Spring has officially begun. Can I get a “woot woot”?! Although Mother Nature doesn’t immediately stop dishing out cold, snow and freezing rain because of the vernal equinox, at least we know the end to winter weather across the country is near.
The winter was tough on everyone, including the construction industry, which, unfortunately, is still trying to climb its way back up after the 2008 economic crisis. I recently was waiting for a flight at O’Hare with a long-time manufacturing friend of retrofit who was saying his numbers were down because of the tough winter the country experienced. I assured him, based on my own experience, that once everyone can uncover all the damage this winter caused, his business and many others within the construction industry will be booming.
For me, the snow, ice and extreme cold here in Chicago were bad; the resulting Great Melt of 2014 was much worse. A little background: In 2007, I bought a second-floor two-bedroom condo on Chicago’s northwest side. The three-floor, 15-unit building had recently been gut rehabbed and I was among the first owners. For seven years, my neighbors and I have dealt with numerous construction defects; the board even passed a special assessment soon after we all moved in to deal with masonry issues. I still believe the developer is laughing on a beach somewhere with my money and I’d love to sue my inspector, but those are stories for another day.
When the Great Melt of 2014 began, as you can imagine, new problem areas arose. I couldn’t catch all the water pouring into my unit—through the back door’s frame, around a ceiling HVAC vent, through the HVAC ductwork in the utility closet and through the microwave. Yes, you read that right. Through the microwave.
My building’s management company brought out a contractor who diagnosed problems with the masonry (again), mortar used inappropriately on the steps leading out of our back doors onto the typical Chicago-style wraparound porch, poor incorporation of our outside-facing doors with the masonry, bad caulking around my exhaust vent (the kitchen exhaust fan is integrated with my microwave above the stove), gutter and downspout problems, and ice dams.
Despite the ongoing problems with my building, I have many friends who live in multifamily buildings in Chicago that also experienced leaks during the Great Melt of 2014. If you haven’t already, now would be a good time to put yourself in front of property management companies and condo associations. They’re going to need good contractors to help them diagnose and fix leaks caused by the winter. And even if you’re not planning to partner with multifamily buildings, based on news reports from around the country all winter long, there will be plenty of work to go around. Are you prepared to meet the impending onslaught of service calls?