[NA] In-ground pool mx [NA]

WannFly

WannFly

Final Approach
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Looking at some properties over in ATL area with in-ground pools and while the idea of jumping into a pool in hotlanta seems refreshing, I am wonder what the MX is going to be? is this a bad idea? terrible idea? run away and never look back idea?

what does peanut gallery think?
 
When we bought our house here in Atlanta 22 years ago, it had a pool and I knew nothing about how to take care of one. 22 years later, I still don’t. :)

Just kidding. We’ve really enjoyed it. The best thing we ever did was to convert to salt water about 10 years ago. I’m not going to lie, you still have to keep up with it, but we get a lot of use out of it.
 
It's been many years, but I found that so long as I kept the pH correct, everything else fell in line as most of the chemistry depended on the correct pH. You'll need to check pH after a heavy rain. Keep the chlorine tablets topped off.
 
WannFly said:
Looking at some properties over in ATL area with in-ground pools and while the idea of jumping into a pool in hotlanta seems refreshing, I am wonder what the MX is going to be? is this a bad idea? terrible idea? run away and never look back idea?

what does peanut gallery think?
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I was going to put in a pool. Friend said dude, just dig a hole and throw all your money into it, it'll end up being a little cheaper in the the long run. Ha ha. I built the pool, maintenance wasn't all that bad. Family enjoyed the ell out of it. I'd say a coupla hundred a year maintaining it. Not heated. Buying a house with one already in I'd get an inspection from a reliable pool guy and see if you are going to face any immediate costs to fix any bad stuff.
 
$300/yr on chemicals and such, budget a new liner and other repairs ($3-4k) every 5-8 years. If you can swing it, a pool cleaning robot like a Polaris is a nice time saver.
 
Our last house in Ohio had a pool. It was a significant amount of maintenance, and with the ages our kids were while we lived there (newborn/toddler) we ended up not using it very much. Cincinnati is also not an ideal place for a pool in general - not enough hot months out of the year. Atlanta is significantly hotter, so I'd tend to think you'd get more use out of it.

We found it to be pretty high maintenance. In 3 years of living at that house, I found that at the end of we'd sort of figured out how to keep it maintained and in good condition. However the new owners of the house apparently had to replace the liner (I think it was original, and around 25 years old), which is an expense.

One big thing that's important is temperature. If it's too hot or too cold you won't use it as much. There are actually varying forms of both heating and cooling available. For us, heating was necessary. We used rooftop solar panels to heat the pool (that was around $6k 8 years ago and would probably cost a good sum more today). A side benefit was that it helped to keep the house cooler and significantly reduced our electric bill. Our pool also had a lot of shade.

In Atlanta, I'm not sure whether the temperature would move you towards needing heating, cooling, or neither. The rooftop panels can also be used for cooling, the idea being if you run the water up to them at night it will cool the water, if you run it during the day it will heat the water.

Owning a pool is a significant amount of maintenance, and in the end we decided we didn't want one again and are happier going to larger community pool that's a lot better on the whole, and if we time it right we still get more or less to ourselves.
 
Bill said:
$300/yr on chemicals and such, budget a new liner and other repairs ($3-4k) every 5-8 years. If you can swing it, a pool cleaning robot like a Polaris is a nice time saver.
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The pool cleaning robot was nice and definitely helped. But we had a lot of weird issues come up with the system that made no sense and cost money besides the liner.
 
I'm glad I pulled this up on the PC, because on the phone I read "in-ground pool mix", and I was going to suggest five sack concrete.
 
Put in a pool in Atlanta about 6 years ago. Chlorine, 18 x 36ft. square one with a liner. Gunite pools are much much more expensive. Kids & wife love it. Our house looks like a public pool once they invite all their friends over. They get in when the water hits 72....i don't get in until it is closer to 83 because my junk tends to hide out like a scared turtle when it is too cold. (Seinfeld) Water temp this week has been 80.

About 2-4 bags of shock per week...less if you add some stabilizer. I did the math the other day...shock from Walmart per bag is about $3.30. Usually around here we need a lot of PH up for some reason. Replaced 5 year old liner last year due to a tear we couldn't patch....about $5k. I did have to also change out our pool pump...burned out a bearing and that was $800...i have heard pool pumps tend not to last that long.

Just our pool ran about $31k, but we had to put in a fence which was another $5k (insurance and code reasons) Then another $1.5k in landscaping and pool deck boxes, chairs etc. Also bought a pool cover from Leslie pools...i seem to recall that being about $1500 installed. So all in closer to $40k. One thing about putting in a pool....pool installers get booked solid so plan way out otherwise you think you will have a pool by summer and they get backlogged due to rain or something and 3 months later they finally show up. I have friends with Salt water...personally i dont think it matters all that much between the two. Learning the filter operation is the fun part...backwash, rinse, filter, recirc etc and when to do them. Chemicals is easier with the little dip sticks you buy from walmart...tells you what you need to add.
 
We put a pool in at my parents place ~4 years ago. Dad and I dug the hole and someone came to set the fiberglass shell. It's saltwater which is not as 'salty' as I expected it to be. It's relatively maintenance free so far (knock on wood). Keep the big stuff dipped out of it and vacuum when necessary, throw in a couple bags of salt every once in a while to keep the salt->chlorine converter happy and keep the pH in balance and it works like a champ. We all use the heck out of it in the summer.
 
scarcherpilot said:
I did have to also change out our pool pump...burned out a bearing and that was $800...i have heard pool pumps tend not to last that long.
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Had to change out the pump motor every other year on average. When the 1st one went bad, I bought a 2nd and installed. I found a good electric motor shop that would overhaul the 1st one for less than 1/2 cost of new, so I got it overhauled and put it on the shelf. Rinse, repeat, always had an overhauled motor on the shelf for when the other dies.

Remember to replace the ceramic seal with new with every motor change.
 
thanks folks. If the property has one fine, but I dont think I will go to the extent of putting a in-ground pool. i was watching some videos on maintenance and sounds like there a constant maintenance to be done to keep it proper.
 
Ted said:
Owning a pool is a significant amount of maintenance, and in the end we decided we didn't want one again and are happier going to larger community pool that's a lot better on the whole, and if we time it right we still get more or less to ourselves.
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Having a 21ft bowrider on the lake, the lake is now my pool. But, with a boat comes it's own set of MX issues. There is no free lunch!
 
WannFly said:
thanks folks. If the property has one fine, but I dont think I will go to the extent of putting a in-ground pool. i was watching some videos on maintenance and sounds like there a constant maintenance to be done to keep it proper.
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If you stay on it a few minutes a day, it’s really not that bad. It’s when you neglect it for a couple of weeks and it’s rained a few times, then the real hassle begins. Like I and others have said the salt water system really helps.
 
I paid someone to do the liner 10 years ago. I did it myself a couple of weeks ago while also addressing some rust and concrete issues that the pros didn’t bother with. The liner was $1350 and all in with new fixtures, supplies and a few pizzas and beers for my buddies that helped for under 2 grand. F39955F7-C1E4-42BE-A1CA-DAD71EFA811C.jpeg7D5146AF-5A2E-4291-9E80-C4612D2EE072.jpeg 190C290A-6616-4985-841B-4B87EE8DC069.jpeg
 
We have an in-ground gunite pool using conventional chlorine chemistry (not salt). I probably spend $500/yr on it in chemicals and miscellaneous parts like seals, the occasional chlorinator, or a pump. I've replaced the pump once in 17 years, and the chlorinator twice. Our filter is starting to look a bit doggy and has some seal issues, so it'll need to be replaced one of these years and that's am $800 item.

Our big expense so far has been resurfacing the pool a few years ago. That was $12K, IIRC.

Right now, I'm concerned that we have an underground leak somewhere. That could be an expensive deal, depending on the what/why/where. I'm thinking it is may be in a return line.

As far as usage goes, we honestly don't use it that much. The 10 year old would rather play on his computer, but he is just getting to the age where friends can come over and not require multiple sets of parents (us plus the friend's parents) to supervise, so the pool may get more use going forward.
 
I've had two houses with pools. I'd be in no hurry to own another.

First was in DC suburbs, lot with many trees, liner in pool. Liner was replaced before we bought, saving the expense. But maintenance was kind of a pain - lost one pump motor, was pulling dead shrews and field mice out of the pool every day, saw snakes swimming fro time to time (undoubtedly after the tasty mice), and keeping the pool clean in the fall when the leaves came down was a never ending battle - a cover helped, but was a pain to use so we left it off during pool season. No heater, so the pool was pretty cold most of the time (the women didn't take too well to what showed through their swimsuit tops) and got less use than it could have.

Second was in San Antonio, combined pool and hot tub surrounded by palm trees. This one was gunnite and had a robot cleaner. The heater worked, but it had an old control system on it and the thermostat was wonky. Had maintenance issues with the pool lights. Nice to use in the summer and the heater extended the season. But. The heater didn't t turn off one time and the yard guy pointed at the steam coming off the pool one day. Oops. DE filter was kind of a pain - and one time algae set in: I should have just drained the pool and refilled as it was a real pain and multiple days to finally get it cleaned. Took a bit of a hit on the sale of the house because they discovered a crack in the gunnite and some washout of the fill underneath.

It was nice to have, though, in the heat. If I did it again, I'd probably hire a pool service and be done with it.
 
Busflyer said:
If it’s a salt water pool it should be very easy to care for.
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This. I have a saltwater pool with a cartridge filter and pressure pump operated cleaner. When everything works, its really minimal maintenance. Clean out the skimmer basket, clean out the bag on the robot, add a few oz of algicide and a quart of muriatic acid about once a week. Every couple of weeks I hose off the cartridge and when I get in the pool, I brush the scumline. A few times per season have the nice lady at the pool-store check the salinity/pH and adjust if necessary (the salt remains the same, its really only the pH that ever needs adjusting).

Now, the dimwits who installed the pool did a couple of things that they should get flogged for.
- plant crap-myrtle trees around the thing
- install the pressure pump straight underneath the drain valve.
- install a Haycrap pool heater.

So this year the qualifier 'when everything works' doesn't really apply.
 
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About the PH levels, do you guys have to measure the level and readjust it every couple of days or is it once a week thing? Watching various YT videos it looks like chlorine breaks down pretty fast without another chemical that I can’t remember right now, and it ends up being a never ending battle to maintain the PH level.

The salt water conversion might solve this problem
 
WannFly said:
About the PH levels, do you guys have to measure the level and readjust it every couple of days or is it once a week thing? Watching various YT videos it looks like chlorine breaks down pretty fast without another chemical that I can’t remember right now, and it ends up being a never ending battle to maintain the PH level.

The salt water conversion might solve this problem
Click to expand...

I rarely have to adjust PH. I find that once I dial the pool in for the summer (duration the pump runs every day, setting on the chlorinator, etc) it is pretty stable. I do test a few times a week, but again, rarely need to adjust.

The chlorine breaks down without cyanuric acid (CYA), which is a stabilizer. It keeps the chlorine from breaking down quickly when exposed to sunlight, but can be a problem itself when the pool becomes overloaded with it which completely screws up the chlorine's effectiveness. CYA is another test you run. If you see you're getting a high level of it, you stop using chlorine with stabilizer and use unstabilized chlorine until the CYA drops. If the CYA level gets really high, you may have to partially drain and refill the pool to reduce the CYA level.
 
WannFly said:
thanks folks. If the property has one fine, but I dont think I will go to the extent of putting a in-ground pool. i was watching some videos on maintenance and sounds like there a constant maintenance to be done to keep it proper.
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Get a pool boy. Turns out there’s no such thing as a pool girl. Gotta be sumpin agin’ the law about that.

 
WannFly said:
About the PH levels, do you guys have to measure the level and readjust it every couple of days or is it once a week thing? Watching various YT videos it looks like chlorine breaks down pretty fast without another chemical that I can’t remember right now, and it ends up being a never ending battle to maintain the PH level.

The salt water conversion might solve this problem
Click to expand...
Once a week, unless I got a bunch of rain worked for me.
 
WannFly said:
About the PH levels, do you guys have to measure the level and readjust it every couple of days or is it once a week thing? Watching various YT videos it looks like chlorine breaks down pretty fast without another chemical that I can’t remember right now, and it ends up being a never ending battle to maintain the PH level.

The salt water conversion might solve this problem
Click to expand...
Our water in San Antonio came out of an aquifer. It required constant adjustment as we regularly had to add water due to evaporation. The aquifer water was alkaline due to the limestone in the area.
 
In Atlanta, I'd say it's swimmable from mid May through mid-September, you don't need to heat or cool it.

When I was a teen, we had a pool and it was my job to maintain it. I vacuumed it once a week and checked the chemicals a few times a week, it wasn't too much work. Ours was surrounded by a screen enclosure, which kept things much cleaner. Here in the ATL every time there's a thunderstorm, you're going to wind up with some vegetation in the pool, and also the occasional frog. You will certainly want to cover it in the off season.

Elementary school kids love being part of a neighborhood pool. Having a personal one isn't nearly so interesting unless they can invite friends over. As an adult, I don't use our neighborhood one all that often, mostly when I'm training for my occasional short distance triathlon. A pool is a little like an animal, you have to maintain it whether you use it or not. If you're going to be out of town much of the time, you may want a service to clean it for you. I think that runs our neighborhood about $5000 per year, plus any repairs. Our pool is 30 years old and has sort of a complex plumbing setup, so it's more work than most.
 
WannFly said:
About the PH levels, do you guys have to measure the level and readjust it every couple of days or is it once a week thing? Watching various YT videos it looks like chlorine breaks down pretty fast without another chemical that I can’t remember right now, and it ends up being a never ending battle to maintain the PH level.

The salt water conversion might solve this problem
Click to expand...

With the salt system, adjusting pH is the main thing you need to keep up with. The electrode keeps using H+ ions, so your pH just keeps creeping up. After a while, you get the hang of it on how much acid to add every week to keep it within range. I worked last weekend, so I didn't get around to do my pool chores. I'll see where I am tomorrow morning.
 
Regular pool maintenance hasn't been too bad; add some chemicals, flush out the filter occasionally, let the automatic sweep take care of the rest. Having a screen enclosure to keep out tree leaves and debris helps a LOT.

But there will be infrequent large expenses. We had ours resurfaced a few years ago. It has a leak now that we need to get repaired. Had to replace the pump a year of so ago. And so on.

We used it a lot when the kids were young and still living at home, not so much now. It's nice to jump in and cool off after working outdoors, but we're not having the pool parties any more like we did in our younger days.

Be sure to check on insurance. Some companies require you to have child locks on access, some require alarms, some don't allow diving boards or slides, etc.
 
I'll echo the salt water.

You will probably have to buy a new cell every 3 or 4 years I think they're like 300 bucks a pop but it pretty much takes care of itself.

I think I throw in the jug of acid about four times a year.
 
Half Fast said:
Regular pool maintenance hasn't been too bad; add some chemicals, flush out the filter occasionally, let the automatic sweep take care of the rest. Having a screen enclosure to keep out tree leaves and debris helps a LOT.

But there will be infrequent large expenses. We had ours resurfaced a few years ago. It has a leak now that we need to get repaired. Had to replace the pump a year of so ago. And so on.

We used it a lot when the kids were young and still living at home, not so much now. It's nice to jump in and cool off after working outdoors, but we're not having the pool parties any more like we did in our younger days.

Be sure to check on insurance. Some companies require you to have child locks on access, some require alarms, some don't allow diving boards or slides, etc.
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Great point on insurance, I will ask my agent. Though no small kids in the household . All adults
 
I've had two pools. A chlorine pool which was a pain and a pool that used an ionizer (silver and copper) and was quite easy to care for. But even at that I agree with the "two best days" sentiments as mentioned by others. I'm done with pools ...
 
Sac Arrow said:
I'm glad I pulled this up on the PC, because on the phone I read "in-ground pool mix", and I was going to suggest five sack concrete.
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On my phone it reads "in ground poo" which would elicit some very different responses.
 
Mtns2Skies said:
On my phone it reads "in ground poo" which would elicit some very different responses.
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That’s also known as a septic system.

If we’re the blue board, a forum on septic systems would be the brown board.
 
Mtns2Skies said:
On my phone it reads "in ground poo" which would elicit some very different responses.
Click to expand...
Nextdoor dot com here had a thread yesterday about a cat that wouldn't poo in its litter box.
 
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