Concerning more ventilation: Most of the time it's fine. I don't mind cooking smells in the house. I've never cooked fish or something with strong unpleasant odors. The only times I really want more is when I'm sauteeing onions or searing steaks and I get smoke going. I turn it on in those cases but it doesn't even have enough pull to really pull the smoke up to the vent if that makes sense. Also I have greasy build-up on top of my cabinets. I had no idea that a fan was even suppose to be used for greasy things (can you tell my mom never used hers either), so now that I know a fan could help with that it would be nice if I had one that worked better so I didn't have to scrub the top of my cabinets every year. As far as current venting goes; if I had any it would have to be in the existing wall, nothing goes through the cabinet over the stove. Also there is nothing on the roof or side of the house that indicts anything being vented anywhere in this area of the house. Weedmeister, after reading your message I realize I was incorrect in my thinking of where the duct connects to the hood. I was thinking they would connect to the back side of the hood (where it touches the wall) but after reading this I think you are saying the duct will connect above the hood. Is that correct? In that case I'd have 2 turns in either direction (one from the fan to the wall and one from the wall to go up or to the side. I'd definitely want the vent in the wall because I have a huge open space above the cabinets up to the cathedral ceiling and I wouldn't want to see a vent running there. Thanks for helping me clarify this stuff. More and more it sounds like going ductless might still be my best choice. The filters on them were rather expensive and I was starting to think maybe over the long term that just installing the ducting work would be cheaper than replacing all those filters. So if I'm going to install a ductless hood, does the CFM's matter so much. I was considering the Broan Evolutions QP130 or Broan QP230 hoods.

We're also in Oakland but used to live at 26th and California in the city for decades. Assume your lot is small and the soil can be poor, so you need to draw your lot to scale and figure out what you want from it. Seating on those rare nice days? Play area for kids? BBQ area for grilling? Flowers? Veggies? The options are endless but your space is limited. THe majority of your budget will go to hardscape unless you are lucky enough to have precisely what you want already. Plants are cheap and seeds even cheaper. There are no really good nurseries in SF. Sloat is barely passable and the others are worse. The closest "serious" nursery is Golden in San Mateo, a superb nursery right off 101 that is sitting on at least $1M of prime real estate - I'm sure that even now, the developers can hardly wait for the family to consider selling, LOL. The East Bay has Berkeley Horticultural and East Bay Nursery, plus Evergreen in San Leandro. Richmond (city of) has Annie's Annuals, a local fav whose website you should check out. She will be having her open house garden party soon, in May I think. She's the source for many terrific heirloom plants that do well here, including the stunning Ladybird poppy, one of the few annuals that I will buy. Contra Costa and Marin have some good Navlet's garden centers, a local chain, but nothing really near you. Don't overlook the big box stores, some of them have decent garden centers with cheap prices on basic stock. If you arrive when the stock is fresh, their plants are fine. EVERYBODY gets their stock from the same three major wholesalers; the private nurseries aim for more specialized plants and a better quality level on the standard plants. Because of this, even when you finally decide what you want and where you want it, don't expect to be able to buy every plant you're interested in. The growing stock comes in at specific times during the year, and special ordering is very costly (I've done it, and it isn't fun when a $250 4-ft tree dies). If you're into cottage gardening, the forum here is very active. I posted recently in the Gallery section of that forum, as spring has brought a lot of blooms in the last month. I don't find the CA Gardening as interesting, but it's more weighted towards edibles and Southern/rural CA gardening, which doesn't apply to me, but YMMV. You might also want to check out the Landscape Design forum. Bahia, a professional landscaper who works out of San Jose, does a lot of beautiful succulent installations and has been recently posting pictures of some of his work. Really remarkable stuff, very inspiring.

Your problem is that you usually can't just get a door and stick it into an opening and expect it to fit. If you don't know a lot about doors, it's entirely reasonable to assume that they are standardized and, say, a 36" X 80" door should be able to be interchanged with another one of the same size. Unfortunately, that is hardly ever the case. For one thing, the hinges on the new door will be off from what you have, and so will be the height of the lockset. It might be close to what you have, but never a perfect match. That is why doors are often bought pre-hung, with the matching jamb; but obviously you want to avoid taking off the trim all around the door and replacing the jamb if you can avoid it. Secondly, when a door is first installed, each one needs to be "tuned": the jamb needs to be plumbed to match the door, and fine adjustments need to be made to both the jamb and the edge of the door so that there are minimal gaps and the door works well and closes properly. When you replace a door, you have to deal with the fact that the jamb was customized to fit the previous door and it takes some skill to get everything fine-tuned. I think your best bet is to get a solid core, slab door that has not been routed out for hinges or drilled for a lockset. Then hire a competent door installer who can do the routing and drilling so it matches your existing jamb and its hardware placement. I don't suggest you try this yourself. I've been doing home repairs and woodworking for over 30 years and I still approach door installation with trepidation...and replacement is even dicier.

My house has central air but I have reasons I think installing a whole-house fan is a Really Good Idea. If someone is interested, I'll go into them (The first sentence will be "I live in Michigan"). The reason I thought about an electrician is that it seems like the hardest parts of the project are the electrical parts - hooking up a new circuit in the attic, dropping wire for new switches - whereas the HVAC parts are really more carpentry projects than anything. Adding attic vents is something I think of roofers doing, actually. So maybe I could have an HVAC guy do an evaluation and some hourly-rate advice, and maybe some attic vents as well. Then I could start it as a DIY project and see where I get stuck.