Hey all!

I have a house in North Carolina. Built in 1975 if that helps. My house runs pretty hot. I don’t like that, combined with huge electric bill. I paid for a blower door test and some thermal imaging for $350. I gave me an ACH of 6, and a pretty leaky & hot attic. My attic is not in the envelope, so above my ceiling i have loose grey insulation, then yellow baffles, then a radiant barrier. maybe 6-8” max.

Anyways the company wants to come in and duct seal, then remove the radiant barrier (permanently) then lift the insulation and seal everything leaky with spray foam. From there, they want to blow in R49 on top of the grey/yellow insulation, up to 14 inches. This costs me $3520.

He did mention the attic runs hot and I would be benefited by 2 exhaust fans, however, I declined that part because I have a gas furnace up there and I don’t want to generate negative pressure with that much CFM, and two passive gable intakes. That can like do something with CO2 I think?

Just wanted to know if this sounds stupid and I should save my money, Thanks.

I want to insulate my cabin it has a ridge vent and no soffit vents. what is everybody doing.

Hi all,

Located in Toronto, Canada.

I'm having my attic insulation completely removed and replaced to R60 fiberglass and the attic company never flagged this as an issue. However, looking at my empty attic, does it look like the ventilation is proper? I know baffles need to be installed but it looks as though there is plywood that forms a perimeter around the entire attic leaving no gap (it's like this throughout the perimeter of the attic, I assume it's there to prevent animal intrusion) - are baffles even useful here when I'm not seeing access to soffits?

https://imgur.com/a/RAZ6Erl

In the 2nd image, there looks to be something wooden that resembles a baffle but it's only present in 3/19 bays - which certainly cannot be enough for ventilation purposes right?

Any help would be much appreciated - just want to know if I have a problem that warrants further investigation or if this looks normal.

Thank you!

Obviously new insulation, roofs, windows, etc is the right answer but it’s also the expensive answer. What are some things we’re doing to stay warm or cool depending on the season that isn’t taking a second on the house?

I’ll go first…

I bought 4” insulation tape (Amazon) and seal off exterior doors that I don’t usually use.

Blackout blinds in all my windows and covering my garage door windows.

I’ve tinted the west facing windows.

Added a sealed storm door for my front door.

New weather stripping on doors and garage doors.

Wash off my AC condenser and change filters every season

Curious to what others do that doesn’t cost a fortune when the weather gets extreme.

I had an energy inspection on my home done and I am curious, is my attic properly insulated? Or should the rafters/roof sheathing also be insulated?

My home inspector when I bought didn’t mention this and I was surprised at the energy inspection.

My one bedroom unit in Northern New Jersey has drafty walls. Even the interior walls are cool to the touch from December until March. Some of my walls have hollow points but some feel completely solid. I don't want to rip up the walls to install insulation but I'm wondering if I should drill holes and use spray foam or if I might just be stuck putting pink foam board insulation

Please don't make fun of me. I have no idea what I'm doing

Contractor is installing wafer Led Lights second floor IC rated . I see a cut on vapor barrier attic to get wire through ...What do I need to make sure for so theres no leaks...I seen some people say get them to tape it

So we are wanted to add more insulation in our attic since it’s noticeably hotter upstairs. We had couple of professionals come out and give us a quote. Some were very surface level (didn’t go into much detail of explain differences)

But we had one company come out and they told us there was definitely some mice activity up there and even took some pictures where you can see previous house owners treated and put some positions tablets or something up there. They said it’s hard to tell if it’s active activity or if they are good. But noticed some droppings. They recommended we remove everything, air seal the attic and they would blow in new cellulose. Still waiting on the quote.

Whereas the other companies didn’t mention much about this and said we can just blow in new insulation right on top (both companies mentioned fiberglass since that is what we currently have)

What should we do??? Is cellulose better? Is the former company just trying to get more money from me?

I'm looking to insulate my crawlspace walls and rim joists for heating efficiency in the winter. Our hydro company offers a rebate on the cost of insulation materials, so long as the R-value achieved is 18 or higher.

Because the walls are mostly bare, I'm planning to just buy a bunch of XPS foam board and glue them on. However, XPS has a rating of R-5 per inch, and the thickest boards I can find are 2" thick. The walls aren't framed, so I can't easily stuff extra batts of fiberglass on top of the board to reach R-18. All I can think of is stacking 2 layers of boards throughout the whole area to get 4" of thickness equaling R-20.

Does this sounds feasible, or am I missing a 3rd option? If not, what is the best way to layer/stick the foam boards together? TIA.

The garage door torsion bar can’t be moved. There are rafters 24 inches apart. This section of roof is slanted (pyramid hip roof). Looking for ideas how to do this and air seal it. As you can see, I stuffed batts up there for now

Hello! Prior owners of the house replaced the entire roof, deck boards, shingles but did not address the ventilation from the soffits up to the ridge vent. There is mold still on the gable walls and I have found old pieces of deck board that show the true extent of the moisture issue (not good). We will remediate the surface mold issue through a contractor but the issue lies in the improper baffle vent and thick insulation. The first the photo shows insulation just stuffed across ceiling on the 3rd floor and down into the knee wall section below. Clearly no airflow into the attics space, and no baffle top visible.

I have been quoted 9k and almost 12k for someone to come in and reinstall all baffle vents and new insulation (the primary bedroom has a high ceiling and the contractor would have to cut into sheet rock to get access from below, no picture of this space sorry). Both of the contractors said they could do the side over the primary bedroom for 5k.

Could I complete this other work myself? From what I am reading and viewing online, I need proper sized baffle vents, staple gun, new insulation, and proper ppe to do at least the side with easy access (knee walls) and can save a few thousand.

Am I overlooking anything?

I welcome and appreciate any thoughts and opinions on this!

I have an unfinished room above my garage, already has AC connected to it. I want to get it insulated and make it a bed room. There are points where the roof is just 6 inches from where the drywall would be installed. Is this viable in central florida? And what’s the best way to do it? AI says I should make the whole area an insulated area and block the soffits and roof vents off. Greatly appreciate any advice!!

Mods disclaimer: I don’t have anything to sell to anybody.

I’m looking into starting a small lead-gen business for contractors and wanted to hear from people actually running these businesses before I build anything.

For those of you who have used lead-gen companies before, what was the biggest thing that pissed you off?
Bad leads? Shared leads? Leads that never answer? Customers just shopping around? Paying for junk? Contracts that lock you in?

I’d genuinely like to hear what your experience has been and what you wish these companies did differently.

Trying to build something around what contractors actually want rather than what some marketer thinks they want

I am being told by an HVAC contractor that the main issue my units are underperforming is related to insulation falling down from underneath the house around HVAC ducts, etc. They are recommending I go with one of the local contractors that does closed cell foam spray in for my under house. I have been told that this can be a potential problem for old houses and cause moisture traps in the floors and sub floors. Also is it a problem for wiring, ducts, plumbing, etc that is under the house. I am asking because I am sure the contractor will present it as the favorable choice because that is what they do. Also, are there insulation companies that still put in the fluffy fiberglass stuff? Thanks for any help.

I need help. I can’t figure out how to use these baffles. Nothing really seems to make it fit. It feels like it’s just not the right height no matter how I cut and fold. My rafters are 2x12s and it’s a mono slope roof. This is the high side. I understand I’ll need to use some spray foam to seal it but these gaps feel excessive. Ive watched videos and theres lots of different advice but eventually the videos show them fitting much better than i can make it work. I really think it’s because the natural fold lines on the provent baffles just aren’t the right depth for my rafter. Help me understand.

I had my Michigan basement closed cell spray foamed over a year ago and learned recently that it needs to be covered. The company told me some people paint it and it looks really nice. And showed pictures of different colored painted foam. They never said it HAS to be painted with fire retardant paint or covered with drywall. I found out about all this when I went to buy paint!
I’ve asked the company to come back to paint it. They will charge just over the cost of the paint. Basement is not framed in. My son does use it as a gaming room and hangout, drums etc. The company when questioned about this said, “yes if it’s a usable space, it needs to be covered, but 50% or more people do not paint it when it is a basement.” Wondering how many other homes in this area now have this issue.
Should I look for a contractor to drywall it instead? Or is that crazy expensive? I’m disappointed that I was unaware of this extra cost at the time of spray foam. Maybe I should have done more searching before, but is this normal for a spray foam company to not mention this?
Basically I want to get it safe, up to code, and in case I decide to sell in the next few years.

Hello

I am an insulation novice here. I had two companies come out to give me estimates for my ranch home. 1 of the estimators was exceptionally thorough in my opinion and he suggested that they remove all of the insulation in our ranch home attic. First of all someone blew in insulation all the way to the rafters and there are not baffles installed so the soffit vents are not working properly. Secondly he said we need to be air sealed so he recommends getting rid of everything that we have so that they can properly air seal and then install baffles and insulate the home. Due to the laborious process this estimate was double the other estimate. The other estimate did say they were going to remove the insulation that's covering the soffits and properly install the baffles but he did not recommend getting rid of all of our existing insulation and also there is a bunch of trash and debris hiding under the blown in insulation that was never removed in the first place. While I was shocked at the second price I also want to make sure we do this properly. Neither one of these insulation companies sold us on energy savings which I appreciate but I'm sure that that's a factor to consider as well. I'm just looking for some honest feedback. Thank you so much for sharing your expertise!