a sanctimonious up at the JAFFA.

(06:22):
Dunedin is such a fabulous city. I just so enjoyed
my time down there, and I must beget and forgetful
or something like that. So I went down very early
on Friday morning on the New Zealand flight which was lovely,
and arrived and I'm driving into Eden and I'm looking
down at the factories and I'm going.

Speaker 3 (06:43):
That's right.

Speaker 5 (06:44):
A Sea Fireplaces have got their factory here in Dunedin.
I know this because it's a big part of this story.
It's a big part of their identity that these fabulous
sea fireplaces get made here locally. So I rang someone
that I know from there. They put me in touch
and I had a wander through the factory, which was fantastic.
I'll tell you a bit more about that in detail

(07:05):
later on, because it was it was really really insightful
something that i've installed a Cerfireplaces, I know a lot,
I know a little bit about them, but to walk
through the factory and Donna, who's the production manager, very
generous with their time, which was fantastic, and I don't know,
a good hour and a half wandering through the factory.

(07:25):
It was fantastic. Some lovely people there. Anyway, I'll tell
you more about the cfires, and of course I was
down for the Home and Garden Show, which has been
a huge success. I have to say car parks are full,
people wandering down the street looking for a car park,
lots of exhibitors, lots of chats and conversations. I was
down there, went and caught up with some people on Friday,

(07:47):
stayed Saturday, came back last night. It's on again today too,
by the way out at the center. So that was fabulous.
I eight hundred eighty ten eighty. Let's get amongst it.
I eight hundred eighty ten eighty and Annette, good morning
to you, Hi.

Speaker 6 (08:03):
And ned.

Speaker 7 (08:05):
Oh Hello, Hi, Hi. You know I've got a question
about bora treatment. I'm considering getting a company to do
extensive over two thousand treatment on our villa in Wellington. Yes,
I'm just wondering if you know, you know how effective

(08:29):
these treatments are.

Speaker 5 (08:31):
From my own personal experience, I don't know a lot
about it because I've never had someone, apart from you know,
doing the occasional borer bomb sort of thing myself, which
is a little bit more diy, I've never actually had
a company come in and do it. I suppose the
big question and we talk about it with rud obviously
from time to time. Is that bora are on the
wing around September October, which seems to be the ideal

(08:55):
time to capture them as they emerge from the timber.

Speaker 8 (09:00):
But I.

Speaker 5 (09:02):
Also actually it was a conversation I had with some
people yesterday and at the Home and gownd show was
they had bore a treatment done on the underside of
the house because they had not significant amount of borer,
but enough to be a bit concerned about. And I'm
guessing that the treatment that you apply, let's say, if
you're not trying to capture the live borer is on

(09:23):
the surface, that makes it uninhabitable for them going forward,
because I guess what you're looking for is something that's
going to stay active for a period of time, not
just for one cycle.

Speaker 7 (09:36):
Yeah, so they are going to spray underneath the house
and in the ceiling.

Speaker 5 (09:44):
Yes, And.

Speaker 9 (09:47):
Also they bore a whole.

Speaker 7 (09:49):
The people that the man that's going to do it
bore tiny little holes up under the rustic weather board,
you know, at the bottom of the weather board.

Speaker 5 (09:58):
Oh yes, through the bottom plate yep.

Speaker 7 (10:00):
Yeah, Because well I think it might even be at
points further up as well, because or maybe it is
just the bottom plate, but because there's no dwangs in
an old house, this whatever tim bore is, the poison
or the as the whatever you'd call it, the pest

(10:21):
control stuff can go straight up between what are those
uprights that's called in the house. Yep, the stud Yeah,
it can go straight up. So you know, I can
see there's kinde a bit of work involved. So I
guess this is why it's going to cost a couple
of thousands. Yeah, but I just hope it's effective. And

(10:42):
I've heard that the boor on the wing from Novembers
Thry till till March, so oh okay, so I'm hoping
it's a longer period than yeah, short, Sure.

Speaker 5 (10:54):
I think what it is is there's obviously that time
that they emerge and then the time that they're active.
Let's say. So yeah, but look, I can we can
certainly have a quick chat with rut about it at
eight thirty. Look, it sounds like and I guess the
other thing to do with all companies. And again this
was a conversation we had yesterday about you know, selecting
trades people if you don't already have some experience of

(11:15):
the company or so on. Is I think it's quite
reasonable to say to anyone, any trades person or contractor
or service provider, Hey, look, can you provide me with
at least two numbers of clients who you've done work for,
let's say, within the last twelve months, and I'd like
to give them a call. I don't think that's unreasonable, right. So,

(11:40):
you know, if I'm a contractor and someone says to me, Okay,
I don't know you, I've found your number online or whatever,
you know, if you're not getting that one on one
recommendation is to go, can you please give me the
name of a client that you've worked with recently and
can I give them a call?

Speaker 7 (12:01):
That's why I'm marringing, because I just didn't know who
to ask. I've asked on my local peace you know
what that is a social media thing? Had any answers?

Speaker 9 (12:10):
Really?

Speaker 5 (12:11):
I think that's the correctly interesting that we've just had
a text come through, and you treat the timber once
they're on the wing, the damage has already done. The
gold standard is timbore, which is the one that.

Speaker 7 (12:23):
You That's what I said.

Speaker 5 (12:26):
Yes, So this whoever is text is from has said
they're on the right track.

Speaker 7 (12:34):
And the thing the good thing or the appealing thing
to me or to these two appealing things. Well as
they do give a certificate of a ten year great.
I don't know if it's a warranty exactly a ten.
Perhaps it's not a teen. It's a specificate saying that
they've done this treatment. Because if I needed to sell
the house, yes, I don't, you know, I would like

(12:58):
something to show that I've done done this. You know
some people I have talked to one or two people.
Every old house around here is Laura, but I mean
it's on our four walls, just not inside, not yet anyway.
You're all on the outside facing heavy weather board. And

(13:19):
I've been injecting with a brand called no More. It's
very tedious. I can't reach it all. I've had to
call on any friends or relatives that are young enough
to get up a ladder quite high and slowly each
hole this, you know, a little tube, and it's very

(13:41):
child well. I don't know if that's affectible or not.
And I think they meant to follow it up with
step two, which I can't remember what it is on
the can. But I'm just thinking, Look, I've got my
husband's very ill at present, and I'm just thinking I've
got enough to worry about. I think I might just
have to, you know, pay out over two thousand and
get someone they know what they're doing to do it.

Speaker 5 (14:02):
It sounds like you're on the right track, and I
think and it getting a referral asking for a previous
client that you can talk to is probably the last
part of your due diligence and then go for it.
So good luck and thanks to the person that texts
through as well to support that idea. All the very
best to you and take care. Your news talk seid B.

(14:23):
It has just gone twenty minutes after six. We've got
a couple of lines spare. Oh, eight hundred eighty ten.
Eighty is the number to call whether.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
You're painting the ceiling, fixing the fens, or wondering how
to fix that hole in the wall. Give feeder wolf
Cap call on eighty the resident builder on News Talks B.

Speaker 5 (14:41):
Your News Talk seed B, it is twenty four. If
I stop for just a second there, there is now
exactly twenty four minutes after six. In a very good
morning to you all. Eight hundred eighty ten eighty is
the number to call.

Speaker 8 (14:52):
Get a Paul yet.

Speaker 3 (14:55):
How are you very well?

Speaker 5 (14:57):
Thank you?

Speaker 8 (14:59):
Hey, I've just got a painting query painting in the bathroom.
And we've been in this house probably about or nearly
three years, I guess, and the previous people who were
in the house were only here a shortish time. But
they painted throughout the house what the same color everywhere

(15:20):
and in this particular area to there on suite. The
paint so you know, like a funny sort of crazy
crack effect on like around the top of the walls,
and so they had some still left over, so that
I'll go and I'll redo that. So that's that's what

(15:41):
I did. But I did it again with the paint
that I that I use. It's I mean the paints
that I'm using a razine, and the previous people had
used the razine. Obviously the original color was like a
lemony color. Because the house is about twenty years old.
They painted over it with this with the razine, and

(16:02):
I just look, I can't remember exactly what it was
now because the tin's gone, but I think it might
have been enough krill, right, and it was a sort
of like a t kind of colors probably wasn't that
one exactly, but it's that sort of shade and so
scorne all this crazy tracks. So I've gone into the
bathroom now to you I prepared all them or send

(16:23):
of them all back. I'm wondering whether I need to
put an undercat over it too before I put the
next yeah player of paint at the top of it.
So I'm just wondering what your thoughts were on there,
whether it was like I've got some quick dry under
coat there, or whether I need to shure seal. I'm
not too sure which way to go.

Speaker 5 (16:43):
Yeah, Funny, I had a bathroom last year that was
doing exactly the same thing, and this was after repainting
it in twenty twenty, and because it was a small
bathroom and I don't think I had the ventilation right,
had these issues and the paint deteriorated really quickly, which
was a bit disappointing. So what I ended up doing

(17:06):
is a couple of things. One is making sure that
the surface that any sort of mold or growth that's
there gets knocked back. So I used the actually I
use the razine sort of interior paint prep, which is
quite a powerful chemical. Because I was slopping it around

(17:26):
willy nilly, and when I looked at my shirt and
my shorts, that had taken all the color out of them. Right,
So it certainly works. So I went through, you know,
clean the surface really really thoroughly using that treatment, let
it rinse that off, let it dry for twenty four
hours or so at least. Then I used shore Seal.

(17:48):
You can now get a water born version of the
shore seal, so not the solvent born one. I still
use the solvent born one, but there are options. And
then I used it was like the bathroom space coat,
and that seems to have lasted a lot better. But
I think the chemical treatment or the treatment is really important.

(18:08):
The shore seal is just kind of binds everything together,
which is what you're after. And then the appropriate top coat.
So a water born wall paint, see the luster Krill
is more for trims, so I'm not sure that that's
necessarily the right thing to do on flat surfaces. I'd
go for the space coat.

Speaker 8 (18:31):
Okay, yeah, so I've already bought it now, but lust
called kitchen and bathrooms. I wanted to semi gloss on
the wall.

Speaker 6 (18:40):
Rather than a flat parent's.

Speaker 8 (18:43):
To clean white down yep. Yeah, it's just that I
had I had this the quick dry undercoat. I've got
plenty of that, and I was hoping not to.

Speaker 10 (18:52):
Have to.

Speaker 11 (18:54):
Look.

Speaker 5 (18:54):
I'm sure to'd be okay, But I think if you know,
I suppose if you take a real belt embraces approach
to it, you'd go. You know, is there an advantist
to using pigmented seal the shore seal? Yes, there is,
And for the sake of an extra tin of paint,
I think I'd probably go and grab it and you
can use it for something else later on as well.

(19:14):
The other thing to look at, of course, is what's
the ventilation like inside that space? Like do you have
really good extraction? Ideally, do you have the If you've
got extraction in the bathroom, is it on a timer
so that it continues to run. I think one of
the big problems we have with extraction in bathrooms is
we've got a fan that we turn on when we're

(19:35):
in there, so as soon as we leave the room,
we tend to turn it off and it stops. Whereas
if you can install a timer on it, that will
you can you know you're heading off to work, right,
so you turn it off. But the fan is on
a timer and it will continue to run for a
little while and then one of the I haven't had
a chance to install it yet, but I picked up
a new fan from Simmis, which is sim X, which

(19:59):
actually has a humidity sensor included in the fan, and
so it runs at a low rate constantly just getting
airflow through the bathroom, which is really important. And then
when you turn it on or when it senses the humidity,
it ramps up and runs at a higher rate until
such time as the humidity drops back down again. So

(20:21):
there's some and this is relatively new to the market, right,
So you know, there's one of the things that's changed
quite dramatically in terms of like building science and home
comfort and that sort of thing is more and more
people are talking about ventilation, which we kind of never
talked about when our houses were really drafty because we
just had lots of infiltration and air floating around. But

(20:45):
as our houses become a little bit more air tight,
then the need to ventilate becomes really really important. So
the ventilation industry, I guess has responded by that to
that by introducing new products including like this seems really
sensible and simple, isn't it. You've got an extractor fan
in the bathroom with its own humidity sensor that ramps

(21:06):
up and it needs to fantastic.

Speaker 8 (21:07):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, we do have a like one of
those three and one fan like things. Yeah, we and
that we leave it on probably for half an hour
after we've finished our share, and so we're using the
bathroom sets.

Speaker 5 (21:21):
Yeah, and then it's you know, is the run of
deducting relatively straight? Is there a decent size opening for
it to exhaust out of those sorts of things? So
have a look at that that and you just make
sure you've got that part of it sorted as well.

Speaker 8 (21:36):
Yeah, which we did. So we've got it's only two
meter run and that's straight.

Speaker 3 (21:40):
How long is the run?

Speaker 8 (21:42):
It's under two meters?

Speaker 5 (21:43):
Oh, great, fantastic. Okay, Sorry at one stage I thought
you said ten and I was like, won't do it
a lot after ten meters? Heany, good luck with all
of that, Paul, take all the this fantastic cool. Oh
eight hundred eighty ten eighty. If you'd like to join us,
it'd be lovely to hear from you. I tell you what,
will take a short break, then we'll talk to Bruce

(22:03):
if you'd like to join in eight hundred and eighty
ten eighty is the number.

Speaker 3 (22:07):
Squeaky door or squeaky floor.

Speaker 1 (22:10):
Get the right advice from Peter Wolfcare, the resident builder
on News Talks EDB.

Speaker 5 (22:15):
You and news talksb open line on all things building construction,
whether it's painting, building borer, or regulations, rules and restrictions.
I guess on what you can do what you can't do.
I was looking through I was looking for a specific
reference in Schedule one of the Building Act around if

(22:36):
you're going to do remedial work on a building element
that you could possibly do without requiring a building consent,
at what to what level do you need to do
that work? Does it need to be to the level
of the building code. At the time, it was all
about windows and sill trays and things like that, So

(22:59):
years ago you didn't necessarily need to have a complete
sill tray under a window. Today it is much more
common out of the guidelines. So if you were doing
some work replacing a window, do you need to do
it to today's code or the previous code. It all
got very technical in the end, but we did kind
of get an answer eventually. I've got one of those

(23:20):
meetings tomorrow as well, so that'll be fun. Oh eight
one hundred and eighty ten eighty is the number to call, Bruce.
A very good warning to you. How are you doing?

Speaker 6 (23:28):
Yeah?

Speaker 10 (23:28):
Good, just looking at doing a kitchen upgrade. Yes, and
it's about twenty five years old. So our dilemma is
that we have to replace the kitchen benches.

Speaker 8 (23:45):
Yes.

Speaker 10 (23:47):
We've also got a quote to replace all the cupboards
and pantry doors, which seems a bit of a waste
of money when they really are quite in good shape.
It's only they've only got grease and grime on them.
And I'm just wondering whether there's any product out there

(24:07):
that I can actually get them up to scratch, buff
them up, or I don't really want to paint them.

Speaker 5 (24:17):
The jos that are on at the moment. And the panels,
what are they, how are they done? What are they
made of?

Speaker 10 (24:26):
Timber? Doors? It's got a blue, deep blue colored paint
on it, so it's it's I preserve, it's sprayed on factory.
I guess there might be four likeer.

Speaker 5 (24:42):
Doors, right, Okay, well then I'm to be I'm not
I'm not quite sure why you would object to repainting
them if they've already been painted.

Speaker 10 (24:56):
Well, they've never well they would have been painted in
the factory, yes, yeah. So what I could do as
I could replace the benchtop, which I have to do, yep,
and then I'm going to get the house internally painted
the whole lot. Yes, So I could get the painter

(25:17):
to do the pantry doors and cupboards for me as well.

Speaker 5 (25:23):
There I can understand why. You know, Look, if you
were to get the painter to do it, and I'm
sure you've got a good painter and all the rest
of it, you know, you can only get a certain
level of finish, right, a certain standard. Whereas, for example,
if you were to find and there are a couple
of companies, and I think there's a couple of companies
that advertise here at ZB around kitchen makeovers, right, so

(25:46):
they might come and take the doors and draw fronts off,
take them away, clean them up, respray them, and reinstall them.
So you'll get sort of a factory finish rather than
a site finish to them. Another option that I've seen
people do is you have someone come in take all
the doors off and make new doors that will fit

(26:09):
in the existing because you're right, if the carcasses themselves
are good, right, And we've all seen carcasses where let's
say the edge of the veneer is starting to swell
up and the trim is starting to come off, or
it's got a bit blackened and moldy and that sort
of thing. But if yours are in reasonable condition, and
it's the draw fronts and doors that showing signs of age,

(26:33):
then just replace those along with your bench top.

Speaker 10 (26:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because I mean, I mean, you know
in the quote we've got new handles, for example, there's
nothing wrong handles. I no, yeah, yeah, I was just wondering,
like I gave them a good washdown yesterday, but I
can't budge any of the grime. And I think it's

(26:58):
just wear and tear. It's been twenty five years old,
it's had its life.

Speaker 5 (27:04):
Yeah, I think.

Speaker 8 (27:04):
So.

Speaker 5 (27:05):
Look, there's a couple of companies around that specialize in it,
and I like, there's always for all the skill in
the world, there's always going to be a difference between
the finish you can achieve, let's say, on site for
doing some of these things, versus what you can do
off site. And i'd challenge anyone to say you can

(27:26):
get the same effect on you know, it's just if
they take the doors off, take them away, you know,
strip them, clean them, strip them and repaint them in
a factory setting, you'll get a much better quality job
and then they can bring them back. Maybe you want
to keep the handles, Maybe you need the hand The
handles might be fine in terms of their condition, but
they might be a bit outdated, right, So trends change

(27:47):
those sorts of things. My inclination would be to probably
sub the workout to a company that specialize in it,
and they might also be able to change some of
the draw slides over to soft clothes. And there's all
those other little tweaks, you know, because kitchens, I know,
because mine's getting onto sort of eighteen years old this
year as well, and there is stuff that I would

(28:09):
do if it was a if I was installing the
kitchen today that it just wasn't available eighteen years ago.
So you could take advantage of some of the new
technology around kitchens as well. But I'd be really inclined
to go, hey, get someone in and try and go
for a factory finish on all of those surfaces.

Speaker 10 (28:29):
Yeah, yeah, because all I need is a face lift.

Speaker 5 (28:32):
Yeah exactly, Yeah exactly. So there's a bunch of companies
out there, certainly the ones that advertise here at ZB
is called My Kitchen Makeover, so you could always try
them as well. All the best, do you, Bruce, have
a good day. Oh eight hundred eighty ten eighty is
the number to call John. Good morning, Good morning Peak.
That very well, thank you.

Speaker 12 (28:53):
Well. I want to talk about over regulation Peak and
it's relevant right through New Zealand. And do you remember
we were talking about, I think last week some of
the flood problems that there and all the rest of it.
I was I'm a member of a committee to do
with the river down here in Southland, and I've heard

(29:17):
rumors about that the Environment councils were considering flattening all
the floodbaks in New Zealand right and yes, now at
the meeting I did raise that point and I was
told by the Chairman of the Environment Southland that yes,

(29:39):
it had been discussed exactly by the environment councils up
north where there's been significant flooding and damage done. And
one of the topics around it was that the councilors
didn't know, if they were going to be held personally
or legally responsible from the management. And one way of

(30:02):
trying to protect themselves was supposedly flat normal flood base
and I thought it was like being in a bloody
man has to teaparty beyond.

Speaker 5 (30:12):
Yeah, Although you've got to contrast that with a story
that I had a look at briefly last week around
you know, proposals for mitigating flood damage in Wairah, which
got heavily hit in the cyclone Gabriel, where they are
actually going to remove a number of houses that are
close to the river, and it seems like they're going

(30:33):
to install more sort of you know defenses let's say,
alongside the river. So rather than removing them, they're actually
adding them. So that doesn't quite tally with you know,
an overall approach to say, let's remove them. I know,
for example, in Auckland that there's about I think it's
almost seven hundred houses that are going to be purchased

(30:56):
by council because they recognize that, you know, the flooding
that we've had is likely to reoccur, in which case
there's no safe space. Let's take that you can habitate
in that area again, I don't know that that's that's
happening right now, because you can go online find the
list right of the numbers of houses that are going

(31:18):
to be purchased or bought out combined through government and
local government.

Speaker 9 (31:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (31:25):
Well, but I think too there is you know, I
think where we've tried to I suppose intervene more than
than is warranted in terms of, you know, managing nature
and so on, some of that's going to get overwhelmed, right,
And so if flood banks don't work anymore, and we've

(31:46):
tried to either put housing or agriculture or industry into
areas where it's just not going to work going forward,
then maybe removing some of those floodplanks allowing areas to
I mean, all of the discussion at the moment about
moving the center of Cumu, you know, a small town
just northwest of where I am right now that's under

(32:08):
serious consideration, is that there is no real achievable fix,
So how about we just move the township.

Speaker 12 (32:17):
Yeah, Like of the other angles that I'm coming from
this construction background thing is that I'm aware of all
of those things. And you can say what you're just
talking about that's really good, But we need to deal
what between the flood banks. It's more aggressively, if you

(32:38):
want to use that word. And we've got built up
to gravel in the.

Speaker 5 (32:42):
River ye discussion too.

Speaker 6 (32:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 12 (32:45):
So look, unless we deal with what's in between the
flood banks properly, we're never going to fix the problem.
And I mean we've got to look at rivers where
they go out into the sea, the estuary opening. Yeah,
and it's just about regulation. Now there's some good regulation

(33:09):
and there's some not so good regulation. And you're talking
about getting consent for doing all sorts of things. And
we're looking there's going to have to be done, some
repairs done on the flood banks, and the councils got
to get resource concerns off their own council to do
something to fix the floodbank. I really struggle with that, yeah, And.

Speaker 5 (33:34):
I mean the whole reform of the Resource Management Act
which has been talked about for ages and ages and ages,
and I think the previous administration somehow managed to make
some reforms which increase the number of pages rather than
reduced it. It'll be interesting to see what these guys
do about it, because I know it's on the agenda
John appreciate that and look, to be fair, I could

(33:55):
talk about this for a long time because I do
actually quite enjoy talking about infrastructure, and you know, we've
got some real challenges. If you're in Auckland and you're
one of those, I'm pretty sure it's about seven hundred
house is across the Auckland Council area that are now
on a list to be brought out. Some people that
I know well got a letter pretty much out of
the blue the other day going hey, we're going to

(34:17):
make you an offer on your property. So it's real
and it's happening. Oh, eight hundred eighty ten eighty is
the number to call. If you've got a question of
a DIY nature. You could call us right now. I'll
take a short break. Me back with Doug after the break.

Speaker 1 (34:29):
Helping you get those DIY projects done right. The resident
builder with peta Wolfcat Call eight Youth Talk.

Speaker 5 (34:37):
V News Talks. It's ten minutes away from seven o'clock. Doug,
Good morning.

Speaker 11 (34:44):
Morning, Pete.

Speaker 5 (34:44):
Yeah, yeah, very well, thanks.

Speaker 11 (34:46):
Yeah, it's just an easy one for you than the
previous schooler.

Speaker 5 (34:51):
Sure solving your world's issues here.

Speaker 11 (34:54):
Yeah, yeah, you were just looking at putting the outdoor
area on now on the outside from our family area
which is out there, yep. But the gable goalas that
sort of stuff. And then we've had a builder come
around and he said to look at it, and he
said that.

Speaker 13 (35:16):
Like the.

Speaker 11 (35:19):
Gable types, they've said that we do not need a
consent in terms of the swim meters.

Speaker 5 (35:25):
Yep.

Speaker 11 (35:27):
But that's even when they're hogging in taking the same
roofline through the the governers and everything are going to
be hooked on to the existing down puts. Yes, then
the builders come around, he said, as soon as you
open up an envelope on you need a consent.

Speaker 6 (35:50):
Is that correct?

Speaker 5 (35:52):
Okay? Yeah, that's an interesting way. So the other thing
is the structure that you're adding on, is it going
to have roofing on it? Yes, then that triggers the
requirement for consent, right okay as well? So yeah, if

(36:12):
interesting is comment around, you know, opening up the envelope.
So if for example, you were going to remove weather
boards and extend rafters out that sort of thing, then
I can understand why that impacts on the existing envelope
and might trigger a requirement for a building consent. I
don't know that necessarily, you know, like bolting a ribbon plate,

(36:35):
for example, to the exterior of an existing cladding or
existing wall necessarily triggers a requirement for a building consent.
Although you know the other thing, and I'm sure you're
aware of this, and I'm sure your builders as well,
that regardless of whether or not work requires a building consent,
it must be done to the building code. So things
like span of rafters, span of lintols, fixings, bracing, depth

(36:59):
of embedment of posts, all of those sorts of things
still need to be as per the building Code even
if you don't get a building consent. But my understanding,
and funnily enough, I was reading through this just the
other day, is very much around if it's got a
roof on it, then that typically triggers the requirement for

(37:20):
building consent. So if it's open rafters, you know it's
it's there for aesthetics, let's say, or maybe a bit
of shade. Great, as soon as you put a roof
on it, building consent.

Speaker 11 (37:30):
Yeah, Oh, that's what we're wanting to do, is to
make it look part of the house. Yeahs you know
when the eave comes out, yes, on the on.

Speaker 5 (37:41):
The gable, so what type of roofing do you have
at the moment.

Speaker 11 (37:45):
It's a corrugated iron.

Speaker 5 (37:47):
Okay, so would you look at extending that corrugated iron
out over this new structure as as solid or as clear.

Speaker 11 (37:56):
Yeah, we're tied on and with the roofing iron, yeah,
and then maybe the clear underneath.

Speaker 3 (38:01):
Yeah, I'm with you.

Speaker 6 (38:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (38:03):
Look, from from what you're starting to describe it, I
think he's right, you do need a building consent for this.

Speaker 9 (38:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 11 (38:11):
Yeah, because he said, like, obviously we're gonna have like
more of at anything happens from there, very good point.
They're tying it into the deck, Maybe we need to
go down and just faulting onto the deck they would
have to, Yeah, to be happening just for a aluminium structure,

(38:38):
I think. But what your point of viewers is actually
just build on.

Speaker 5 (38:43):
Oh I see, you have those options of buying kit
sets or something like that because they're not attached to
the house, and the roofs they open. So some people go, well,
because I can open it, Therefore it's not the same
as a solid roof.

Speaker 11 (39:03):
But we're probably he can get a gable aluminiums structure and.

Speaker 5 (39:07):
Then free standing.

Speaker 11 (39:09):
Well, now that's it all. Yeah, it's the same as
an extension, but the aluminium, oh okay. And then then
you put your carrigan iron on top and bar oh
okay instead of actually been timber as an addition. That's or.

Speaker 5 (39:27):
Yeah, interesting, I suspect regardless of what you build it
out of the fact that it's attached to the house
and it's got a roof on it and it's reasonably tall,
all of those things would would trigger requirement for building content.
Good luck with that, mate, all the best, All right,
take care, all the best to you and Lee. We'll
see if we can squeak this one.

Speaker 6 (39:47):
And how are you.

Speaker 1 (39:49):
Very good?

Speaker 14 (39:50):
Good morning. We are renovateen nineteen twenties cottage, we think,
because once again we had canceled ahead of fire.

Speaker 6 (40:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (40:00):
Absolutely yep.

Speaker 14 (40:03):
So the new reelboards seat of gone on. They don't
always fit flush with the one below it, leaving a
lovely gap. So we're at the painting stage. Do we
need to fill the gaps because the paint's trying to
jump through that gap and making a mess.

Speaker 5 (40:21):
How big is the gap? Like sort of three to
four mil or one to two mil?

Speaker 14 (40:28):
Uh, And it's probably step three mil.

Speaker 5 (40:31):
In that yeah, and is it only where you've got
the combination of old and new.

Speaker 14 (40:38):
No, no, new on you as well, right.

Speaker 5 (40:43):
Oh, I wonder whether what the what the builder might
have done is they've they've got a weatherboard that's a
regular profile now, but they've set it up to so
that the spacing is the same as your existing one,
but the profile means at the bottom of the board
kicks out a little bit. Look, you can seal it,

(41:04):
but weather boards move. So what you tend to get
it is this like you know stretchy effect happening where
at certain times of the year you'll see that kind
of opening and pulling apart. No, I don't actually think
there's any harm in adding some celent there, particularly in
areas where you can see it areas that you don't
see it. I'd probably leave it alone. I hope that

(41:25):
helps leap all the best back after news and sport,
top of the r at seven.

Speaker 1 (41:29):
Measure twice God once, but maybe call Pete first, feed
you walfcaf the resident builder News Talks.

Speaker 5 (41:36):
He'd be news Talks, he'd be welcome back to the show. Oh,
eight hundred and eighty ten eighty, as always is the
number to call taking your calls right through till eight
point thirty. We don't have any guests joining us today.
Sort of working on a couple coming forward, including something
I've been working on for a little while around hearing protection.

(41:58):
It turns out it's I've had a few emails this week.
I think it's next week is Hearing Awareness Week. It's
a bit of a sort of personal crusade thing for me.
I have to say, is you know, if you're involved
in construction like I've been for all of these years,
or if you're in high noise environments, or if you're

(42:21):
doing DIY and you're using power tools and they're noisy,
and most of them are, then I think hearing protection
is really really important, and it's kind of a pernicious
thing where and I've even noticed it for myself right So,
I think my hearing is still pretty good, and I've

(42:42):
been reasonably diligent about wearing hearing protection when I'm using
power tools or making lots of noise, and I've always
opted to invest in quality gear that feels comfortable to wear,
and so on and so forth. So I think at
this point in time, after getting close to forty years
in the area in the sector that my hearing is

(43:04):
still pretty good. But it's one of those things where
if you don't use it and your hearing starts to deteriorate,
then you think that it's not as loud as it
is because you're already starting to go deaf. And then
we know now some of these long term impacts. And
I've always had a lingering doubt around the efficacy of
noise canceling headphones for hearing protection. Anyway, I've decided that

(43:28):
my opinion doesn't matter. I'm going to find an expert,
and I'm on the hunt for an expert right now
and i think I've found someone, so stand by. We'll
do some stuff on that. In the same way that
I'm going to an event tomorrow at One Tree Hill
College where they've taken an old house that was part
of the where the eastern bustway along ted Kaar Drive

(43:49):
is being done. So instead of those houses being demolished,
some of them have gone been transported in this case
to the school where students along with trade professionals have
refurbished the house. That's an introduction into the trades that
can be experienced by the students at One Tree Hill
College and I noticed on the guest list that Minister

(44:10):
Chris Pink, who we've interviewed on the show last year,
will be there, so I'll have a bit of a
chat with him, and we're going to set up another
interview with Chris Pink as well. And then we've got
I mentioned earlier Ventilation Storm who was with us last year.
Storm up and from Simmicks is going to join us
again in the next couple of weeks, so we'll get
some we'll get some interviews underway, but the hearing one

(44:32):
will be really really interesting. I'm looking forward to that.
Oh eight hundred eighty ten eighty is the number to call.
Thanks for your patience, Brian, A very good morning to you.
Hi there, Hella, very well.

Speaker 12 (44:43):
Hi.

Speaker 8 (44:43):
I've just got a new house being built nextor our
property and I can see a storm order price that's
been put in and it's coming down to our property
and there's no storm order connection, nothing known infrastructure at
all there. And the year I rung up the Awkwall

(45:03):
City Council and I'll put it through and they get
you can put a report through to the building Consents team. Yeah,
and I've done that, and I just was wondering if
I'm on the right path or not.

Speaker 5 (45:15):
Absolutely. I mean the other option, and I know that
there's not always that easy to do, is to actually
hop across the fence, talk to the builder or the
project manager or the developer or the owner of the
property and go, hey, what's your plan here?

Speaker 6 (45:30):
Yeah?

Speaker 8 (45:30):
I know, it just it just looks awfully sneaky. It's
like I'm the only one that can see it, right.
It's because I'm not looking over the fence and or
Parke's been buried, everything's been displaced, the big open one
hundred and mill pipe, and I'm thinking when that Bruce
goes on, I know it's going to happen. Yeah, absolutely,
fly yeah, yeah, And I just just wonder whether it's

(45:52):
probably best to go straight to the top.

Speaker 5 (45:54):
Look, I think you're doing the right thing. I would
probably go directly to council too, because there's no way,
I would hope right now that you could get a
building consent. Is this a new build or an alteration?

Speaker 3 (46:07):
Yeah, yes, it's a new building.

Speaker 5 (46:09):
Okay, all right, So they will have had to have
proven what how they're going to control stormwater. Now, maybe
what they're going to do is take the end of
that pipe and go further to do you know where
the council line might be with the public liners.

Speaker 8 (46:25):
It would be right back on the road for to
somehow pump it back.

Speaker 5 (46:29):
They're going the wrong way. Genius far Okay, And is
it just one house or is it like twenty five.

Speaker 8 (46:37):
It's one house, one house? Yeah, it just looks looks
a bit sneaky.

Speaker 5 (46:41):
Yeah, yeah, look either way. The the the absolute is
that they must connect, they must control their stormwater, right so,
you know, potentially depending on where they might have said, hey,
look we can do on site stormwater control. We're going

(47:02):
to be drilling down, or we're going to do a chamber,
or we're going to do it chamber and then we're
going to pump. Council I think, you know, for an
entire house would be really reluctant to say, yep, you
can send all of your storm water because you're talking
like thousands of liters right in a decent rainfall into

(47:23):
a chamber and then pump it back up. They typically
don't like those solutions. They like gravity feed solutions. So
they would be better off going to the road frontage
and having it on a siphon system. If it had
to travel slightly uphill rather than allow it to go
downhill and then have a mechanical solution. You can do
mechanical solutions, but again not desirable in terms of collecting

(47:49):
all of the roof water. And certainly nowadays, if you
do have mechanical solutions i e. Storm waters into a chamber,
then there's a pump. Typically you have to have a
second pump in there for a redundancy there. Often they
have to be alarmed so that you know if it's
not working and you can do something about it, because

(48:10):
you know what you don't want to happen, and what
your concern is about is that, hey, all that water
is going to end up in my property and that's
a no no. Yeah yeah okay, So yeah, you're definitely
on the right path and I think you're right to
be concerned.

Speaker 8 (48:24):
Yeah yeah, yeah, it's all good.

Speaker 11 (48:26):
Thank you.

Speaker 5 (48:27):
Yeah, oh mate, all of our best. Take care. Thanks Brian.
Always interested to know how those stories play out too. Oh,
eight hundred eighty ten eighty is the number to call.

Speaker 3 (48:43):
A wee.

Speaker 5 (48:43):
While ago we had a text or a question around
painting in a bathroom and some crazing that happened. So
just to follow up to that from a text from
a guy who your person who is a painter morning,
I'm a painter. In the issue is that the original
sealers were never used over the waxy surface. For example,
it's aquiline. So what we know about aquiline and bathrooms

(49:04):
is if you're going to seal it, you need to
use sure seal, you need to use a pigmented sealer
of some description. Quick dry or standard wallboard sealers won't
work on those and so it may even keep happening
after repainting, because it's the key into the substrate that's
really important, he said. Unfortunately, with some new homes, some

(49:27):
painters are basically just lazy and they're using the wrong
sealers and they just you know, they can't be bothered
swapping out between a sealer that you might be able
to use in the hallway next door to what you're
using in the bathroom. So thank you very much. So
it's taking a little while to get to that text,
but that's you're absolutely spot on. No surprises there. Oh,
eight one hundred and eighty ten eighty. Actually another quick

(49:48):
text before we go, we might go to the break
in a minute. Good morning, We've got a three year
old townhouse, and I've noticed that in some areas the
screws of the plaster board have started to pop out slightly.
They become visible through the paint. I was wondering what
the cause of that would be, and if it could
be related to any moisture, or whether there is something
that can have and doesn't need any further assessment. Thank you. No,

(50:10):
it's basically I'm just going to lay it out there
and go it's poor workmanship, right. It happens, it can happen,
but it shouldn't happen consistently, and it shouldn't happen a lot.
So if what you're starting to see is the screws popping,
chances are the it's a combination of things. The wall

(50:33):
framing might have been too wet at the time that
the plasterboard was fixed, so it's gone over. The plasterboard's
gone on over wet framing, the framing has dried, and
as it shrinks, the screw doesn't shrink because it's metal,
and it starts to push out. Might also be that
they use screws but not enough glue, and so they

(50:56):
don't sink the screw far enough. In doesn't hold the
board to the wall lining, and if there's not the
right amount of glue in the right places, then you
might keet popping from that, and I think it should
be repaired. So if it's happening, and it's it's you know,
more than a little bit, then I would say I

(51:16):
would probably talk to the developer and get them back.
Three years might not be possible. They might have said
look for a year, will warranty that type of thing,
But I would try and fix it either, you know,
scrap scrap the top of the screw head clear, screw
it in a bit, or just take it out and
then stop and patch the wall. But you're probably end

(51:37):
up repainting entire walls as well. Right, oh oh eight,
one hundred and eighty ten eighty is the number to call,
and let's go to Grunt straight away. Gooday, Grant, how
are you doing?

Speaker 11 (51:48):
Yeah?

Speaker 15 (51:49):
Good things all right there?

Speaker 5 (51:51):
Absolutely yeah.

Speaker 15 (51:52):
So I think this one will intrigue you. So we've
got a BIA cycle system that's a sewerage system YEP.
Three chamber system air rights, first chamber take all the
house waste y air right the second chamber, third chamber
pumps out to a field fifteen years old, worked brilliantly,
no issues. Council inspected every six months perhont Last time

(52:16):
the guy said, lilak, you know the first chamber is
getting full.

Speaker 12 (52:19):
You need to empty it.

Speaker 15 (52:20):
So we waited three months until it was nice and dry.
We got it emptied, no worries. Guess what, having it
empty put a crack in the plastic tank. Okay, so yeah, yeah, exactly.
So now we're up for a replacement. Here's where it
gets interesting. I've had three separate contractors come around. The

(52:40):
most preferred contractor, he says, we need to go for
a consent, but it's a light for like system. In fact,
the same manufacturer, the insurance company, and two other contractors saying, hell,
don't tell the council, that'll be the start of your problem.
And you know it is one hundred percent like for
like system. It's still an aeration system. And at the beginning,

(53:03):
you know, the testing and the consents required to put
this thing in the first place are enormous. So what's
your view on that consent or no consent?

Speaker 5 (53:15):
Perfect timing in a sense, because I spent a little
bit of time this week trying to work my way
through Schedule one of the Act, right, so there's like
a two page summary, and then I downloaded, I clicked
on download, and I ended up with four hundred and
sixty two pages of the Building Act, which I haven't
finished reading yet but I will. So like the Schedule

(53:39):
one of the Act sets out work that can be
done without necessarily requiring a consent. And then once you
start reading through the two page summary of it, in
the Act, it talks about, you know, replacing items the
same item, right, and then it talks about for example,
weather boards you can replace a reasonable number. Then it
talks about one of the exemptions. Well, so it sets

(54:02):
out what you can do without necessarily requiring a consent.
Then in that is accept in situations where it's a
failure of a system, and so there is a possibility
that if but it's not a failure, as in, your
system hasn't failed, it's just that it's got to crack
in it. So you're it's not like a window, for example,

(54:22):
that's leaked because it was poorly made or poorly installed.
It worked, it's broken and you're replacing it like ful like,
and particularly I think if you're going to use a
replacement unit from the original manufacturer. I think you could
do that without a consent.

Speaker 8 (54:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 15 (54:39):
Two of the two of the contractors are saying, look,
it's emergency works, so it has to be done right away. Yes,
and it is in all respects the similar system. And
they're talking about like it's a maintenance surgeon. Just go
ahead and do it.

Speaker 8 (54:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (54:54):
I think so too.

Speaker 15 (54:55):
I think content can take months.

Speaker 5 (54:57):
Yep.

Speaker 12 (54:58):
And you know this is a job.

Speaker 5 (55:00):
You need to have this done now. I'm curious, just
going back to the original point. So once it was
once the tank was empty out, what do you think
caused the cracking? Just the fact that it had no
internal volume.

Speaker 15 (55:11):
Yeah, I had to sign a waiver. This particular company,
Devon nine thousand. They no longer make them anymore notorious
for when they get emptied. Their thraw is not level.
It has some undulations right, like chambers, and apparently because
there's no hydrostatic pressure at this time of the year,
the drying the ground is bone dry and you have

(55:31):
to fill it up immediately, which we did. But it's
just the tank goes and it cracked.

Speaker 11 (55:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 15 (55:38):
Yeah, yah, they warn me this would happen, and yeah,
it's this particular system isn't made anymore.

Speaker 6 (55:44):
The company still.

Speaker 15 (55:45):
Exists, but they've upgraded the type of plastic. And yeah,
I mean it's a nightmare. It's just something you wouldn't
and you know you're talking twenty grand and if you
have to wait for a consent could be months. And
in the worst case scenario, if you've got a very
bad lead, the accounts that can already order you out
of the house.

Speaker 6 (56:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (56:07):
Look, you know, given that you're you're going to you know,
if you said, look, I'm going to do it myself,
i'd go. But if you're going to use, you know,
a suitably experienced and qualified contractor, you're going to be
using the same product again. You know, even if it's
not required, you could get a producer statement from the

(56:28):
installer saying this is what I've done. You've got the
warranty documents from the supplier of the product, document the work.
I can't see the benefit of going and getting a
consent for this.

Speaker 15 (56:41):
The products are all certified and you can't buy them.
It has to be done by draining, are you? But
you know they come along with a digger's the one
day job. They dig it out, they cut it up,
they put the new one in and they connect the
old feel back up and it's all going again within
twelve hours. Yes, but do we need a consent or
do we need just a letter of acceptance? And of
course as soon as you notify the council, you've stuck

(57:01):
your hand up and said, look at me, I've got
a problem.

Speaker 5 (57:05):
Can I could just one quick question before we go.
So with your system, which has been in for how.

Speaker 15 (57:11):
Long fifteen years?

Speaker 8 (57:12):
Worked flawlessly and.

Speaker 5 (57:14):
Over those finteen years time, have you always had the
six monthly inspections?

Speaker 15 (57:21):
They started about two years ago. Pain in the net
you get an automated letter from an AI bot and
if you don't do anything, you get another one. I mean,
they honestly don't need inspecting every six months, but because
I'm always cleaning my filters anyway. Yes, the good thing
about our system and if you treat them kindly, we've
been very paranoid about the right dishwashing part products fifteen

(57:44):
years before the primary tank needed.

Speaker 6 (57:46):
To pump out.

Speaker 15 (57:47):
It's remarkable a and the systems work flawlessly, and the
water that comes out at the end of the field
when you test it, you wouldn't drink it, but it
probably could.

Speaker 5 (57:57):
Yeah, I'm with you.

Speaker 6 (57:59):
It's that good.

Speaker 5 (58:00):
How interesting he appreciate that for what it's worth. I
think you know you've covered off all of those points
that would go you know, what are my risks?

Speaker 6 (58:08):
Right?

Speaker 5 (58:09):
And how have I mitigated those risks? And I think
you're doing it spot on. Yeah, all the best, Grant,
Good luck mate, all the best. Pob By Then eight
hundred eighty ten eighty is that number to call. We'll
talk to Graham about the shower after the break. If
you'd like to join us, the lines are open. The
number is eight hundred eighty ten.

Speaker 1 (58:25):
Eighty doing other house extorting the garden last Pete for
a hand the resident builder with Peter Wolfcap call eight
hundred eighty eighty news togs V.

Speaker 5 (58:35):
Just another thought on Grant's conversation just prior to the break.
This is about the septic tank system, BI cycle system
is just in terms of signing things off with council.
I wonder if it would be worth someone suggested going
for a CoA, which I wouldn't advise because they'll they'll

(58:58):
wonder why you're applying for a certificate of acceptance when
you could have applied for a building consent if you
felt that you needed one. But in terms of like
just getting a sign off from council, I wonder if
it's worth talking to council about getting an exemption. So
you're notifying them of work that might trigger the requirement
for a building consent, but you're getting their approval to

(59:21):
not get a building consent. Therefore, if someone asks you
later on, why don't you have a building consent for it,
you could go well, because I talked to council explain
what I was doing, and they've given me an exemption.
And I was talking to a contractor yesterday at the
Home and Garden show Nderneden. They were their doing insulation
into exterior walls. We know that adding insulation to existing

(59:44):
exterior walls requires a building consent. One of the processes
that they have is they go to council with all
of the information about their system, the location of the property,
and they get an exemption from a building consent. That
at least makes counsel the record keeper, so we know
that the work is being done, we know that it's

(01:00:04):
been done appropriately. We don't need to a building consent,
but we do have a record of the work being
done and it's that record keeping. You can kind of
see the government moving to shift Council into that role
a little bit, just as a wider political thing, becoming
the record keeper rather than the regulator in a sense. Oh,
eight hundred eighty ten eighty is the number to call

(01:00:27):
another couple of behind them a text messages. So bear
with me just a second, Pete. We want a double
glaze and average size nineteen sixties house close to Hamilton.
It's got existing timber joinery. We can't decide on the
aluminium inserts, the PBC inserts or the double glazed timber.
How well air sealed are the timber window sashes. One

(01:00:47):
quote was for standard alley without the thermal Breakthanks very
much from Dave. Sorry it's taken a little while to
get to that, Dave. Look, in terms of the thermal
performance of the joinery, timber performs particularly well. So if
you can deal with the air leakage around the edge
of it by making sure the hint are in good
condition or the stays and the latches and maybe adding

(01:01:10):
draft seal around the perimeter, then retrofitting your existing timber
joinery is actually a huge advantage. If it's in good
condition if that's all too much work. One of my
family members extended family, had a nineteen fifties weather board
house where they opted for PVC inserts or uPVC inserts,

(01:01:34):
so that was keeping the frame but taking out the
actual sashes and mullions and those sorts of things, and
that worked particularly well. And again PVC has a higher
thermal efficiency than aluminium, so there's an advantage there. Hopefully
that helps, but yeah, the timber's got some advantages to

(01:01:55):
be fair under floor installation on a batch. Look, there's
a range of really good products out there. If it's
quite exposed, you might want to look at one that
has like a building attached to it. What that does
is it reduces the amount of airflow into the insulation material,
because insulation works best when there's no drafts through it,

(01:02:16):
so in an exposed area you might want to consider that. Otherwise,
my go to has always been green Stuff for the
last couple of years, so they do a very good
underfloor insallation. Heat transfer one room to another are the
heat transfer kitsworth installing. I've always been a little bit
skeptical of the efficiency of the system, like how much

(01:02:37):
heat actually goes from one area to another saying that
I know people who have installed them, and if they've
installed them well and they've been reasonable with their expectation,
it might actually be more of an advantage to having
the ventilation rather than the heat transfer. But yes, if
it's a modest amount of money, go for it. Quella

(01:02:58):
leaching pre leaching by using something like wet and forget
and letting it dry and then wash off. I'm not
sure that I've ever talked about doing that. I would
leave my queeler out, let's say, on the lawn. If
it's going to be installed somewhere where it could drip
down onto the concrete path, then I would leave it
exposed to the weather for a period of time before

(01:03:21):
it's installing it. I do the same with outdoor furniture.
If it happened to be a hardwood, or if it's
on above an area where it's going to leach, then
you want to protect that area for as long as
it continues to leach, which kind of answers another text
question as well. And then talking about the hearing pete,
I remember once reading that banging and nails with a

(01:03:42):
hammer so not a power tool insight is a significant
contributor to hearing loss, which is often overlooked. So please
cover that off with your experts to see if that
is in fact the case. I will take that and
make a note of that, Mike, thank you very much.
I'm just trying to think.

Speaker 11 (01:03:58):
Look.

Speaker 5 (01:03:58):
To be fair, my standard practice would be I would
be wearing my ear muffs while I'm ammering, not just
using power tools, let's say, or not just using you know,
like a nail gun, whether it's a gas one or
a battery one. I happen to have both of them,
I would use it. And certainly every time I pick

(01:04:19):
up a skill sore or even an impact driver, typically
I would. I'm also to be fair, I bought a
pair of muff Tech ear muffs, which are New Zealand designed,
and they're done by a couple of young guys out
of Wellington who got sick of having poor quality speakers,

(01:04:40):
so they've got speakers in them. They're not noise canceling.
They're a conventional hearing protection ear muff, just with really
good sound in them and Bluetooth connectivity. So I tend
to wear those pretty much all day long, you know,
because they're comfortable, which is great eight hundred and eighty
ten eighty. Let's get back to the calls. Thank you

(01:05:01):
very much for your patients. With that, it's good to
get through a bunch of those text messages. Very very
good morning to your Graham.

Speaker 3 (01:05:09):
Good morning, Peak, how are you?

Speaker 5 (01:05:10):
Thanks for waiting? Good thank you.

Speaker 16 (01:05:13):
Hey. We just bought a house that's almost three years old, yep,
and we're the second owners. And the shower liner in
the main bathroom and the on suite. When you push
the liner, there's there's movement between the wall and the liner,
and one of them is quite quite significant. You know,

(01:05:33):
is it worth pursuing or.

Speaker 11 (01:05:37):
Will it be okay?

Speaker 5 (01:05:42):
Is at the top of the liner is it well sealed?
So in fact, I was in a shower in the
hotel used to and they had a liner on three sides,
and so because I can't not look at anything building
related without asking building questions, I was looking at the
top of the liner, going I wonder if that's particularly
well sealed. So at the top right where obviously your

(01:06:05):
wall lining deends to the ceiling and the shower or
lining will go up to two meters, say, at the
top of that, is that junction well sealed or can
water get in behind there?

Speaker 16 (01:06:16):
Yeah, I'm not too sure, but right along the top,
it is right along the bottom. I know that at
the moment, but it is right along the bottom. Yeah,
but it's just not in the middle area.

Speaker 5 (01:06:28):
Yeah, you come away and when you press that, like,
does it bulge out and is noticeable or is it
only when you press it you can tell that it
hasn't laminated you correctly when you press it.

Speaker 16 (01:06:39):
Yep.

Speaker 3 (01:06:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:06:43):
I wonder whether even at three years it might sort
of be outside of warranty. I mean, the system will
be warrantied for longer, but whether or not as a
workmanship type thing, you could say, actually, it obviously hasn't
been well adhered. I think one of the challenges is
that people don't often prop or support or I call
it tomming. So whenever I've installed shower linings like that,

(01:07:07):
I've pre cut a series of pieces of timber that
once I've got the shower in and pressed tightly against
the wall, and I've got the adhesive in, and I've
done the adhesive correctly, and you have to read the
instructions from the manufacturer. There's a very specific pattern of
how you apply the adhesive. To the substrate before you

(01:07:28):
bond the liner to it. And then I typically cut
myself some packers and I put that against the shower
lining and then I prop it against the walls so
that it's holding in place while the glue sets, rather
than just shoving it in and taking off to the
next job. So maybe they haven't done that.

Speaker 16 (01:07:51):
Yeah, the place that we just sold off, put a
shower liner in that one there myself and fifteen years ago,
and that when we left there was no sign of.

Speaker 5 (01:08:00):
It, no move at all.

Speaker 3 (01:08:01):
Yeah. Yeah, and I've we've.

Speaker 12 (01:08:02):
Done what you exactly what you said, raced it all.

Speaker 5 (01:08:05):
You know, if it's a three year old house, then
obviously the builder and the developer and that sort of thing.
Hopefully there's still around. It would be worth going through
the property file. These days, there should be a lot
of information on the property file about who installed that system.
You could always or if you can identify the manufacturer,
invite them to come back and say, look, is this

(01:08:25):
a concern. Do I need to do some remedial? The
hard thing is what do you do about it? Right?
Because essentially you're talking about peeling the lining off in
order to put new adhesive in there, in which case
you know you have to remove the doors. Then you
perhaps you know you run the risk of damaging the

(01:08:46):
doors or damaging the lining or damaging the substrate, and
you start to go, you know what if That's why
my first question was is it sealed at the top,
because that's your biggest issue is water getting in behind there.
So if that's well sealed, then I think it's relatively
low risk. Okay, then yeah, good luck. You take care

(01:09:06):
I get all of this, Bob out you a new
SKS B. Let me see we were at with the brakes. Yep,
we need to go to a break. Cynthia be with
you straight after the.

Speaker 1 (01:09:13):
Break, whether you're painting the ceiling, fixing with fence, or
wondering how to fix that hole in the wall.

Speaker 3 (01:09:18):
Do you have a feeder wolf cavicle on the resident
builder on news dogs B your news.

Speaker 5 (01:09:25):
Talks, B and Cynthia are very very good morning to you.

Speaker 13 (01:09:30):
Good morning pea.

Speaker 5 (01:09:31):
By there.

Speaker 13 (01:09:31):
I have a laundry window seven sixty wide with two
opening sashes at the top. It goes down to the floor,
two opening stashes at the top, fixed panel down to
the floor. I would like to replace that window so
that I can put keeping the two sashes at the
top the same, but I can get if I sorry,

(01:09:55):
go ahead at the top, remove the fixed panels at
the sorry, yeah, the fixed panel at the bottom. Yes,
So I can put laundry cabinet tree on the inside
and replace or repair the panels on the outside. I
think it's linear weatherboard. Can I do that without consent?

Speaker 5 (01:10:22):
There's so many layers. I mean, I know it sounds
like a really simple question, and in my mind I'm
sort of going through a bit of a checklist, right going. Okay,
so there is provision within the act sed you. One
of the act that goes if let's say you've got
a window like you've got and you want to change
it to a door. For example, so you're twelve, how

(01:10:46):
wide is the window roughly seven sixty seven sixty okay,
so it's relatively narrow. So if, for example, you did
just want to put in a taller window, or if
you wanted to change that to a door and you
were cutting through the cladding and redoing the flashings around
it and put in a door, you could do that

(01:11:06):
without necessarily requiring a building consent. But and so in
that sense, changing the window and making the window shorter. Theoretically,
you know, you'd look at that and you'd go, oh,
I wonder if that's able to be done without a consent.
But because you're working on the weather tightness and the

(01:11:28):
envelope of the house by adding new weather boards, I
wonder that whether the adding of the new weather boards
is the part that would then require a building consent
or trigger requirement for building consent. My sense is that
you probably do need a building consent for that type
of work. Now, you know which if you went to counsel,

(01:11:49):
they requests some drawings, they'll want specifications. Da da da
da da da da. We know that it's a sledgeham
at a crack a nutt type situation, that it's relatively
low risk work. But where it comes back and sort
of bites you is, let's say you ahead and did
the work without a building consent, and later on you

(01:12:10):
go and sell the house and someone looks at the
original consent plans held by counsel and the property file
and they look at what's there and they notice the change,
and then they go, Okay, I think that needed a consent.
Did you get one?

Speaker 3 (01:12:21):
Though?

Speaker 5 (01:12:21):
I didn't. Do you have any record of information or
about it. Well, no, not really, and then it'll become
a oh, it's non consented work, and then you'll try
and get a building consent later on, and that's a
hell of a process, to be fair, doing a couple
of those at the moment. So I wonder whether the
one way forward is to go have someone do a

(01:12:45):
basically explanation of what you're going to do, go to
council and ask for an exemption, right because it's it
is low risk work. And then if counsel acknowledge the
fact that you're doing the job, and then the only
other thing that you would probably need to pay some
money to get someone to do is to get the

(01:13:07):
original elevations of the house updated to show the new window, right,
and they like do clouding around it saying this is
now changed, and then there's some evidence. Because again it's
now increasingly all about when you go to sell the house,
does the house look like it's on the plans. It's

(01:13:27):
just such a big issue at the moment.

Speaker 13 (01:13:30):
Yes, okay, And can that be done with just an
inquiry to the council do you have to actually make
an except?

Speaker 5 (01:13:37):
Look again, I think you're probably going to end up
having to engage either an architect or an architectural drafts
person to do that work. Maybe they would be a
good person to go to council on your behalf with,
so they could you know, they could do a simple
drawing showing what you're going to do and how it's
going to look. Once the work is completed, take that

(01:13:59):
to council, go for an exemption. Once that's been granted
and you've got something in writing from council, then go
ahead and do the work. And of course the work
has to be done as further building code, so you know,
if there's a cavity there, you need to keep the
cavity be interesting. Like ideally, you probably wouldn't want to
have just a row of soakers because you're going to

(01:14:23):
have a join right where new wheather boards are inserted
where there was a window. And what you tend to
end up with it's on most old houses where you've
seen windows change, is you then but the weather boards
together and you put a soka over the top. Now, linear,
there are no soakers in the linear system. It's a
tongue and groove junction on the butt joins. So how

(01:14:44):
do you then deal with that and do linear as
a system approve of the use of soakers where a
non tongue and groove join has been done. So there
is a little bit of complexity in it, right, Sorry
to make what seems a really simple thing to do
sound so damn complicated.

Speaker 9 (01:15:06):
It's quite right.

Speaker 5 (01:15:08):
Yeah, that's right, Yeah, absolutely, all right, all the very
best to you, thank you, ok, here bye. Then, just
on the popping screws thing, we had a painter stopper
just text through Carl. He says, Look, we find that
houses that have been framed up during the winter period

(01:15:28):
and lined and painted through the earlier summer months and
then have been locked up with no airfloor airflow have
more issues of the popping screws, and this can happen
over a period of a couple of years. We highly
recommend that all properties have airflow through the summer months.
If it's a new build, you can't leave these houses
locked up with all of the heat. Our recommendation is

(01:15:49):
that new homeowners to leave the windows on the second
lock on the window handles to allow that constant airflow.
I mean, houses are dynamic right as an environment, so
you need to control and regulate that. And I think
you're right again, like it. It's not great when it happens,

(01:16:10):
and it really shouldn't happen. And I'm thinking back of
jobs that I've done over the years where you might
have one or two screws. You might put a thousand
screws into the wall board lining, and one or two
popping that might happen. More than that, it's not a
good sign. Oh, eight hundred eighty ten eighty is the
number of cour will take short break be back with
Brian in a moment.

Speaker 3 (01:16:30):
A squeaky door or squeaky floor.

Speaker 1 (01:16:32):
Get the right advice from Peter Wolfcare, the resident builder
on newstalksb.

Speaker 5 (01:16:39):
A couple of quick texts just with regard to Cynthia's issue.
Let's say so where she wants to physically remove the
window and install some cabinetry. A number of people are
on the same page where you're going, Hey, look, what
about just doing a film on the window, or changing
the glazing and or putting a board on the inside
and then putting the cabinet tree there. Use the cabinetry

(01:17:01):
for as long as you're in the house, and then
later on if somebody doesn't like it, they can just
take it out. Because it is kind of sad that
we've got to that point where as soon as you say, oh,
it needs a building consent, there's just this huge, oh,
croaky and you know, it's arduous, right, and it's expensive,
and it just seems like such a high barrier that

(01:17:25):
people are inclined to go, oh, well, I can't be bothered.
I'll just go ahead and do the work. I'm sure
that if counsels made that process for relatively small jobs
so much more adaptable or accessible, more people would do
the right thing and go and get a consent. Because
the general sense, and I've fallen into this category, I

(01:17:47):
think I've sort of adopted this malaise as well. Where
I'm going. It just seems like so much hard work
to go and get a consent for something that's you know,
for big, complex jobs fair enough, but for something as
simple as I want to take a window out. I'm
not expand I'm not impacting on the bracing. I'm not
making the window wider. I'm not changing the lines or
all of the things that are in the building code

(01:18:07):
at the moment and in the Building Act around CHIDU one.
I'm not making massive changes, and there should be a
relatively straightforward way to ensure weather tightness. But it's still
the process. I mean, it could be a couple of
grands with a compliance for a thousand dollars job. That's

(01:18:28):
where it gets a bit hard to cope with, isn't it.
Oh eight hundred and eighty ten eighty is that number
to call? And a very good morning to you, Brian.

Speaker 6 (01:18:36):
Good morning, Brian. Are you there?

Speaker 8 (01:18:40):
Go for it?

Speaker 6 (01:18:43):
Yes?

Speaker 9 (01:18:44):
I am yeah, yeah, Brian here, Brian. Yeah, I'm painting
my kitchen now, and I'm taking all the paint off
the ceiling because it's all clak in the neck and
and I just wondered if I got to put a
seal on it, I could put a seal on it. Yes,

(01:19:05):
they could in the kitchen and all that.

Speaker 5 (01:19:08):
You know, look, I think it's all the ceiling's already
been painted, hasn't it.

Speaker 9 (01:19:15):
Yeah, it's been painted before, Yeah, exact there for twenty years. Yep,
so well done. It's time and I just thought, well,
got it, you know, might prow a ceiling in there.

Speaker 5 (01:19:27):
Yeah, I think like a really really thorough clean so
with a proper indoor paint cleaner, clean it thoroughly, send it.
I would apply a sealer, a pigmented seala over the
entire surface, you would put a I would yep, and

(01:19:48):
then I make sure that I'm using some kitchen or
bathroom paint just to make it a bit more durable
as well, like a water borne enamel.

Speaker 6 (01:19:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:19:57):
Well, when we have done the bathroom, in the toilet
and or share something, and we put that lining paper
on the walls and oh, yeah, it's come up really good. Yeah, yep,
it's coming really good. A lot of people go with

(01:20:17):
the wallpaper, but I'd rather you put the shining paper
on it. Yeah, it's come up really good.

Speaker 5 (01:20:30):
I think you've got it sorted, Brian. It'll be great.
But on an old surfaces and a hard wearing area
like kitchens and bathrooms, if you're stripping it back or
sending it hard back cleaning it, I'd always go for
a pigmented seal or it just binds everything together. That's
that's the way that i'd go. Good luck to you, Brian,
Thank you very much for your call. Coming up five
minutes away from eight o'clock. In the next hour, of course,

(01:20:51):
we will jump into the garden with a roid climb
pass from eight point thirty, but we've got time straight
after the news to take your calls. Can I just
say again, I have just come back from dneed and
I flew back up yesterday. Actually it was a beautiful flow.
It was a fantastic day. And the flight path kind
of takes you out of Dunedin along the coast, basically

(01:21:14):
over Akaranga or Akaroa rather and then looping out towards
Farewell Spit and you can see Wellington in the distance.
A couple of things. One is I was looking down
out of the plane. I had a window seat and
I'm looking out going cheap is this is a stunningly
beautiful country. We kind of, I don't know, maybe we
get a bit complacent about it. But it was just

(01:21:36):
looking down at banks Peninsua and Akara is just absolutely fantastic.
Looking down at christ Church, then looking out at the
Marlborough Sounds, it was just absolutely stunning. And then the
how the thought I had is, you know, all this
talk about mining and that we've got a big country
hiding a couple of minds in there doing a bit
of mineral exploration ain't going to change things that much. Also,

(01:21:56):
had a fantastic time at the Asia factory so a
sea make fireplaces, and I spent a very happy hour
wandering through with Donna, who's phenomenally well. She runs the
place basically, So we were looking at you know, the
stamping machines and the lasers, and the guy does the welding,
and the people doing the powder coding and the people
assembling the components, and it was absolutely fantastic. And they

(01:22:20):
export out of a little factory or decent sized factory
and Dunedin. It was a great time. Righty oh, we're
back after the new Sport Weather top of the at
eight o'clock.

Speaker 1 (01:22:36):
We helping you get those DIY projects done right. The
resident builder with peta Wolfcat call eight Youth Talk zebby.

Speaker 5 (01:22:46):
Well, a very good morning, welcome back to the show.
It is coming up seven minutes after eight. We will
talk building, construction, renovating DIY right through the late thirty.
Then we're going to jump into the garden with her
at climb past so we can talk all things gardening
and the wonderful world of entomology as well. So if
you've got any questions for Rid after eight thirty, of course,

(01:23:07):
you can dial eight hundred eighty ten eighty if you
dial eight hundred eighty ten eighty right now, which would
be a great idea. We can talk all things building
and construction, quite a few sort of painting questions, and
a number of people responding to my comments about sort
of hearing protection. So I'm very much looking forward to
if I can get this interview sorted out around hearing protection.

(01:23:31):
I guess the impact of hearing loss. I notice it
actually to be blunt. I notice it even when I
come into the studio here the volume that some people
have the headphones on right and I typically have to
come in and turn it right down because thankfully I've
looked after my hearing and so I can still watch
the television without it being on seventy five on the

(01:23:53):
volume control. And part of this is sort of informed
by my own experience growing up. Dad worked in we
had a steel business. I used to see his ear mufs,
but typically they just hanging on a nail near his workbench.
I can't very rarely recall a time where he wore

(01:24:14):
his EA muffs, and the impact of that was later
on in retirement and when I was still living at home,
you know, the TV was on really loud, and then
later on you get that whole social dislocation. I think
that comes along with hearing loss, so it is a
big issue. Anyway, We're going to be talking with an audiologist,
a proper experienced audiologist around hearing protection sometime in the

(01:24:36):
next couple of weeks, so looking forward to that, a
couple of quick texts. Any tips on how to remove
thirty year old vinyl from a concrete foundation. Number one is,
even if it's thirty years old, there is still a
potential that has asbestos in it, so ACM, so aspecies
containing material. So I would take a small piece, take

(01:24:58):
it to a laboratory, get it tested if it comes
back clear. And because you're doing it on a concrete flow,
depending on the area that you're doing, you can actually
get some machines which are like have a big blade
but are powered almost like an old fashioned floor cleaner,
you know, the Worthly ones that used to get and
they've just got a blade that just jams it's souf

(01:25:20):
underneath the lino. And because you're not too worried about
damaging the concrete slab, you can use one of those.
Otherwise you could use a rotary hammer drill with sort
of a wide blade on it and try and just
get underneath it. You can just use a broad knife
as well, but the main thing is to get that
material tested before you start ripping into it. From Greg

(01:25:43):
gap filler for a Remoo window sills, we've got a
gap where the sill meets the sash and want a
sand and polyurethane on the top. The hard thing there
is that gap filler typically is designed to be painted over,
so if it's remou you don't want to use something
that's going to jump out at you. I wonder whether

(01:26:05):
you can get colored cork, often for flooring and so on,
So if you've I would almost be inclined to do
all my painting first and then neatly fill that gap
with some colored cork at the end of the process,
rather than something that you're going to apply a coating
over the top, because some of those don't accept paint

(01:26:26):
and you'll get a funny sort of bleeding that happens
around the cork. So do the coating, then do the
cork over the top. Pete, what's your thinking about tradesmen
that put their radio on when coming to work so
that everyone around the workforce has to put up with
this intrusion. Please, my piece has been ruined by my
neighbor's renovation. Your advice please, well, just get them to

(01:26:48):
listen to ZB That's simple. I mean, nobody minds z
be at ad decibel's from the neighbor's place, any of
that untz untz stuff, And I can understand the upset. Look,
I think you know, ideally we should be considerate, right,
So no, if someone's got the radio balance on the
fence and you get to hear all of their favorite

(01:27:09):
music from the sixties and seventies or whatever you happen
to be listening to, it's annoying. So I tend to
go across and just go, hey, look, come on, seriously.
Site radios in some cases have been banned. I know
a couple of builders who just ban it because they
are sick of the argument among the young fellas, so
they just go that's it, no radios. Increasingly, people tend

(01:27:31):
to have sound in their hearing protection, so I certainly do.
I've got a couple of different brands. The ones that
I wear most often are the muff Tech ones at
the moment, So whether I'm mowing the lawns or banging
nails or using the tables or whatever. I'll tend to
have that on and then I can bluetooth and listen
to my favorite podcasts while I'm working away. And that

(01:27:55):
concerns nobody but me. So that's kind of where it's
heating right now. But yeah, I think it's annoying if
the radio's on and you don't like the music, and
it's just if it's loud, it's annoying. And another quick text,
does the Consumer Guarantees Act apply to building and construction companies?
If so, does this circumvent some of those short warranty periods?

(01:28:16):
Very good question, and yes, in general work is covered
by the Consumer Guarantees Act, so it's not always just
about the implied warranties around building work. But the Consumer
Guarantees Act does come in as well. And someone else's
text through about there's obviously a new schedule for development

(01:28:38):
contributions for twenty twenty five, massive increases about to come
in for example, and Tommicky it goes from thirty two
thousand to one hundred and nineteen thousand. This is absolutely
absurd according to Dave Well. That does seem like an
extraordinary leap, doesn't it. I mean, if you're paying that
amount extra onto a development. It's no wonder that houses

(01:29:00):
are not affordable. Oh, eight hundred eighty ten eighty is
the number of call. We'll take more of your text,
but we'll get to the calls as well. Jerry, good morning,
Good morning Pete.

Speaker 6 (01:29:10):
You know you have about a nineteen twenties house. Yep.
I have a very small pitcheen and it's got a
door that leads through to the dining room, but there's
no door on it. I'm thinking about taking this wall out. Yes,
now it's the boarding wall. Obviously I need to put
a beam across to take the roof trusses that hold

(01:29:31):
the roof up. Yes, what do I need consent to
do this?

Speaker 5 (01:29:37):
Yeah, as soon as it's if it's load bearing right
then yes, Council want to make sure that you've looked
at all of the you know, the possible bad things
that will happen. The ceiling is going to collapse or
the building's going to rack because you've taken out all
the bracings. So it's typically the load that it's carrying,
the span of the lintel and whether or not there's

(01:29:59):
some bracing in there as well. So yes, that does
require a building consent.

Speaker 6 (01:30:06):
Now if it's not load bearing? Do I need consent.

Speaker 5 (01:30:13):
If it's not load bearing and it's not bracing now, yeah,
it's a nineteen twenties house, right you are. You are
not going to find bracing calculations on a nineteen twenties house.
So typically bracing back then was maybe a bit of
fourmer one let into the frames, typically on the outside petitions,
not often on the inside. And you know on the

(01:30:36):
sections of wall that are left or are you taking
it off sort of right across so there's nothing left
of that wall at all.

Speaker 6 (01:30:45):
Take it right across from the doorframe against the firewall,
right to the other side. It's probably about two meters.

Speaker 5 (01:30:53):
Yes, having have you been able to have a look
inside the roof space.

Speaker 6 (01:30:59):
Well, yeah, I mean this is why I thought I
should go up there a look before I ring. Now,
we had a builder's wife over for dinner last night
and he said, why don't you just cut a big hole,
leave the door frame and everything in there. Cut a
great big hole. Well, there's two. There's two. There's cupboards
on the top half, yeah, and a bench and covers underneath.

(01:31:20):
Now we take the cupboards out from the top half,
but leave the bench and the cupboard and cut like
a big window without a window in it.

Speaker 5 (01:31:30):
Yes, but in effect that's the same as taking the
wall out right, because you've still got this big unsupported
span that you need to prop up somehow. So you
will need to install a lintel of some description. Whether
you opt to install that in the roof space and
support the roof rafters or the ceiling joists that way,

(01:31:50):
or you simply put the beam underneath and they can
rest on it. It really does depend. Is it load bearing,
is it bracing? And what happens if it is load bearing?
Definitely needs a building consent. So yeah, okay, get an
our be p to have a look, or a designer
to come and have a quick look. And they're pretty
straightforward houses, right, you'll soon tell whether or not the

(01:32:13):
wall's load bearing.

Speaker 6 (01:32:14):
Yeah. Well, the wife's partner that was here.

Speaker 5 (01:32:18):
Yeah, okay, Oh, he should be able to give you
some decent advice. The other thing is, even if you
go ahead and do it, I would still get some
paperwork that shows that you did due diligence right, that that.

Speaker 3 (01:32:31):
You considered before.

Speaker 5 (01:32:33):
Yeah, that's why I was reading through some property information
for a client the other day, and and and sort
of the it was a bathroom renovation that had been
done and it didn't get a building consent, and I
wonder whether, in fact they should have got a building

(01:32:54):
consent for it because it included a tile shower, and
so they had to produce a statement from the waterproofer. Great,
they had effectively a p. S. Three from the plumber
saying they'd done all the plumbing work to the building code,
which is great. They had an explanation from the builder
as to what had been done, which was good. What
the builder didn't say is why they felt that it

(01:33:16):
didn't need a building consent. And so now there's a
difference of opinion around should it have had a building
consent or shouldn't it And if it did require one
and they didn't get one, then suddenly it becomes unauthrized work,
and that becomes a real issue when you go to
sell the house.

Speaker 6 (01:33:33):
Yeah, we did the bathroom about four years ago and
didn't get any consent and didn't speak to the council
at all.

Speaker 5 (01:33:40):
Now, possibly your word's not mine, all right, all the best,
you take care bother them. Sort of legal you can
use on site. You're not supposed to use on the radio.
But I think we all know where he's coming from,
right Pete. If a trade is working on my neighbors,

(01:34:02):
it's just great people up there making a living. Turn
the radio up, bloody, Karen's Andy, Well what about this one, hey, Pete?
Read the building sites. How about seven o'clock on White
Tonguy Day across the road from us. They wouldn't turn
it down, So I rang, no noise control, job done, cheers.
Chances are they shouldn't have been working on White Tonguy
Day anyway. So typically building work and residential sites shouldn't

(01:34:27):
happen on public holidays and on Sundays. So yeah, noise
control had the same thing happened to me and the
guys that were working with me years ago now, Because
it's tough for tradees at this time of year, right,
especially if you're self employed, if you're a contractor, and
you've had Christmas, then you've had New Year, and then

(01:34:49):
suddenly you get all these other public holidays in there
as well, Auckland Anniversary Day, why Tonguy Day. There are
all days that you're not getting paid, and by mid
February it starts to hurt, right, so I think it
was Auckland Anniversary. We were working through the summer break
and one of the guys said, look, I I don't
want another day off. I want to go and work.
And I said, yeah, sure, there's things to do.

Speaker 8 (01:35:10):
You go for it.

Speaker 5 (01:35:11):
But about eleven o'clock on Auckland Anniversary day he rangs
me and said, oh noise control of just come home
told me that I'm not allowed to work and I'm off.
I don't think he was using radio either. Oh eight
hundred eighty ten eighty is the number to call. Can

(01:35:32):
he please finish what you're about to say about whether
or not you consider an internal wall and one hundred
year old bracing or not. What I'm saying is that
you know bracing as we do it today in terms
of calculation bracing units. We've got a grid pattern, we've
laid it out, we've indexed the walls by going you know,
ABC one, two three. Adding bracing details to all of

(01:35:58):
those lines across a building plan is not what you'd
find in the nineteen twenties house. When you pull them apart.
You might find that on exterior walls in particular, they
might have let in a bit of four but one
you know, notched it into the frames and that gives
a bit of bracing. You might find some noogs that

(01:36:19):
are done on a diagonal, which will also provide some
bracing typically internally, not so much for bungalows, but certainly
for villas. The sarking, the twelve by half inch rough
saw and poards they provide some bracing, and so I'm
always mindful of if we're going to take those out,
what am I going to do to replace the bracing

(01:36:39):
in a de facto sense in there. My go to
has been typically when I'm working on older houses where
it's permitted to remove the linings and all the rest
of it, as I nail everything off as a brace.
It's really simple. So you just screw fix everything as
a GS one or a GS two brace everywhere throughout
the house. If you want to up it and use

(01:37:01):
some braceline or something like that, that's a good idea
as well. It's a kind of belt and braces approach.
But you know, if you're going to take out a
big chunk of wall, that wall's doing something. It's there
for a reason, and so you've got to think about
what that reason is in terms of load bearing or bracing,
and make sure that you've got you've made provision to
substitute those elements when that wall is removed. That's the
whole point about it. Oh eight hundred and eighty ten

(01:37:23):
eighty is the number. Pete had radio problem with an
employer twenty years ago who told me that he couldn't
have his radio blearing. Oh, if he couldn't have his
radio blaring all day, he wouldn't work for me. I
showed him where the gate was and wished him and
his radio a happy life. Colin, thank you. It was
so much simpler back then in terms of showing people

(01:37:44):
the door, wasn't it. I read that article about a
young fellow who was a working for a fencing contractor
in the South Island, who was on his phone quite
a lot, and the boss told him in no uncertain
language to pack up and go home. He then took
him to the employment court, and I think the employer
kind of fell that that got him on a technicality.

(01:38:05):
He was working on a trial, but he didn't have
an employment contract, and therefore the employer was fined fifteen
hundred dollars for sacking him. I don't think he's actually
fine for sacking him. He's just fine for having him
working without an employment contract, even if he was on trial.
But yeah, I look, if I trigger you on that
particular topic, we'll have a bunch of text, won't it.

(01:38:27):
How you know, if you're employing contractors, Oh, this could
be a great topic for talkback one night. If you're
employing contractors, you kind of expect that the boss, right,
the head guy might be on his phone or her
phone for a while. But if you see the workers
on their phone while they're working for you, how do

(01:38:49):
you feel about that? I'm going to drop that little
bombshell and run off into the garden with red climb pass.
There you go, there's something to wind people up about.
It is twenty two minutes after eight. We'll take a
short break. We'll be back with we can take one
more call if you rush otherwise, I think we'll get
rid of early and we'll jump into the garden back
in a.

Speaker 1 (01:39:06):
Moment measure twice God was but maybe called Pete first?
Do you walk caft the resident builder news talks?

Speaker 2 (01:39:13):
That'd be.

Speaker 5 (01:39:16):
Oh, I feel that I've just dropped this little you know,
sniff that into the conversation that we could talk about
for hours. Ross Caday.

Speaker 17 (01:39:25):
Yeah, okay, guys, this use of public mobile phones and
the internet in your boss's time, I just view it
as theft. You're feeding your boss's time. It's his time,
he pays you, and you've got a smoko and lunchtime
to conduct private calls. And I guarantee most of the

(01:39:47):
people that did steal bosses time don't make it up
after work in their own hours, So why shouldn't it
be viewed as theft?

Speaker 5 (01:39:57):
Look, you know what, You're not going to get an
argument from me. I'm not sure that i'd describe it
as theft, but I certainly and I was conscious of it.
You know, back in when I was running a group
of guys and we're on site at a person's house
and they're essentially either they're paying us by the hour
if it's a charge up job, or I'm paying my
guys by the hour, and I've worked out how many

(01:40:18):
hours we need to do the job. And if you
look out and every twenty minutes someone's got their phone
out and they're scrolling their latest Instagram or something like that, yeah,
I'm going to have a word to them and go
I'm sorry I'm not paying you to be on your phone.
I'm paying you to work. And I'm sure though for clients,
you know, like, if I'm the guy running the job,
then part of my job is to organize, and these

(01:40:41):
days you do that with your phone. So if I'm
chatting away on the phone, I can imagine that it's
a frustrating image for the client to see. But if
I'm on the phone organizing the concrete and the delivery
and the subcontractors and chasing up materials and booking inspections,
that's part of my job.

Speaker 3 (01:40:57):
But typically no problem with that.

Speaker 5 (01:41:00):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 17 (01:41:01):
People constantly on the phone. An't sure whatever I mean,
it's it's blatant theft.

Speaker 6 (01:41:10):
Oh look and should be beauty as such.

Speaker 5 (01:41:12):
You're not going to You're not going to get a
disagreement from me on that one. All nice to talk, lovely.
We might raise this again. Is a bit of a topic.
I know it's it's sort of building related, but it isn't.
But you know, that's the thing. If you're a client
and we've got we've always got friends who are renovating.
We've got some friends who are renovating at the moment,
and you know, One of the things that they are

(01:41:34):
starting to get a bit upset about is one of
the tradees as a smoker. Now that's that's their decision
to do that. But if they stop, you know, once
an hour to sort of sit down and have a
cigarette or something like that, then you kind of go,
do I want to be paying for that? Not really,
And that would be no different if they just sat

(01:41:55):
down and started scrolling through their Instagram messages to see
whether they've gone off what is it going off? Blowing
up on socials? You know that they've done a post
and they're checking whether they're on up on socials, and
you don't want to be paying for that anyway. On
that happy note about building, we're going to jump into
the garden. Rid Climb Past is standing by. If you'd
like to talk to Rudd call us right now. Oh

(01:42:17):
eight hundred eighty ten eighty viewing.

Speaker 1 (01:42:20):
Up the house storting the garden, asked Pete for a
hand the resident Builder with Peter Wolfcamp.

Speaker 3 (01:42:25):
Call oh eight hundred eighty ten eighty News Talks EDB.

Speaker 1 (01:42:29):
For more from the Resident Builder with Peter Wolfcamp, listen
live to News Talks EDB on Sunday mornings. From six,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season

Dateline NBC

The Bobby Bones Show

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Full Show Podcast: 23 February 2025

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season

Dateline NBC

The Bobby Bones Show

All Episodes

Full Show Podcast: 23 February 2025

40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season