Most people get into these situations do so to save money. Hey, donâÂÂt get me wrong, I hire workers on the side for my home regularly to save a buck. However, I know how to direct them, make sure what they are doing is needed and if their work is correct. I also know every square inch of my property. I have a very large umbrella policy that would cover me if someone was injured on my property. If your neighbor was seriously injured working on your home, the courts would likely award him a hefty sum of your money if an insurance policy wasn't in place. Most people donâÂÂt (want to) consider repairs and maintenance into their monthly budget when purchasing a home. If R&M is considered, that typically means less money to spend on the purchase price of the home. WeâÂÂve all been there. A good 30âÂÂ-40â extension ladder can cost you $400.00 at Home Depot. Not to mention all the other tools to maintain and repair a historic house can run on forever. If you donâÂÂt even have a ladder, you are not prepared to maintain a historic home. Trust me; a ladder is just the beginning. Many people can't safely handle an extension ladder of that size anyway. I DONâÂÂT RECOMMEND BUYING A LADDER AND DOING IT YOURSELF EITHER!!!!! MANY INEXPERIENCED PEOPLE CLIMB LADDERS EVERY YEAR AND END UP SERIOUSLY INJURED, DISABLED OR DEAD FROM A FALL, ELECTROCUTION OR OTHER LADDER MISHAP. OVER 165,000 PEOPLE GO TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM ANNUALLY DUE TO LADDER FALLS. 97% OF THOSE ARE RELATED TO THE HOME. IMO, pay the $700.00, never let him touch your home again as he lacks experience and consider you got off cheap. It would have likely gotten real expensive if he actually did some work and screwed it up. Going forward, find a small contractor who has good references and plenty of experience for historic homes and answers his/her cell phone when you call. If his/her voicemail won't accept any messages because the mailbox is full, Run, Forest, Run! Start a relationship with a contractor and make sure your neighbors conclusion is correct at the same time. Make sure the contractor has sufficient insurance with workers comp. If he's a one man band and doesnâÂÂt have workers comp, make sure you get an indemnification/hold harmless agreement signed and make sure it holds up in your state. Only pay for work completed or materials delivered to your home. Never pay for work in advance! Budget for R&M just like groceries but use the 1% rule. Figure 1% of your homes purchase price annually for R&M. Older homes will typically be more and newer homes will typically be less. A home built before the Civil War, more! If you want to keep your home maintained and its value up, itâÂÂs absolutely necessary. IâÂÂll even wager youâÂÂll save money in the long run. Good luck, This post was edited by mepop on Tue, Nov 26, 13 at 19:08

>There should not be little holes and cracks everywhere for them to get in. All it takes is ONE hole. I bought an old house in an area where EVERYONE has mouse problems--in fact, when I was remodeling the gest house, I didn't tape over the hole where the old shower was, and we had PACK RATS the next time I came in. Anyhow, I'd been certain the mice were coming in the main house mostly through the laundry room, but it wasn't until I completely demo'd the kitchen that I found the spot--the ONE spot. Haven't had a single mouse since I sealed it up. Of course, that doesn't mean I won't in the future--all it takes is for one pregnant mouse to scoot through the door while you're unloading groceries, and you've got a huge problem again.

Well, I took your combined advice and it worked! She (hopefully) fixed everything and ended up not charging me anything for it. I really do like her as a person and I trust her. And, yes, she is licensed and bonded and very experienced. But, she was originally going to charge me $190 for a new part that she brought , although "nothing for the labor" . She'd called some folks at KA and it was what they suggested. I told her that DH was really upset because we'd spent almost $1,000, had her out 4 times to fix them and nothing was fixed still. And then talked about how exhausting it always is to have to haul everything out to our garage fridge and freezer and then back again later. Which it truly is. That's a long walk back and forth dozens of times! I admit that I took the coward's way out, laying the anger on DH who wasn't present. So, she installs the new part for the oven, which was pretty complicated, as I watched the whole thing. She turned it on . . . and it still didn't work! OMG, we were both so discouraged! She tries a few more things, but nothing. And then, she notices that the oven door has a small worn (?) hole in it where the latch fits in, and it is letting the latch slide out most of the time. When it slips out, the oven won't turn on! It was fairly unobvious, being on the door itself, but when the door successfully latched and stayed latched, the oven would turn on. When the latch slipped out, the oven wouldn't. She made a temporary small metal patch that she drilled in and will now search for a replacement latch hole strip. So, the new part wasn't needed after all, but she left it in because it would have been a bear to take everything apart again. She did say that in all her almost-20 years in this business, she's never seen of such a problem or heard of it. I told her to write a paper on it to present at the next convention. And then she starts working on the freezer. She brought a small portable steamer with a cone nozzle, stuffed it down the drain in the bottom back of the freezer drawer and blew out and dried up a clog there. The clog caused the freezer to ice over and then drip. It also iced up the tracks that the drawer slides on, so we may have not needed the new runners after all. She did show me how to use our own steamer to do the same if it happens again, but she said it shouldn't for many years, if ever. She also said that the drawer was tilted down a bit and used a electric screw/bolt driver to tighten it. What a saga! I truly hope it's over! Thank you all for your thoughts, words to use, and encouragement. I listened and they worked! If people are rude to me, I have absolutely no problem "jumping down their throats with both feet", as DH likes to call it. I'm very effective wording things, both in person and in writing. But, if it's a nice person that I like, and she is, it is so, so hard for me to say anything! So, this sometimes-Cowardly Lion says, "Thank you for the borrowed courage!"

As kimmq pointed out, mice are so common outdoors that attempts to eradicate them are a waste of (monetary) resources. Rodents become a problem when they damage structures, raid vegetable crops or their droppings contain pathogens. These problems are most often associated with rats.. Unless the mice are actually inside your house, I wouldn't worry about it. If that happens, the traditional baited trap is really all you need. In the meantime, there's no need to lure the mice indoors with cheese coup de grace when they are content outdoors. Since this forum is devoted to IPM, as opposed to traps and poisons, the IPM approach is to encourage a pest's predators, in this case raptors and snakes.