I found a wonderful dual valve that has a short stem with a ball knob that you turn both hot and cold water lines on with at the same time. Mine is solid brass and I like the look and feel of it. It is easy enough for my wife to switch. I think stainless can be had for more money. A plumber installed it . Our stand pipe is behind a sheet rock wall, except for a very short pipe that Y's off at the top and protrudes out of the wall. We stick the drain hose into it. No problems with backup or smells.

Compression fittings are fully code compliant when installed in a non-concealed location. The copper supply piping in the wall is installed during the "stack out" phase of construction and at that time each fixture supply is stubbed out and capped. Later after all the walls are finished and the cabinets installed we do the final phase of the plumbing which is called the "trim out phase" which is when all the final fixtures are set in place. During Trim out the copper pipe stub outs are cut off and the line stops or angle stops are installed. Most plumbers, myself included, prefer to use the compression mounts for the line stops or angle stops because it eliminates any possibility of scorching a wall or cabinet which could result if we were to solder valves in place. The other advantage of compression mounted stop valves is that they can be very easily changed in future if the need should arise, although we constantly hear about people who run into problems here also. When a compression fitting is installed the compression nut is slipped onto the pipe first, then a brass compression ferrule is slipped on the pipe and the valve or fitting is then slid on the pipe until the pipe bottoms out in the fitting input port. With the fitting held firmly in place the compression nut and ferrule is then slid outwards towards the fitting and the nut is tightened in place on the fitting. Properly you should hold the valve or fitting steady with one wrench while tightening the nut with a second wrench. As the nut is tightened the compression ferrule is compressed into the wall of the copper pipe effecting a water tight seal. If it then becomes necessary to change the valve at a later time you hold the valve steady with a wrench while unscrewing the nut with a second wrench. Once the nut is off the valve the valve can be slid off the pipe. The nut and compression fitting will not slide off because the inside diameter of the compression ferrule is now slightly less than the outside diameter of the pipe on which it is installed. Rather than attempt to remove the nut and ferrule you remove the nut and ferrule from the new valve, slide the new valve on the pipe and tighten it in place with the existing nut and ferrule. In your case you have a small section of copper pipe in the basement that is leaking. You should not need to remove the valve or riser to the valve. Instead, you should be able to use a tubing cutter to cut out the bad section of copper in the basement and replace just that section by soldering in a new section of copper in place with a couple copper couplings.

chris8796: Yup, I think that is the route I'm going to have to take. (I'm just tired, that's all.) I've never done any plumbing because my dad never did any plumbing: he always figured the price of failure was too high to mess around with for that area of home improvement (and electricity, too). I don't doubt I can do this, though. It is just one more line item on my list of things to learn how to do because I can't find anyone to not rip me off. suburbanmd: Actually, we ponied up for the plumbers report for Washington Consumer Checkbook. I called the top fourteen on the list and only got two callbacks. One was the $580 quote (of the two quotes I got, it was indeed lower than the other by about $100), and the other never returned my follow-up call (I wasn't home when he first called me). And Angie's list is basically useless. I think we are small and plumbers either won't bother or they jack the price up high enough that it is "worth" their precious time. Fair enough but I'm sick of it, and at best, it is either rude or disingenuous. There is absolutely no way I think removing two stupid cut-off valves will take almost four hours by a licensed plumber (which is what the $580 implies, given what that company quoted as their time-and-materials per-hour rate). And yes, I do understand that when they give you a firm quote, they are supposed to be trying to factor in the "mystery" part where they don't actually know for sure what is inside your walls or what they might encounter. But we have no drywall and they can see everything.

I live in a condo which has 122 units and ONE shut off valve for the building's water supply. In other words, if water to a unit has to be shut off for any reason, the whole building has water shut off. In my experience, you can't replace a shut off valve without turning off the water for the building. You use the shut off valve so that you don't have to turn off water for the whole building to change a faucet or even a toilet. I would double check with management or whoever is in charge of maintenance because based on personal experience, you would need to close down all the water to replace the shut off valves. Because of the horrible consequences if a shut off valve breaks, my building has an annual inspection of all the shut off valves in each unit. If your shut off valve is found to be leaking or in danger of seizing (e.g. not shutting or opening properly), our building will make note of it. The HOA then turns off the water for one day so all homeowners on the list can get them replaced and the HOA generally provides the ability to use a plumber who bids a discount price. But the chief incentive is that normally it costs $2000 to shut off the water but there is no cost if you have the valves replaces on that day.