Episode 1924
From Tariffs to Tissues: Surviving Winter's Double Whammy!
Tariff talk is heating up between Canada and Mexico, and I'm here to break it all down for you! We'll dive into how these trade talks might be shaking up the prices on everything from cabinetry to drywall, which could leave homeowners feeling a little uneasy. But wait, there's more! As winter rolls in, I’ll also share some killer tips on how to keep those pesky colds and viruses at bay this season. Seriously, who has time to be sick when there’s home improvement to tackle? So grab your favorite beverage, kick back, and let’s navigate the wild world of home improvement together while keeping those germs at arm's length. Don’t worry, I’ve got your back!
The chatter today is all about how home improvement is dancing the tango with international trade. We've got Eric G diving right into the nitty-gritty of tariffs that are stirring the pot between Canada and Mexico, and trust me, it’s not just a political soap opera. Picture this: a kitchen designer sweating bullets over a potential 25% hike on cabinetry imports from Canada. Yikes! That’s enough to make any homeowner reach for the nearest stress ball. Eric breaks it down beautifully, explaining how the U.S. is throwing some serious shade at its neighbors, and while it’s all a bit of a mess, he reassures us that some of those sweet Canadian materials are still flowing across the border and into our homes. He offers sage advice on budget adjustments and how to prepare for potential price hikes in raw materials. Spoiler alert: It's smart to plan ahead for those pesky price increases that could hit your next home project right where it hurts — your wallet!
But wait, there’s more! As we shuffle through the winter months, Eric shifts gears to discuss keeping those nasty winter colds and viruses at bay. He’s got tricks up his sleeve that go beyond the usual hand sanitizers and masks. First up, he advocates for a strict 'no shoes in the house' policy, which honestly feels like a game-changer. He shares his personal experiences with air filtration systems and highlights the magic of an air scrubber that zaps airborne nasties like they’re unwanted party crashers.
From air filters to keeping your home clean and tidy, Eric's practical advice is sprinkled with his signature humor, making the daunting task of home maintenance feel like a walk in the park. So whether you’re a DIY novice or a home renovation pro, this episode is packed with insights that not only keep your living space cozy and safe but also give you the upper hand against those sneaky winter illnesses. Buckle up, because this episode is a whirlwind of valuable knowledge wrapped in Eric's warm, witty charm!
Takeaways:
- Understanding the impact of recent tariff talks between Canada and Mexico is crucial for homeowners, especially in regard to potential price hikes on materials like cabinetry and drywall.
- With winter colds and viruses making the rounds, we discussed practical tips such as removing shoes at the door to keep homes cleaner and healthier.
- Investing in good air filters or air scrubbers can significantly improve indoor air quality, especially during flu season, helping to trap potentially harmful particles.
- Homeowners should remain vigilant about online shopping, particularly on platforms like Amazon, as many innovative products risk being copied or knocked off shortly after launch.
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Monument Grills
- Amazon
- IQ Vice
- Real Avid
- Z Line Appliances
To get your questions answered by Eric G give us a call in the studio at 833-239-4144 24/7 and Eric G will get back to you and answer your question and you might end up in a future episode of Around the House.
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Information given on the Around the House Show should not be considered construction or design advice for your specific project, nor is it intended to replace consulting at your home or jobsite by a building professional. The views and opinions expressed by those interviewed on the podcast are those of the guests and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the Around the House Show.
Mentioned in this episode:
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Check out the BEST Trailer in the US!
Freedom Water Filters
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For your next BBQ check out MonumentGrills.com
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Transcript
Foreign the house on this episode of around the House.
Speaker A:I really like the look.
Speaker A:I did them for my house last year and so I noticed last time I was in my floor and decor store here and this is not a floor and decor statement special.
Speaker A:They don't pay me a dime.
Speaker A:This is not a commercial forum but this stuff you used to have to order, pay for shipping, everything else, they now have them on the shelf.
Speaker A:That is what's cool with this is you can go into your local store and grab them off the shelf.
Speaker A:This is what's trick with this stuff.
Speaker A:Now let's talk about where the good application for and where the not so good application for a couple things.
Speaker A:These the sheets are 21 wide by 93 tall.
Speaker A:So when it comes to remodeling or renovating your home, there is a lot to know and we have got you covered.
Speaker A:This is around the House.
Speaker A:Welcome to the Round the House show, the next generation of home improvement.
Speaker A:I'm Eric G.
Speaker A:Thanks for joining me today.
Speaker A:To find out more about us, head over to the website around the house online.com and then make sure you follow us on social media.
Speaker A:We've got our own YouTube channel.
Speaker A:Of course.
Speaker A:We have the television show around the House Northwest as well as, you know, our closed group over on Facebook which is, you know, around the House Nation.
Speaker A:I've got some more stuff coming up on there.
Speaker A:I've got some videos that we're just finishing up here soon to go up on that channel.
Speaker A:But I tell you what, there's a lot of stuff out there.
Speaker A:So I'd love to join, have you join me in this journey of home improvement to see if we can get you the most information so you can make the right choices for your home.
Speaker A:This hour is brought to you by our friends at Monument Grills.
Speaker A:If you're looking for that brand new barbecue, check them out@monumentgrills.com even though we got six more weeks of winter, they say I think barbecue season is all year round.
Speaker A:And I just had a beautiful steak on the barbecue last weekend.
Speaker A:Man, it was good.
Speaker A:Nothing like a good steak even in the wintertime.
Speaker A:Today I wanted to talk about a bunch of different subjects.
Speaker A: hing around our homes here in: Speaker A:We've talked about stuff the last hour.
Speaker A:We talked with Dallas Jones about radon.
Speaker A:We talked last week about the cost versus value.
Speaker A:And I wanted to hit some topical stuff here today to really start hitting on What I'm seeing out there, landscape, because there's a lot of fear, there's a lot of politics and all that stuff.
Speaker A:And first off, I wanted to give you my new pledge.
Speaker A:I've been really thinking hard and this has been one of the roughest, most divisive years here in my lifetime in American history here.
Speaker A:And I see it in our families.
Speaker A:I see it talking to therapists and counselors out there that are friends of mine.
Speaker A:And we are putting so much stress on our personal relationships out there.
Speaker A:I've wiped politics off cause I hit the overload thing.
Speaker A:So we're not gonna be preaching here one side or the other.
Speaker A:I am just done with the fear in the fighting.
Speaker A:So that's not gonna be a part of this show.
Speaker A:But I'm gonna try to give you the best information based off the facts that I can find and not some candidates political spin zone, no matter what side you are.
Speaker A:Because I've had it.
Speaker A:I've had enough.
Speaker A:And I think we should all just get along because really they're both making money off us fighting.
Speaker A:So let's see if we can do something a little bit better.
Speaker A:So here's the thing.
Speaker A:Home improvement and tariffs have been a hot topic.
Speaker A:I've had a lot of questions coming in with people panicking.
Speaker A:And it could be a kitchen designer that's worried about a 25% increase on their Canadian cabinetry, or it could be drywallers worried about that gypsum coming out of Mexico.
Speaker A:And so there's a lot going on out there.
Speaker A:Now, first off, I just kind of call the spade a spade.
Speaker A:We are seeing a lot of posturing by the United States right now.
Speaker A:We are throwing, throwing bombs over fences.
Speaker A:And I'm not talking something physical, but we are just absolutely slapping our neighbors around trying to get their attention.
Speaker A:Now, I'm not saying that's right or wrong.
Speaker A:That's not my thing here.
Speaker A:But I'm going to talk about the ramifications, what we're seeing in our marketplace.
Speaker A:So there's a couple things people don't have to worry about that Canadian stuff coming over the border.
Speaker A:Here's our problem.
Speaker A:Let's get down to the nuts and bolts in my area, Washington, Oregon, especially in Oregon, we've lost a bunch of lumber mills over the last year.
Speaker A:2024 was a brutal year for lumber mills.
Speaker A:And that's because the state of Oregon put a lot of taxes in fees on logging.
Speaker A:Now, a majority of our land in Oregon is government owned.
Speaker A:It's a big number when you see on the east coast, you'll see states with single digit numbers, 3, 4, 5% government owned.
Speaker A:Over here, it's above 50% in a lot of these western states.
Speaker A:So the government controls what's going on in that land.
Speaker A:So what happens is when they put those fees on there so they can get money, it prices our lumber that's local, out of the mix and Canada's got a lot of lumber.
Speaker A:So what we're seeing now is a lot of lumber coming over.
Speaker A:Softwood lumber, like framing lumber, plywoods, things like that are coming across the border into the United States because it's cheaper.
Speaker A:And it just is right now.
Speaker A:So I think we're a little misguided trying to get the cheaper lumber coming over.
Speaker A:Maybe what we should be doing is worrying about these fees and taxes that we've increased that are costing us money here for home builders, homeowners.
Speaker A:Because if it's costing the home builders money, it's costing us money as consumers.
Speaker A:It's making homes less affordable.
Speaker A:We already have a massive labor problem here in the United States because we decided to go the school of many school districts of everyone's getting a college education, whether you like it or not.
Speaker A:And we are not going to support the trades.
Speaker A:So what happens is now those kids that want to go out, guys, plenty of women getting into this and I love it into home building, into framing, into H Vac.
Speaker A:It's a great career.
Speaker A:And right now, if you want to provide for your family, go be a home builder, go be a framer.
Speaker A:You'll make more money probably in your area than a school teacher does and you're not going to have that college debt.
Speaker A:So if you like working with your hands, it's a great place to be.
Speaker A:But the problem is we have eliminated so many of those programs and there's a lot of people out there that are working to get those back into the schools.
Speaker A:But those wood shop classes, those automotive shop classes, the welding classes that left are adding tens of thousands of dollars to our homes these days.
Speaker A:And that's becoming a problem.
Speaker A:And it's going to be a problem.
Speaker A:We are getting ready for another round of all this stuff happening where we're going to lose another generation of people retiring.
Speaker A:And now we're really going to lose that brain trust and we're going to be really hurting on this.
Speaker A:So what's that do?
Speaker A:Adds more cost.
Speaker A:That's why when you look at H Vac contractors coming out and giving you bids, that's half of the reason why you're seeing a $25,000 bill for putting in a brand new high efficiency furnace and AC in.
Speaker A:That's part of the reason.
Speaker A:So not only do we have a lot of computers in there and a lot of high efficiency stuff, we're paying higher and higher labor numbers for that.
Speaker A:So that's an issue.
Speaker A:So we've got labor going up and now we've got materials going up and we're gonna see this thing like with Canada, for instance, with lumber.
Speaker A:Here's what we're gonna see.
Speaker A:There's a lot of cabinetry manufacturers that get their plywood and particle board out of Canada.
Speaker A:In the US There's a lot of people in the US that buy cabinetry out of Canada.
Speaker A:So when it comes to lumber, when it comes to anything made of wood for your house, there is going to be a chance moving forward that there's going to be 10, 15, 25% surcharge on those raw materials.
Speaker A:So we're going to have to see what happens.
Speaker A:This happens hour by hour, day by day, week by week.
Speaker A:And until they get that stuff figured out, we're just going to have to budget for this.
Speaker A:Kitchen and bath designers, contractors out there need to put something in your contract so that your homeowners know that this could happen and it could affect the price so you don't eat it.
Speaker A:And homeowners, you need to budget that, that it could cost a little bit more for these projects in the near term.
Speaker A:Right now.
Speaker A:Good time to go buy that stuff.
Speaker A:Do we need balance in that?
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:Now coming out of Mexico, we've got drywall because that's where that gypsum is coming out of there.
Speaker A:Now if we see a 25% tariff on that.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:Are ridiculously high, drywall prices are going to get higher.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And so we'll see that.
Speaker A:Now what we'll see though is that we might see it coming out of other places, but that takes time.
Speaker A:So unfortunately as homeowners and we're seeing stuff coming out of China that could be.
Speaker A:Well, anything in our homes is coming out of China it seems.
Speaker A:You know, right now we can do a lot really supporting our people in the U.S.
Speaker A:those local companies.
Speaker A:If you're gonna pay more, buy local.
Speaker A:Now when I come back, I want to talk about something that's big and this is Amazon and I'm not going after these guys, but I want to really give you a really thing to pay attention to right now out of Amazon.
Speaker A:And it's becoming a problem for people out there all across the country.
Speaker A:We'll do that just as soon as around the House returns.
Speaker A:Don't go anywhere.
Speaker A:The kids these days will never understand what it's like to play an instrument, to be in a band.
Speaker A:What's up?
Speaker A:This is Sticks It In Ya and Satchel from Steel Panther.
Speaker A:And you are listening to around the House with Eric G.
Speaker A:Yeah, we love Eric G.
Speaker A:And you should, too.
Speaker A:Welcome back to the around the House show, the next generation of home improvement.
Speaker A:I'm Eric G.
Speaker A:Thanks for joining me today.
Speaker A:If you want to find out more about us, head over to our website, aroundthehouse online.com.
Speaker A:we got a new website coming up soon.
Speaker A:I've been busy on other stuff, but we're getting ready to roll that thing out here really soon.
Speaker A:Been working with my buddy Johnny over at Site Hype Designs.
Speaker A:He's been working on some other people's projects, too.
Speaker A:And I said, hey, man, work on that for a little.
Speaker A:I'm tied up working on projects, getting ready for design and construction week in a few weeks down in Las Vegas.
Speaker A:This is going to be the biggest trade show in the world for home improvement stuff, design, construction, everything.
Speaker A:And it's always exciting to get down there.
Speaker A:See, my friends will be broadcasting down there as well for future episodes.
Speaker A:So we've got some absolutely exciting people, new products, things like that to see down there.
Speaker A:And we'll be sliding that stuff in here in February, March, all that stuff.
Speaker A:I've been buried with that stuff.
Speaker A:So hopefully we'll get up on that stuff and get going on it.
Speaker A:This hour is brought to you by our friends at Monty McGrills.
Speaker A:Check them out at monument grills.com and it's just something to we're going to be doing a lot of stuff here in February and March.
Speaker A:So you guys are going to get a treat with a lot of great new stuff coming.
Speaker A:We've been talking here about the tariffs and how that could affect homes.
Speaker A:And one thing I wanted to just put a comment in here on a new one that's been really getting worse and worse is Amazon.
Speaker A:And Amazon, like many other online retailers, has an interesting problem on their hands.
Speaker A:And this is where I feel bad for our American inventors.
Speaker A:That lady, that guy in their garage coming up with a better idea to do something innovative.
Speaker A:They spend the time, they get into production, they go get a patent.
Speaker A:They work through that over the years, or at least patent pending, and they bring it to market.
Speaker A:It's beautiful.
Speaker A:It's awesome.
Speaker A:They put it up on Amazon and 90 days later, some company out of overseas is taking the product Knocking it off.
Speaker A:I mean, they have bought one and they have copied it.
Speaker A:Colors, new name, cheap, and you buy it on Amazon.
Speaker A:And this is one of those things just absolutely drives me nuts.
Speaker A:And really, as a person here trying to do something, you can't do much to defend it.
Speaker A:And our system has made it so it's very hard to do that.
Speaker A:And that's where really I have a problem with some of these online retailers.
Speaker A:Great example.
Speaker A:Last year I met at the National Hardware show, these super awesome people that built a vise for your benchtop.
Speaker A:IQ Vice, a 360 degree articulating bench vise made from steel cast aluminum.
Speaker A:It is heavy duty.
Speaker A:You can do anything from firearms to bicycles, to guitars, to pipe with it.
Speaker A:It is beautiful.
Speaker A:And this is what's cool with this thing.
Speaker A:It works great.
Speaker A:But what do I see?
Speaker A:I jump on Amazon and they have an exact copy sitting right there.
Speaker A:Instead of IQ Vice, they call it the real Avid Vice.
Speaker A:And instead of it being 279, they have it for 239 and they've got it on the quick delivery.
Speaker A:It is a cheapo knockoff with it.
Speaker A:And I can't stand to see this.
Speaker A:They have just absolutely ripped off this vise and they have copied every little piece.
Speaker A:I would bet that the parts are even interchangeable.
Speaker A:And that's the sad part.
Speaker A:People go on there, they don't know the brand name, they don't know that's an IQ vice that somebody spent all their time in.
Speaker A:And there's nothing really that these guys can do.
Speaker A:And even if you have a patent or a trademark, and this is what's crazy here, I own the trademark for the around the house show.
Speaker A:I paid for it, I've spent thousands of dollars.
Speaker A:But if somebody comes out and does a knockoff off it and there's people out there that are that do it, then you have to spend the money.
Speaker A:All you can do with a trademark like this, or with a patent even, you have to send a cease and desist.
Speaker A:And when they tell you to pound sand, the only real option you have is to go to federal court and sue them.
Speaker A:There is not another way.
Speaker A:The trademark office doesn't get involved.
Speaker A:I've had people go out and try to trademark around the house and do a copy of this show.
Speaker A:And guess what?
Speaker A:At least the uspto, which is the trademark office, says nope.
Speaker A:That causes confusion.
Speaker A:You can't do it.
Speaker A:But you have to sit there and defend that trademark just like you have to defend a patent.
Speaker A:So not only does this company spend all of their assets.
Speaker A:And I haven't talked to IQ Vice about this.
Speaker A:This is something that I've seen on my own.
Speaker A:I know they're aware of it.
Speaker A:So this is not anything to do with them.
Speaker A:This is my being online and seeing it and going, oh man, somebody's ripping them off.
Speaker A:And yeah, real avid Vice is doing that.
Speaker A:They made a bad copy of it and they're trying to sell it and do that.
Speaker A:And it's just sad.
Speaker A:I look at it here and they have 392 reviews on Amazon for that, on something that they ripped off.
Speaker A:And that's sad.
Speaker A:That's what it is.
Speaker A:But here's the thing.
Speaker A:They've made it so impossible.
Speaker A:Those guys would have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars and to go after that company.
Speaker A:And what's the company do?
Speaker A:They're over in China, they're a knockoff.
Speaker A:They'll change the name, they'll shut it down and they'll do it again.
Speaker A:And what's Amazon going to do?
Speaker A:They're going to shrug their shoulders and go, not our problem.
Speaker A:We're not the ones that have to sit there and do that.
Speaker A:We don't have to sit here and police that.
Speaker A:So I think there's going to have to be something out there to protect our American inventors on this knockoff stuff.
Speaker A:And to me, I would say we should start off with, by holding people like Amazon and other retailers responsible for this stuff.
Speaker A:They're the, they're the end result.
Speaker A:And no.
Speaker A:Does Amazon have the ability really to go through and check all that stuff and see it?
Speaker A:No, they don't.
Speaker A:But you should be able to as a manufacturer reach out to them through something and say, hey guys, these guys are ripping me off and you're playing a part.
Speaker A:And they should be able to go, oh, you're right.
Speaker A:And this goes with knife sharpening.
Speaker A:This goes with all the different major cool tools you see out there.
Speaker A:And I have tested a lot of these online.
Speaker A:That was part of my show for the first 18 months of the around the House Northwest.
Speaker A:I did a segment called you test it and I bought the cheap ones out there.
Speaker A:And about 90% of the time they were absolutely horrible pieces.
Speaker A:Some of those things I couldn't even test them because that's how bad they were.
Speaker A:Sometimes I had my hands on them and I was putting on a cut proof glove because I didn't know if it was going to explode and do something and hurt me.
Speaker A:So these are things that I'm really worried about with our consumers out there and something that we need to figure out as consumers to maybe take a second when we jump on Amazon to buy that new tool and figure out is that the real one we're getting.
Speaker A:And that's the problem.
Speaker A:Now the other thing that we're seeing too on some of these things is if you go buy it and they're saying oh, no returns.
Speaker A:And this is on Amazon prime.
Speaker A:Watch out for this.
Speaker A:No returns.
Speaker A:You're gonna have to deal with the company.
Speaker A:Some of these companies out there.
Speaker A:I've got one that I was gonna do a review on.
Speaker A:Great example.
Speaker A:These were some outdoor patio lights I was already do a review on.
Speaker A:I'm gonna see how these things work.
Speaker A:I have been working since Thanksgiving to get a warranty replacement.
Speaker A:Only way you can deal with them is email and I just got a notification that they're processing this week the new one they're sending out for a defective item that lasted just months for outdoor string lights.
Speaker A:And they basically grind you down and take months to do this stuff on the house.
Speaker A:Be right back after these important messages.
Speaker A:Don't change that dial.
Speaker A:I'm just getting started today.
Speaker A:Hey, this is Ron Keel, the metal cowboy from Keel, the Ron Keel Band and Steeler.
Speaker A:We are rocking around the House with Eric G.
Speaker A:Raise your welcome back to the around the House show, the next generation of home improvement.
Speaker A:I'm Eric G.
Speaker A:Thanks for joining us today and we've been having a great conversation here about so many different topics and it's just going to be not one of those shows where we have what Henning.
Speaker A:We are just diving into all this different home improvement and home improvement news.
Speaker A:And here's the thing and this one is a sad one and I'm have to bring it down to give a quick tribute here as the entire radio industry is mourning the death of the Money Pit host Tom Krautler.
Speaker A:Now Tom was a really good guy to me.
Speaker A:I met him at industry events, was always gracious, was always nice, we always chatted and he was always a dude that was great to talk to, always appreciate him.
Speaker A:And I feel so bad for his co host, his family, wife, kids, all the people he influenced.
Speaker A:And it's really sad.
Speaker A:He passed away on Sunday, last Sunday here on the second complications from surgery.
Speaker A:Don't know all the details but he was really out there, one of those guys.
Speaker A:Accomplished craftsman, educator, former chair of the news, New Jersey's first regulatory authority for licensing home inspectors.
Speaker A:And he was a big behemoth out there in the radio world.
Speaker A:So anytime we lose one of Those people out there that have been a legend for a long time, tip my hat to him and just feel bad for him and his family.
Speaker A:We lost a bit of knowledge there.
Speaker A:That guy had a lot going on with that show.
Speaker A:And tip my hat to him and his family, and so sorry for their loss, but we'll see what they do.
Speaker A:I guess they're trying to work out where do they go from here, and I don't blame them for doing that.
Speaker A:So hats off to the Money Pit folks out there.
Speaker A:We're all competitors in this world of radio and podcasting, but we still gotta sit there and say, man, that's a loss.
Speaker A:Sorry to hear that, guys.
Speaker A:The rest of this segment here, I wanted to talk about some things that we're seeing out there that maybe can affect us, how we're doing stuff around the house.
Speaker A:And I wanted to talk here about some of my tips and tricks to keeping your house cleaner and a little healthier, especially with flu season and of course, Covid going around.
Speaker A:I know so many people right now that have got the latest gin of COVID out there, and I'm so happy we're not all running around with masks and all that stuff.
Speaker A:But I wanted to talk a little bit about that as some of my tips and tricks in some of these I've learned from a lot of my friends out there.
Speaker A:And it's some of those things that, you know, and I don't want to get it, but at the same point, it's one of those things that I look at and go, all right, what can we do to prevent that?
Speaker A:So the first off is when you come, and this is one of the hardest ones for me, when you come into your house, take those shoes, boots off, leave them at the door so you're not tracking in all the stuff from the street, from the whatever, leave them at the door so you're not walking those in.
Speaker A:Now, the second thing is I recommend a really good air filter or air scrubber, but you got to be a little bit careful.
Speaker A:So in my house, I put in a few years ago a new carrier infinity furnace system.
Speaker A:So I did the gas furnace with the.
Speaker A:With a brand new AC unit in my house.
Speaker A:And it was an upgrade from a really old 90s unit that was just old, inefficient, and it was no longer in great working order.
Speaker A:It was working, but it was on its last legs, so it was time to upgrade it.
Speaker A:When I did, I put in their D Gappa air filter.
Speaker A:So it's like your big 4 inch filter but it also has static bars that come across and there is a basically a carbon that goes down there.
Speaker A:So it captures and kills anything in the air as it goes through there.
Speaker A:Think of it as a bug zapper for viruses, dirt, anything that's in the air like that.
Speaker A:So it does a really great job of that.
Speaker A:So by taking down those contaminants and by doing that, it really makes to have cleaner air.
Speaker A:And so this time of year, if you're not worried about your energy bill, one thing you can do is if you've got a filter like that and you're worried about catching up for maybe people in the house, kids coming from school, that kind of thing.
Speaker A:One of the things I recommend is maybe just go over during that time.
Speaker A:If you've got a good filter system like that that captures and kills, maybe turning that on for a week or so on low.
Speaker A:So you're just moving air around and extra filtering the air.
Speaker A:Because with most systems, when the house gets to temperature and this time of year, it's mostly depending on where you're at.
Speaker A:In most of the states right now, you got heat on.
Speaker A:Maybe down south in Arizona you got the AC going like normal, but that's it.
Speaker A:But if you've got that heat or AC on, it's going through there.
Speaker A:When it turns off by turning that fan on, it's going to continue to filter air.
Speaker A:So that's a great one.
Speaker A:The next thing I recommend is if you have any kind of HEPA filters in the house, run those.
Speaker A:And then the third one is important here.
Speaker A:And this is one of those things that I added.
Speaker A:And this is one of those things we've talked about on the show before.
Speaker A:Makes me a little nervous.
Speaker A:I added one of the air added air scrubbers that basically puts out a hydrogen peroxide or a peroxide ozone kind of thing.
Speaker A:It doesn't give out ozone, but it's this space age technology.
Speaker A:It kills anything that's airborne.
Speaker A:Now the good thing with that is, is I think it does a really good job of killing that kind of stuff.
Speaker A:The bad thing is my wife Julie goes to sit there and cook pizza dough.
Speaker A:She's going to put pizza dough together with yeast.
Speaker A:It'll kill that before it has a chance to grow.
Speaker A:So that's how efficient this is.
Speaker A:I have to go unplug that when I'm gonna go baking or she's gonna go baking.
Speaker A:So I have to make sure and unplug that after a few hours.
Speaker A:Ventilate the house a little bit, get that stuff out of there, so she can actually do stuff with that.
Speaker A:So that's something to consider.
Speaker A:And I'll be honest, I have no idea what the health benefits of that are and what the damages are.
Speaker A:They say it's safe, I won't know for later.
Speaker A:So I just run that when I'm worried about getting sick.
Speaker A:Now one of the things that I recommend too, balanced diet, making sure you're getting your sleep at night.
Speaker A:For me personally, if I am exhausted and I've got been running four or five days on four or five hours sleep, that is my rapid recipe for getting sick.
Speaker A:And I've got a friend right now, she is about as healthy as it gets.
Speaker A:And she's been down for two weeks with COVID right now.
Speaker A:And I feel bad.
Speaker A:She can't talk and she's down for the count right now.
Speaker A:Now getting a little better.
Speaker A:So that's good.
Speaker A:But this is stuff that's cruising around out there.
Speaker A:Another thing you can do is just make sure clutter is not your friend with this Countertops clean.
Speaker A:I'm not a big fan of the canned wipes that I'm not going to say the brand, but we all know them.
Speaker A:Sometimes it's better just go around with hydrogen peroxide, wipe down those hard surfaces, do something like that because I don't like putting the chemicals out there.
Speaker A:That's not great.
Speaker A:If you have any air quality monitors in your house, you'll set those things off with many of those wipes.
Speaker A:Go the greener option and just make sure you're washing those hands.
Speaker A:Keep washing those hands and do it correctly and really spend some time getting that stuff going there.
Speaker A:Now that's a big one.
Speaker A:Now the next thing is, and this is tough because this is one of the ones that I always get nailed on this heading out to shows and concerts.
Speaker A:This is a risk.
Speaker A:When I go out and see my favorite rock band up the street or in a big place like that, man, those are those cold flu Covid super spreader events.
Speaker A:So what I would recommend when you come back from those, take the clothes off, get inside the door, of course, clothes, shoes, everything off.
Speaker A:Go take a shower, scrub up, wash the hands first so you don't touch your face.
Speaker A:And really try to not bring that stuff home.
Speaker A:And you might have a chance with that.
Speaker A:And then the other little tricks that I do is when I run my laundry, I run it through the steam cycle.
Speaker A:So as long as the clothes can handle it, run it through the steam cycle so it'll go through the sanitation process.
Speaker A:Because my dryer has that, which is cool.
Speaker A:And I can run it through the steam in there and it'll sanitize that as well as, as well as running my dishwasher.
Speaker A:I always run my dishwasher.
Speaker A:When I run it, I always run it through the sanitation where it's the NSF certified.
Speaker A:So everything that comes out of there is sanitary.
Speaker A:And those are my little tricks and tips to try to keep that stuff at bay.
Speaker A:And of course, when you jump in your car, meeting people, whatever, have some hand sanitizer, have some wipes, whatever you're going to use to clean up with, the more you can do that stuff without touching your face and touching everything around you, the better off you're going to be.
Speaker A:And some of these things are really simple that you can do.
Speaker A:There's UV filters, there's a lot of different things out there.
Speaker A:But the more that you can do to keep that air clean and the stuff inside.
Speaker A:So think of that front door as your barrier to the outside and all of that.
Speaker A:So the more you can do to keep that stuff from coming in the front door, the better off you're gonna be.
Speaker A:And that's gonna really save you some headaches and maybe make it a little bit healthier for you around the house.
Speaker A:Be right back after these important messages.
Speaker A:Don't go any.
Speaker A:Welcome back to the around the House show, the next generation of home improvement.
Speaker A:I'm Eric G.
Speaker A:Thanks for joining me.
Speaker A:This last segment of this hour of the show.
Speaker A:So thanks for tuning in.
Speaker A:If you want to find out more about us, head over to aroundthe house online.com and of course, this hour is brought to you by our friends at Monument Grills.
Speaker A:To check them out, head to Monument Grills.
Speaker A:I started a project that I did this week here for an upcoming episode that's airing today on around the House Northwest, the television show.
Speaker A:And this one was a lot of fun and we went over to my executive producer's house and installed some of those acoustic wall panels.
Speaker A:Now this stuff is an easy DIY project.
Speaker A:Now his house, pretty nice older house.
Speaker A:But I tell you what, the challenge with this stuff and I wanted to talk about these acoustic panels first.
Speaker A:Now here's the thing.
Speaker A:These are the ones you see out there if you don't know what I'm talking about.
Speaker A:They have a felt like a three, eight inch thick felt back that's black and they have about three quarter inch strips up with a half inch between them, maybe an inch.
Speaker A:And they are either natural oak or walnut look.
Speaker A:And they have strips that come up and it gives you that really cool.
Speaker A:They've been all over the Internet, this acoustical panel, and I really like the look.
Speaker A:I did them for my house last year, and so I noticed last time I was in my floor and decor store here.
Speaker A:And this is not a floor and decor statement special.
Speaker A:They don't pay me a dime.
Speaker A:This is not a commercial forum, but this stuff used to have to order, pay for shipping, everything else.
Speaker A:They now have them on the shelf.
Speaker A:That is what's cool with this is you can go into your local store and grab them off the shelf.
Speaker A:This is what's trick with this stuff.
Speaker A:Now let's talk about where the good application for and where the not so good application for a couple things.
Speaker A:These.
Speaker A:The sheets are 21 wide by 93 tall.
Speaker A:So they're a little short of 8ft high.
Speaker A:They're really cool.
Speaker A:What I like about them is that they're basically a veneer on those pieces.
Speaker A:And really low gloss.
Speaker A:You can't refinish them.
Speaker A:It's literally a veneer painted on kind of surface, like a picture of it.
Speaker A:But it looks really good.
Speaker A:And here's the thing, it has a core.
Speaker A:But what I like about this is because you have the black on the felt, they made the MDF black.
Speaker A:Now, floor and decor, they're about 100 bucks a piece.
Speaker A:So that's 21 by a little short of 8.
Speaker A:That's metric sizes.
Speaker A:All you Canadians are like, oh, yeah, that's what that is.
Speaker A:So all you folks out there.
Speaker A:So it's 19 millimeters thick, 92.9 inches, and 20.96 inches wide.
Speaker A:So that's what it is.
Speaker A:But here's the cool thing with this stuff.
Speaker A:It looks really cool, looks great on a wall.
Speaker A:A lot of things you do with it.
Speaker A:Now, here is the problem with this.
Speaker A:Now, of course, the price could be different in your area, and I'm just giving the price off of my website.
Speaker A:When I went and got it, it picked it up.
Speaker A:But the one thing with these panels is.
Speaker A:And that was my.
Speaker A:My challenge over at this house today is that nothing is square, plumb or level.
Speaker A:Nothing.
Speaker A:Walls racked, had to work around a countertop.
Speaker A:It was leaning.
Speaker A:It was just.
Speaker A:Everything was off half a bubble.
Speaker A:And when you have a very straight square line with a gap in between it, and you've got a very lineal pattern, this can be really tough.
Speaker A:It took me twice as long to do this because I was scribing everything.
Speaker A:But the problem we have with something like this is that when that stuff goes up against the door trim, it needs to sit up in there.
Speaker A:Even with that door trim, even when the door trim's wrong and being not my house, I can't sit there and rip all the trim off.
Speaker A:We can't square the walls up.
Speaker A:We can't do all this stuff.
Speaker A:This is a hundred year old plus house.
Speaker A:It is what it is.
Speaker A:So the challenges with that are pretty good.
Speaker A:But let me give you some tricks and tips with this stuff.
Speaker A:This stuff looks really good.
Speaker A:You're not paying the shipping.
Speaker A:It's cool.
Speaker A:And it really has a significant sound absorption rate with it.
Speaker A:So when you think about it, in a house that's got hardwoods and you get that bounce, you get a little bit of that gymnasium echo.
Speaker A:What's cool with this is that it cuts that down a lot.
Speaker A:So it really does a great job of, of, of cutting that echo down in the room.
Speaker A:So it's really cool.
Speaker A:And so there's a couple ways to do it.
Speaker A:I use my track saw because I could, I had a lot of angles to cut and I could set those angles really easily and not worry about it.
Speaker A:And thanks Milwaukee for the new track saw.
Speaker A:That thing is awesome.
Speaker A:I love that thing.
Speaker A:Works really good.
Speaker A:And so they have the real wood veneer on there and you got the MDF behind it.
Speaker A:So it does look good.
Speaker A:You can't refinish it, you can't do anything to it.
Speaker A:It's just too thin of an ear.
Speaker A:But it works well.
Speaker A:So what you do with this stuff is I always start out with the most visible spot and I will set that full piece because they're offset.
Speaker A:So they have a half inch offset.
Speaker A:So the, it hides the, the gaps in the felt with these panels.
Speaker A:And so what's cool with these things?
Speaker A:And I'll put this up this weekend on the around the house Facebook page so you can see it up there, that segment.
Speaker A:So you can see what we're talking about.
Speaker A:Just go over to around the house show over on Facebook and I'll put the video up there so you can watch what I'm talking about.
Speaker A:But they have this half inch overlap basically on this.
Speaker A:And so I like to bring that up against the trim so you can see in the most obvious spot you have a straight edge to go with and it makes everything look straight across there.
Speaker A:So at least you're lining things up and looking that way and then go back down the road.
Speaker A:Now there's a couple ways to do this.
Speaker A:When it goes to fastening it up on the wall, I like to go through and use about 2 inch nails, pin nails, and I'm going to pin through the veneer on that and that way you can just pin that in.
Speaker A:I'm using an 18 gauge pin nailer and then I can go through and hit that with some touch up and you're good to go.
Speaker A:It's natural oak, so I just got a wax stick and do that.
Speaker A:Now one of the things that I do with this.
Speaker A:Here's a trick of mine to making this look good.
Speaker A:I had a popcorn ceiling above it and everything else that there was no way I was going to get that perfect up against that because I don't want to mess with this guy's popcorn ceiling.
Speaker A:It's not mine because it's a older house.
Speaker A:So what you can do is take your scraps after you're done cutting and you've cut it to length.
Speaker A:What you can do is go in behind that MDF slat with a utility knife, fillet that off of the, the felt back material.
Speaker A:And now you've got trim to cover up on those areas that you want to bring up to because you have to get it in to fit in there and you don't want to mess up the popcorn.
Speaker A:Or if you've got an area where things are just gapped and you can't do it.
Speaker A:We ran into this in another area where I had to fake it out a little bit, but I actually kept the gap on the other side of the trim because if I were to put a piece of wood there, it would have been an inch at the bottom and half inch at top, which screams everything is not right.
Speaker A:So what I did is I brought it.
Speaker A:So I spaced it out.
Speaker A:So that gap was in the black and it hid and made the gap wider so it looked really good.
Speaker A:So these are little tricks and tips you can do and it makes for a really great project.
Speaker A:Now, design wise, these acoustical wall panels that you see are accent pieces.
Speaker A:I probably.
Speaker A:Unless it's.
Speaker A:I wouldn't.
Speaker A:Unless it's an office.
Speaker A:I wouldn't do every wall.
Speaker A:I would do one wall or maybe two walls.
Speaker A:It's got accent paint that you've seen people do over the years.
Speaker A:I really would like to do on those maybe one walls, maybe two in that thing.
Speaker A:Because you don't.
Speaker A:You can have too much of a good thing.
Speaker A:So I like them as an accent and they look really good.
Speaker A:And you can do light, dark.
Speaker A:And if you want to get real wood ones, not mdf, you can get those too.
Speaker A:If you're like, I want the real Thing.
Speaker A:Yeah, you can get them, but they're probably 4, 5, 600 bucks a panel.
Speaker A:So it's a big investment versus heading down to your floor and decor store and getting the 99 ones.
Speaker A:So there's the big deal there.
Speaker A:So anyway, this is a fun project.
Speaker A:I walked through it.
Speaker A:There's a lot of tricks on that one that you can tackle, but it's a great wintertime project when the weather's bad and you could really make a difference at making your house look amazing when you do it.
Speaker A:All right, I got one more thing I want to give a shout out to today.
Speaker A:And we got a great show coming up next weekend.
Speaker A:I can't wait to share with you.
Speaker A:But if you're listening on the radio, make sure you're catching us on the podcast because we do a midweek special on Wednesday mornings that comes out.
Speaker A:It's a little 10 minute piece you might be missing and it's a great time to grab that.
Speaker A:But I had an upgrade on my range this last week from Z Line appliances and man, these guys make amazing stuff.
Speaker A:And so I did an upgrade on my range.
Speaker A:This thing.
Speaker A:Talk about an upgrade from their model even a few years ago.
Speaker A:I love it when companies build things and they build them and keep innovating and making them better and better and better.
Speaker A:And boy, I tell you what, that new 48 inch range there, I think it's the RAB BR, which I got, the black stainless 48, that is a great range.
Speaker A:And when you look at them, they're half the price of the bigger brands out there.
Speaker A:The Wolfs, the Mila's, the all the big brands out there, the.
Speaker A:All the other ones that you see out there that are 14 to $20,000 and these guys are closer to seven or eight.
Speaker A:There's a lot of value there for you that you should be paying attention to because that's saving some money.
Speaker A:And I tell you what, it cooks even.
Speaker A:It's solid and something to take a look at if you're out there trying to do a project on a budget.
Speaker A:All right, guys, this wraps up this hour of around the House.
Speaker A:If you want to find out more about me, head over to aroundthehouse online.com and please help us out.
Speaker A:I'd love to see if you could be following on the YouTube channel.
Speaker A:All right, everybody, have a great rest of your weekend.
Speaker A:I'm Eric G.
Speaker A:Thanks for tuning in around the House.
Speaker A:We'll see you next week all over the rodeo with.
