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Tell me about getting rodents out of your home


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I have a problem.  We had two possums get into our living space in the last week.  Wife is not happy, and she is unaware of the second incident.  Had a guy out today, patched up some points of entry, but there are some serious issues in the attic.  We are putting the house on the market in the next few months and moving out of state, so I’m not crazy about dumping a ton of money into this problem, but I also cannot have possums scurrying around the house and expect to get top dollar when we sell.  I, and especially the wife, also would need spend our last few months in this house chasing rodents around.  What is a reasonable price to completely get rid of a variety of rodents that have infiltrated your attic?  I have another guy coming out tomorrow because the number I got today seened really high.

Edited by conVINCEd
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You got to trap them in your attic, with a live trap. You have to seal off the entry places. Then, call local Animal Control to cart them away. 
You can’t poison vermin in your attic, because they might crawl somewhere in the insulation and die (and stink). 
Do you have rats? Pro tip- tie a string around the rat trap, and the other end around a beam or support. That way a wounded rat can’t crawl away to die (and stink). 
Good luck!

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We apparently have lots of things, including rats.  The insulation is torn to hell as well as some ducting.  We have a bunch of oak trees, so noises from the toof are not unusual, and I blow it off most of the time as a cost of doing business in this neighborhood.  When a possum shows up in the kitchen and bathroom a few days apart, shit gets escalated quickly.  I really don’t want to spend the last couple of months in this house catching possums, nor dealing with the wife freaking out about possums, and I really don’t want to pay what the guy who came out today wants me to pay.  He wants to vacuum out all of the insulation, do some form of treatment, install new insulation. This is the expensive part of his proposal, and I have some doubts as to whether this level of mitigation is necessary.They would also fix all of the damage to the interior and exterior, which while not excessive, is not inconsequential.  This company was highly recommended by a few people whose opinion I trust.  The number is just really high to me for possums, rats, and squirrels.

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2 hours ago, conVINCEd said:

I have a problem.  We had two possums get into our living space in the last week.  Wife is not happy, and she is unaware of the second incident.  Had a guy out today, patched up some points of entry, but there are some serious issues in the attic.  We are putting the house on the market in the next few months and moving out of state, so I’m not crazy about dumping a ton of money into this problem, but I also cannot have possums scurrying around the house and expect to get top dollar when we sell.  I, and especially the wife, also would need spend our last few months in this house chasing rodents around.  What is a reasonable price to completely get rid of a variety of rodents that have infiltrated your attic?  I have another guy coming out tomorrow because the number I got today seened really high.

Remind me---are you in Austin/Central Texas? 

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It's probably going to come up in the home inspection portion of your real estate transaction.  And a scrupulously honest Seller's Disclosure.

And it might possibly be the subject of a lawsuit if the full extent of it is revealed.

Also, opossums are marsupials.

Edited by TwiceHorn
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4 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

It's probably going to come up in the home inspection portion of your real estate transaction.  And a scrupulously honest Seller's Disclosure.

And it might possibly be the subject of a lawsuit if the full extent of it is revealed.

Also, opossums are marsupials.

I’m trying to do the right thing without spending like I plan to spend the rest of my life here.  I would imagine “we had some rodents/marsupials in the attic and paid some pros to take care of it” is a pretty common seller’s disclosure in hoods with a lot of mature trees.  I was thinking $3-4k.  The first bid was well north of that.

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I think changing insulation and cleaning the attic out is addressing the symptoms and not the cause. You need to walk around your house and figure out how they’re (possums and rodents) getting in. Then you need to seal or board those openings. Then you need to remove anything that is stuck in your attic, through trapping (live traps for possums, lethal traps for rodents). Good luck!

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8 hours ago, conVINCEd said:

I’m trying to do the right thing without spending like I plan to spend the rest of my life here.  I would imagine “we had some rodents/marsupials in the attic and paid some pros to take care of it” is a pretty common seller’s disclosure in hoods with a lot of mature trees.  I was thinking $3-4k.  The first bid was well north of that.

Oh I get it.  Just making sure you considered that.

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9 hours ago, Jerry Callo said:

First you make the roux.

Had this mom and six babies running around my office earlier this week. This is a bad time of the year to have possums coming in.



a38681b193f0d6b335995f04d69c26ca.jpg

Dog found two babies in the yard today.  I released them in the same place I released the larger ones (mom & dad)?

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On 3/23/2022 at 11:25 PM, TwiceHorn said:

It's probably going to come up in the home inspection portion of your real estate transaction.  And a scrupulously honest Seller's Disclosure.

And it might possibly be the subject of a lawsuit if the full extent of it is * revealed.

Also, opossums are marsupials.

 

*not

 

I prefer the polyphyletic term "vermin".

 

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Had a squirrel in our attic about a year ago.

 

finally caught the fucker after 6 months.  I checked the live traps every couple days for a few months, then it was every couple weeks. No telling how long he had been trapped, but he was as dead as Caesar when I checked the last time.

 

Had to go through 2 pest control companies to get a good diagnosis on access point.  It wasn’t at all obvious.  Time will tell if the last guy was right.  So far so good for about a year.

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On 3/24/2022 at 10:03 AM, Jerry Callo said:

First you make the roux.

Had this mom and six babies running around my office earlier this week. This is a bad time of the year to have possums coming in.



a38681b193f0d6b335995f04d69c26ca.jpg

I read a "Strange but True" factoid that I hope is a troll job.

Apparently fat William Taft LOVED to eat roasted possum. So much so that he tried to market Billy the Possum stuffed animals as the new Teddy Bear (obviously originated from Roosevelt).  The catalyst of all this was his once eating an 18 pound roasted possum in one sitting. 

That's it, I'm going to find the link!

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On 3/24/2022 at 10:03 AM, Jerry Callo said:

First you make the roux.

Had this mom and six babies running around my office earlier this week. This is a bad time of the year to have possums coming in.



a38681b193f0d6b335995f04d69c26ca.jpg

I think last year's freeze thinned the  possum crop  around here.    My dogs from time to time would encounter not just one, but two or three at times  in our backyard late at night when I'd let them out and let the whole neighborhood know about it and that just doesn't occur as often as it did pre Feb 2021.  Even with it being so dry now.  

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On 3/23/2022 at 8:03 PM, statsman said:

You got to trap them in your attic, with a live trap. You have to seal off the entry places. Then, call local Animal Control to cart them away. 
You can’t poison vermin in your attic, because they might crawl somewhere in the insulation and die (and stink). 
Do you have rats? Pro tip- tie a string around the rat trap, and the other end around a beam or support. That way a wounded rat can’t crawl away to die (and stink). 
Good luck!

We used a live trap baited with peanut butter to catch a squirrel that had taken up residence in our attic and had been driving us nuts for several weeks. The snap traps & glue had failed. 
Anyway I bought the trap at HD @ $20. Son put it in the area where the  critter had been making the most noise. It got very quiet for a couple of days, so when son went back up there to check, he brought down the cage trap which contained a very pissed off squirrel. He released the little SOB several miles away alongside the road that cuts through Robinson Ranch by 45.It undoubtedly made a tasty snack for one of the local coyotes.
Son had done a careful survey around the exterior of the house prior to putting in the trap, but found nothing. After the squatter was evicted, son discovered its point of entry.- the bathroom exhaust vent pipe had come loose somehow, and the squirrel could get in when the fan was running, which opened the vent pipe valve. He wired and duct taped that sucker shut.

No intruding critters since.

 

Edited by Armybrat
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Update: secure the perimeter of your property on a regular basis.  These fuckers entered through a corner of the house I don’t look at very often.  If you have a place like that on your property, mosey over there once a week, it will be cheaper than what I paid for today.

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