Randolph "Randy" Kelly, BHGRE, Heritage Group

06/03/2026

Episode 5: "First Contact" or "Lions and tigers and bears. Oh my!"

Our GC finally got finished with his current job and it was our turn. Per "THE plan" the first task was to open up the ceiling of the existing porch so we had enough space to run both return and supply air ducting. The GC's workers cut open the ceiling the width of the new planned HVAC closet to reveal the top of the exterior structural wall as well as the "original roof" of that section of the house. It was apparent the original roof (just above the ceiling of the porch) would need to get cut open to have enough clearance for the ducting. Through the original "exploratory hole" we knew there was something else above that original roof and the current "top" roof. When we started opening up the "original" roof we discovered there was another roof "structure" in between the original roof and the "top" roof. The GC said he needed to open up the whole patio ceiling width of the proposed HVAC closet out to the end of the roof. We cleared him then went back to work inside.

Shortly thereafter the GC comes in with the "you need to see this" caveat, so we went out to take a look. Apparently when the additional "wings" of the house were built, the 3 roofs for those wings all extended over the porch and the contractors that added those additions just built new roofs on top of the old ones. To make matters worse, one of the roofs was a flat asphalt and gravel roof and it appears there 10s if not 100+ lbs of gravel up there. It also appeared the "top" ceiling joists had just had tapers cut in the end and screwed into the roof/supports at the far edge of the porch. It was apparent there was probably even more evil hiding above the ceiling of the porch that wasn't just an "esthetic" problem, but was probably a structural issue that HAD to get fixed. We cleared the GC to open up the entire porch so we could get a full picture of the problem. If we had structural problems like we suspected it would need to get fixed NOW, which was bad, as "demolition" and engineering was definitely going to "bust" our original cost estimate. We HAD the funds to do what was needed, but like other followers of Dave Ramsey's school of financial thought, those funds were already assigned to a different upgrade (namely completing al the shelves in the "library" so the "Borg Cube" of books could finally disappear from the middle of the library floor.) However, seeing as how one of our "visions" had been for a "sun porch" for Leigh out there, this might be the time to accelerate that project.

After discussion between us, Leigh and I decided the "farther down the road" "sun porch" improvement was now a higher priority. With the GC already on site with workers and having to tear the porch roof up as part of the Radon mitigation (a MUST DO), the porch upgrade would be cheaper and easier to do now.

The porch "ceilingectomy" was very revealing in a not so good way. Yay verily we did have 3 roofs over the porch and there was rotten wood in up there on the "2nd" roof. The "top" roof was not appropriately tied into the beams at the outer end of the house the full length of the porch roof and there were structural trusses protruding beyond the house exterior walls over much of the porch area which would severely limit our ability to raise the ceiling of the porch. Lions and tigers were bad enough, but our final assessment was that the beams holding up the existing "roofs" had never been stressed for that. So, the whole supporting structure needed to be re-engineered and a new structural wall for the roof needed to be installed. On the good side, when we had finally cut away the two lower roofs over the new utility closet area, we had enough space to install the ducting recommended by our HVAC contractor.

While we pondered the implications of how to "restructure" the roof supports and give us clearance to raise the ceiling outside of the utility closet, our GC was able to frame up that closet and install power and condensate drains. With those two things done we gave the HVAC contractor the OK to install new return vents in the 3 wings of the house, route ducting to the closet and move the HVAC heat exchanger. It was going to be a couple days before the HVAC guys could get to our job which allowed our GC to work on the other problems of the porch. Fortunately, the weather was looking pretty mild for the next week plus and we wouldn't need the HVAC. While waiting for the HVAC guys to get there, we continued with the demolition into the exterior wall adjacent the bathroom of the original house to access power, water and sewer lines which would be needed for the wet bar, refrigerator niches and cabinets. The GC also came into the house to start sealing off the old floor air return vents leading into the slab.

A few days later the HVAC guys showed up. The split into 2 teams, one team crawled into the ceiling to locate places to cut the new return ducts and run new ducting and the second team to relocate the HVAC heat exchanger from the kitchen utility closet to the new cabinet my GC had constructed on the porch. While there always interfacing issues when moving existing equipment to a new location, the "joint" meeting I'd had with the "leads" on the GC team and HVAC team before we got started kept the problems small. The biggest disconnects appeared to be a the "finished" passage for the air returns appeared to be too small and a coolant pipe that looked like it was going to interfere with the doors. In both cases everything was built to the agreed upon size but the "fitting" and "final installation" of adjacent structure had to done separately by the different contractors. (Basically the "finished" dimensions were adequate for the finished installation but the finished dimension didn't allow you to install the other parts, so we had to pull stuff apart, finish the HVAC installation then put the pieces back in.) After 2 days, we were able to power up the HVAC and had heating and cooling again. This was a critical Radon mitigation milestone as we were no longer pulling air into the house from under the slabs but there was still an open hole in the kitchen closet floor that needed to be sealed and we still needed to install the Radon venting pipe to the existing sub-slab air return ducts. Work commenced on the porch again and we began the "reconfiguration" of the kitchen utility closet into a pantry. With the closet empty the GC's team cast a concrete "cap" for the air return plenum and sealed that plenum up and we started looking at how/where to run the Radon vent piping from the only access to the old return ducts.

Routing the Radon out of the slab and up through the roof for a passive vent looked like it would be easy but with the new ceiling we were concerned that if we would need to install a Radon pump to keep a vacuum on that vent, that there wouldn't be room. I'd been keeping our Radon Mitigation Contractor in the "coordination" loop for the previous several months so we pulled him back into the discussion with "requirements" for access, space needed and power for the pump so if the "passive" vent was inadequate, we wouldn't have to start tearing stuff out. With that information in hand our GC ran the appropriate size pipe up from the floor vent, along the back wall (where it would be hidden behind the cabinets), up into the attic and over to the apex of the roof and through the roof. We now had a passively vented 60+ year old slab twice as large as the slab for most houses of our size with "conventional" attic ducting. If we were ONLY dealing with Radon incursion from the return vents we should be home free. How much any cracks, seam incursion or/and our floor vent closures that were not absolutely sealed would impact our Radon problem was still unknown. Could one simple modification (sealing the vents) make a problem that was intrinsic to the very ground the house was built on disappear? Time for another test.

Next Episode: "The Shelbyville Experiment?"

05/26/2026

Hum. Interesting concept on "re-use" of business property in the "post COVID" "telecommuting" environment. Could this man's ideas work and if so, will we see them being "downsized" to work in smaller towns with a more "country" or "homey" atmosphere? Fellow Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Heritage Group agents? Could this be a new development and rental market in some our smaller Middle Tennessee towns? (Hey it wouldn't be attractive to me at this time in my life, but consider some of our younger Bedford County adults who might love being within walking distance of "The Grindstone Cowboy" or "The Coffee Break"?

Developer Asher Luzzatto has targeted Denver for a radical experiment in converting vacant commercial space into residential units.

05/25/2026

Episode 4: "The Plan..."

After talking to all 4 mitigation contractors as well as my GC and HVAC contractor we were pretty sure we understood the basic problem, namely the slabs were trapping Radon under the house which were being scavenged by the HVAC circulation fan and pumping the Radon back into the house. At first each of the contractors had an idea of how to fix the problem based on their understanding of the problem and previous works. That gave us about 5 "plans" (options) to consider, but personally I was convinced we needed an overall engineered solution to deal with the actual problem versus the solution.

It was pretty obvious we needed to get the returning air OUT of the slab. Our HVAC contractor determined it was fairly simple to install air returns in the ceiling but getting them back to the HVAC heat exchanger could be a problem. I coordinated with our GC and HVAC contractors to get them there at the same time as we were obviously looking at simultaneous space, air circulation, engineering/structural as well as "esthetic" issues. After several individual and group discussions we had a basic consensus of our primary constraints.

First, the existing air return plenum in the floor of the utility closet drove the basic circulation pattern for the HVAC heat exchanger system, and our heat exchanger was optimized for a vertical orientation. The space above the HVAC utility cabinet it was almost completely covered by the existing HVAC supply manifold/plenum. It may have been possible to come in from one corner but it would still require rebuilding the supply manifold and the ducting would completely fill the remaining portions of the utility closet which was part of Leigh's kitchen storage space. We were now pretty sure we were looking at relocating the HVAC heat exchanger which could present space, power, noise mitigation and condensate draining problems.

While we thought there was (barely) enough room to relocate the heat exchanger to a platform in the attic, the ceiling joist structure would probably not support it and it would be noisy. It could have been possible to route a return outside into a vent adjacent the wall to the porch and pe*****te back into the house but again that would take up MORE of the closet space we were using for storage. After closer inspection looking back at where the roof structure crossed over the exterior wall it looked like we had enough vertical clearance to run two sets of HVAC ducts over the top of the wall to an outside closet. Since the initial "remodel" of the house, Leigh had a vision of improving the back porch into something more useable. An outside utility closet would interfere with her "vision" but we thought it might still work. We measured the existing HVAC unit and utility closet and determined there was sufficient space to duplicate that space on the porch and still be able to have usable space around an exterior closet on the patio slab without occluding the back porch door. If that would work, we could relocate the HVAC heat exchanger and recover almost ALL the utility closet for a pantry adjacent the kitchen.

We cleared our GC to cut a 6" diameter "test hole" through the ceiling of the porch to see what was above that ceiling. There was structure up there from the original porch roof and another "layer" of something, but it looked like we had room between the roof and the wall to run rectangular ducts. With this new information at hand, we mapped out THE plan (as Mentat Piter de-Vries would say): 1) Open up access from the attic for both HVAC supply and return to the back porch of the house, 2) relocate the HVAC heat exchanger/condenser from inside the utility closet adjacent the kitchen, to a new utility room on the back porch, 3) seal off all air return vents from the house into the sub-slab return lines, 4) cap off the HVAC return plenum in the old utility closet, 5) connect a passive Radon vent pipe to the existing "vent" through the back porch slab and route back through the attic to an area with sufficient space and power to support a Radon pump if needed and vent through the roof, and 6) convert the existing HVAC utility closet into a pantry for my Spouse's kitchen.

OK, now we had THE plan, but there's an old saying in the military, "No plan survives first contact with the enemy." We didn't know what if any "surprises" we would encounter as most of this work was "hidden" behind existing walls and ceilings but we had a plan and an idea of what it would cost to do the main pieces of work. Our GC was busy on another task and stated it would be another week before they could start working - but at least, the wheels were in motion. In the back of our mind though was, "what was that other structure" our GC's "test hole" had revealed and how far did it go?

Next Episode: "First Contact" or "Lions and tigers and bears. Oh my!"

05/23/2026

Episode 3: "Elementary my dear Watson!"

In the last two episodes I revealed we recently learned that the mid-century ranch style house we had lived in for the past 3 years had Radon at levels that were considered a health hazard. This was a shock not only to us but also to our General Contractor (GC) and our HVAC Contractor who had never heard of such a problem in Shelbyville. Why was this such a problem OUR house? There was nothing unusual about the location of our home relative to other homes in Shelbyville, so I figured the answer was right in front of us with some analytical thought. To quote Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's character, Sherlock Holmes, "The game is afoot." It was time to pull out my magnifying glass and deerstalker hat.

"Sherlock's first clues" - From my preliminary internet research, I already knew Radon "seeped" up through the ground and we were in an area of "higher than normal" Radon seepage relative to other parts of the state. Our first "remodeling action" for the house was the installation of all new windows so the house was "tighter" than it had ever been in the past. Next, our house was built on a concrete slab and while a slab should be relatively impermeable to a gas, they usually have cracks and seams where gas could get through. That should have been less a problem in our house since our floor (except for 2 rooms) is covered in tile overlaid on a "Schluter" membrane which should have made the floor less permeable. However, as I noted earlier, the house was built in "phases" and because of that, the home is on 4 slabs poured at separate times. Additionally, the living room slab was "sunken" about 8" below the others. (Sunken living rooms was apparently a big thing in the 50s and 60s.) These 4 "abutted" slabs and the vertical discontinuity of the living room provided lots of "seams" between slabs for seepage.

"The next big clue" - There was a "hot air return" out of the original fireplace that went through the floor of the original "utility room" that went underground to the HVAC air return plenum. That was a pretty cool idea in that it allowed the original owners to heat the whole house in the Winter using the fireplace. Unfortunately, sometimes "good" ideas turn out to be "not so good" ideas and in this case it turns out that ALL of the air returns in the house were routed DOWN through the slab into conduits running under all 4 slabs. The air returns were all routed to the central plenum in the utility closet off the kitchen where the HVAC heat exchanger was installed.

"We can infer the slabs and returns are suspects. Time to test our hypothesis" - When we opened windows on opposite ends of the house and set up an "exhaust fan" we learned the Radon levels could be "managed" by keeping a cross breeze in the house. However, as soon as we closed the house up and turned on the HVAC, Radon levels would climb to multiple times the EPA safe limits within a few hours. (This was obviously an unsatisfactory mitigation during cold or hot weather.) I was already talking to my GC and HVAC contractors who shared my hypothesis the subterranean return lines were a major part of the problem, but Radon was not their specialty, so it was time to call in the experts.

A quick Google search for Radon Mitigation resulted in a "slew" of hits and advertisements. I used Google and an app called Thumbtack to find Radon Mitigation Contractors servicing Southern Middle Tennessee. I contacted 5 Middle Tennessee mitigation contractors, of which 4 actually contacted me and arranged for a visit to assess my situation. All 4 of these contractors sent representatives and gave me timely information and a bid for the job.

Tennessee Radon Services: https://tnradonservices.com/contact/
Radon Solutions LLC Tennessee: https://radonsolutionstennessee.com
Frontier Foundation and Crawlspace Repair https://www.frontierbasementsystems.com
Radon 1: https://radon1.com

From my visits with each of the mitigation contractors we were able to determine 1) Although the "carpeted" rooms had a slightly higher level of Radon seepage we didn't have a single "Radon super hotspot" source (such as seen in some older homes on stone foundations), 2) although the "static" Radon levels in the air return plenum were somewhat higher than those in other parts of the house when the HVAC was off, the "vacuum effect" of the HVAC circulation system greatly exacerbated the Radon levels in the plenum, 3) the maximum Radon levels seemed to vary with weather frontal passage (consistent with Radon seepage in the local soil changing with atmospheric pressure and rain levels). "Watson, by deduction we see the sub-slab return conduits are the prime suspect in this case."

At the beginning of each of my meetings with the mitigation contractors I walked them around the house and showed them the existing HVAC ducting setup. Each of these contractors acknowledged the "uniqueness" of my situation but made an estimate/bid based on current standard practices and their pricing structure. Depending on their perception of the problem from their perspective, the contractors estimated it would take between 1 to 4 Radon pumps pulling from beneath 2 to 4 of the existing slabs. On average, each of the radon pump and slab vent pipes would cost between about $1,600 to $2,000 depending on their specific approach. Our situation appeared unique, requiring an "incremental" solution so we could judge our success at solving the "problem" versus treating the "symptom". For "normal" homes with a crawl space or a slab radon incursion problem, I would recommend ANY of these 4 mitigation contractors. In the end I chose Radon Solutions L.L.C. because they were local, they offered the best Veteran discount and they were amenable to working with/around my GC and HVAC contractors over the longer period of time it would take to coordinate work between 3 contractors. For such a "unique" problem like ours, a plan to deal with the "problem" as well as the "symptom" was essential.

Next Episode: "The Plan..."

05/20/2026

Oh, THESE sound like a yummy snack or even desert (with ice cream).

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05/19/2026

Hum. Whiskey connoisseurs. This sounds tasty:

On the heels of the 15-year, Heaven Hill's Elijah Craig brand is releasing a new batch of the 18-year-old single barrel bourbon

05/18/2026

Episode 2. "Alice, who the heck is Ray Dawn??"

"No Ralph, that's 'what is Radon?'"

"Pow! Right to the moon, Alice!"

Well Ralph, this is not good. Radon (Rn, atomic number 86) which was discovered just before the turn of the 20th century is a chemical element. It is a non-reactive noble gas. It is colorless and odorless. It is also unfortunately radioactive. There are several different isotopes of Radon which are decay products of Uranium238, Thorium232 or Radium. The Radon222 isotope has a half-life of 3.825 days which gives it enough time to seep out of the soil or rocks where the isotope was generated. Eventually, like the radioactive precursors it was produced from, Radon decays into Lead. That takes a VERY long time but unfortunately neither the radiation nor the decay products of Radon are good for you. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Radon is the second most frequent cause of lung cancer, after cigarette smoking, causing 21,000 lung cancer deaths per year in the United States. About 2,900 of these deaths occur among people who have never smoked.

OK, so Radon is nasty stuff. Since it is a (long term) decay product of Uranium, Thorium or Radium, you would think you'd be pretty safe unless you lived near significant deposits of those nasty elements. Unfortunately, there are trace amounts of those Radon precursors in lots of rocks, and rock is a pretty plentiful resource in Middle Tennessee especially along the Cumberland plateau and the Nashville basin. Worse still, the sedimentary rock we are all sitting on is very porus and easily allows Radon from deeper layers to "percolate" to the surface. So how did we discover we had this nasty problem?

The thanks for that goes to my in-Laws. About the same time we moved to Middle TN to get closer to family, they also moved back closer to home to a town right on the edge of the Cumberland Plateau. Since they came from a state with a Radon problem, they had their new (late 60s mid-century-modern construction) tested and discovered they had a problem. They contracted with a Radon Mitigation Contractor shortly after moving in and had the problem addressed pronto. Then this last Christmas, since I (and another one of our extended family) were licensed Real Estate Agents, they thought a recording Radon detector for us to check out our new listings would be a useful gift. I didn't have any current listings but I figured I needed to know how the detector worked, so I set it up in our own home to test it out. Within a few hours the audio alarm was going off. After a couple days recording, I was seeing Radon levels as high as 22 -24 pico Curies per Liter (pCi/L). The "danger level" according to the EPA is 4 pCi/L, and we were seeing levels 5 to 6 times that. According to some estimates this put my non-smoking spouse and I in the same cancer risk category as 2 - 3 pack a day smokers. Overnight, our comfortable but "still in renovation" home had gone from a daily "place of refuge" to a "health hazard". We had been living here for 3 years, but now we knew about it and something HAD to be done. (Oh, and once you know about this, you are now ethically and legally required to note this on the disclosure form, so don't even THINK about trying to sell it and not saying anything unless you want to end up the wrong end of a lawsuit in court.)

Your first thought in something like this is "how was this not discovered before?" After a bit of internet searching we discovered we live in an area where unmitigated Radon levels are frequently in the danger zone. In discussions with our General Contractor (GC) and HVAC contractor, neither of them had ever heard of anybody in Bedford County having a Radon problem. In fact, my GC who was required to install a passive mitigation membrane and vent into all new construction wondered why it was necessary as he hadn't heard of anybody having a problem. Is soon became apparent that it wasn't a problem because nobody was testing for it and "ignorance is bliss". In the late 40s when the first "phase" of our house had been built, Radon wasn't even in the "local" vocabulary. Our home inspector in 2015 didn't mention or test for it. As my GC noted, all new housing is required to install a membrane and vent as a mitigation. (I don't know when that became a requirement.) My passive detector could measure small amounts of Radon even sitting under our carport (which is on a slab). So WHY was this such a problem in OUR home and how would we fix the problem? (And hopefully this episodic "tale of woe" should be a lesson for my fellow Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Heritage Group Agents.)

Next Episode: "Elementary my dear Watson!"

05/12/2026

Episode 1: "TheMoneyPit?"

In the hilarious Tom Hanks comedy "The Money Pit", Attorney Walter Fielding and his classical musician girlfriend, Anna Crowley, purchase a seemingly beautiful property for a fraction of its "apparent" value. Walter's and Anna's joy take an alarming turn when the front door frame rips out of the wall, the main staircase collapses, the drains hold rather than flush sewage and the wiring catches fire. After months of restoration work (versus the promised "two weeks") and mounting bills, Tom Hank's character Walter refers to the house as a "money pit". Finally, though, he and Anna have a beautiful home.

OK, in no way am I implying you should be afraid of buying an old, classic home in Middle Tennessee, but the old tried and true "caveat emptor" ("Let the buyer beware") phrase applies. The standard safeguard in this buyer scenario is to employ a knowledgeable and thorough home inspector before closing - but there's another old saying that also applies - "beauty is only skin deep". Meaning - home inspectors are not "Superman" or "Supergirl". They DON'T have X-ray vision and there may be stuff "hiding" down there you can't see or smell. My spouse and I have a very nice home here in Middle TN but after 6 years we still haven't completed all the items on our "restoration" list. The reason for that delay was a string of "invisible" defects we didn't know about.

Now I'm not implying we ended up with a "lemon" when we purchased our single-story ranch house in Middle TN. Like I said, it's a very nice house, but it's transition from its humble beginning as a 1bedroom, 1 bathroom farm home in 1948 to a 3000+square foot 4 bedroom, 3 bath plus multiple bonus rooms mid-century Ranch House in the early 60s drove some interesting design features (and materiel limitations) that resulted in challenges down the road. I will talk about some of the problems and challenges we faced in later "episodes", but the thrust of THIS tale is the resolution of a recent major challenge we encountered but never expected, namely, the discovery of Radon in the house.

Radon was certainly NOT a household word in Tennessee in the 1940s, unless you worked at Oak Ridge. It wasn’t a conversation topic of the family that converted that 1 bedroom farm house into a nice roomy mid-century ranch-style house across a decade of additions. And unfortunately, it apparently wasn't in the checklist our home inspector was using in the mid-2010s when we bought the property. I say "unfortunately" because we not only discovered Radon in our home but it was at levels that were impossible to ignore from a health perspective. That problem is now fixed, but why it was a bad problem and how we fixed it is more than will fit in one Facebook post. Some of you friends and followers may not be interested in this story I'm going to tell over the next couple weeks, but if you are a Real Estate investor/professional (like my fellow Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Heritage Group agents) or you own an old Middle TN house, you'll probably want to get this whole story.

Next episode. "Alice, who the heck is Ray Dawn??"

12/15/2025

OK, somebody asked me why I had a pictures airplanes on a "business" page related to Real Estate. (Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate, Heritage Group specifically.) That's a good question that may not be easy to answer. I've been told by professionals that real estate pictures with your (more specifically, my) smiling face pointing out property features are boring as hell and don't gather any "looks". That was good news to me, because in general I hate pictures like that too. Hey here's what you really need to know abut me. I'm a retired nerd aviator (long story - ask me later) who invests/works in Real Estate, has a weakness for good whiskey and old Rock and Roll. (I'm playing ELO in the background as I type.) Real estate is a sideline for me. That doesn't mean I'm not SERIOUS about it, but I'm not out beating the bushes every day for customers so I can eat and pay the rent. (I DO use Real Estate profits to help pay for my flying.) More importantly, I do business for friends/acquaintances who need an agent to look for that "special" piece of property that meets their needs. Likely, if you're into aviation, engineering, STEM education and you're looking for something special but you don't know exactly WHAT or aren't ready, I can probably help you if you ask. (I'm providing weekly updates to several friends that have been looking for "that place" for well over a year and either can't find what they want or aren't ready to pull the handles yet.) But what if you need something NOW and you need somebody that will work 7 days a week to bring something to a close? I may not have the "bandwidth" at this moment, but I/we at BHGRE can connect you with other agents who do have the time. (I've got agent contacts all over Middle TN and have even given/taken referrals from California.)