Wood burning fireplace for heat

[franklin2]

Thanks to everyone for the info in this thread. It explains my situation.

My house was built in 1916 and the chimney is completely closed off. There is no sign of a fireplace ever being in any room, so the house was set up for woodstoves. The holes for a woodstove exhaust duct have been covered by paneling in every room that had a corner on the chimney, and the chimney not having a liner (or otherwise not meeting insurance requirements) probably explains why. The house was later set up with an oil-fired boiler and radiators for heat.

One of the old houses I once owned was two story with two different chimneys. It had multiple thimbles also (that is what they call where the woodstove hooks in at the wall). Having multiple inlets or thimbles on a single flue is against code. Each thimble must have it's own flue. So if you wanted to use the old chimney in that case, if it was structurally sound you would have to get it lined and block off all the other thimbles in that flue.

When I bought that house they claimed the one chimney had been redone and was lined. It was, but I found out after working on the house why. The old chimney had caught fire and it had almost burnt the house down. They caught it just in time, I was underneath and the floor joists around the chimney were charred a little bit, and some of them had been repaired. They must have contracted to have the chimney rebuilt, it was redone with chimney cinder block all the way up through the middle of the house with a clay liner.

 

[sgtsandman]

Some states will allow insurance for a home with a wood burner or fire place if the wood burner or fireplace is not the primary heat source for the home. Do your research and pay attention to the fine print before you leap.

 

[franklin2]

Some states will allow insurance for a home with a wood burner or fire place if the wood burner or fireplace is not the primary heat source for the home. Do your research and pay attention to the fine print before you leap.

I didn't think it was up to the state, but the various insurance companies themselves? Each one you go to seem to have different requirements and different amounts of risk they will take. But you are right, most insurance companies will not insure a home that has just wood for heat.

And what I found out also, the bank will not loan you the money for the house if it does not have a central heat source. They do not consider a wood stove as central heat.

That is what is crappy about the whole system. You are young, not much money, and find a old house you can afford and want to fix up. You can buy it, but the bank will not loan you any money on it. Too much risk for them I guess. It's a shame. Now if you are a contractor and have your contractors license, then they may do it.

 

[Roert42]

I think the states a a day to some extent. They can make rules to limit their use or conditions, using fire/ building codes ect.

 

[sgtsandman]

I didn't think it was up to the state, but the various insurance companies themselves? Each one you go to seem to have different requirements and different amounts of risk they will take. But you are right, most insurance companies will not insure a home that has just wood for heat.

And what I found out also, the bank will not loan you the money for the house if it does not have a central heat source. They do not consider a wood stove as central heat.

That is what is crappy about the whole system. You are young, not much money, and find a old house you can afford and want to fix up. You can buy it, but the bank will not loan you any money on it. Too much risk for them I guess. It's a shame. Now if you are a contractor and have your contractors license, then they may do it.

It might be a combination of both the state and the insurance company. I have heard of instances where a person was able to insure their home in one state but couldn't in another with the same setup. I believe the insurance companies were the same.

You might be right on the reconditioning of an old home but that may be a state by state thing as well. We have some many homes around here that are a 100 years or more old and people don't seem to have a problem, other than paying for the renovations, buying them and getting them insured.

 

[Roert42]

The problem with buying an older home is not necessarily the age, but the condition.
Most mortgage companies will not loan to you if the house is not considered inhabitable. Ie, heat, running water, not half gutted, no leaky roof ect.


so if you want to buy a house with any of those types of issues, you either need cash, other collateral to take a loan on, or they have special loans that can be taken that allow for some of the money to be used on repairs. Problem with those are, the owners generally aren’t permitted to do the repairs, they want to see receipts from contractors.

 

[bilbo]

It might be a combination of both the state and the insurance company. I have heard of instances where a person was able to insure their home in one state but couldn't in another with the same setup. I believe the insurance companies were the same.

You might be right on the reconditioning of an old home but that may be a state by state thing as well. We have some many homes around here that are a 100 years or more old around here and people don't seem to have a problem, other than paying for the renovations, buying them and getting them insured.

I believe the state sometimes requires insurance companies offer certain coverages. For instance, apparently MN requires insurance companies offer glass coverage. When we moved to ND I asked for it and nobody would offer it.

Also they will sometimes suddenly decide to stop covering things. When I was a kid, my dad installed a wood stove in his shop, which was attached to the house. He asked what needed to be done so he didn’t end up with something they wouldn’t cover, and made sure it was done up to code plus their specifications. It was inspected and good to go. Two years later he got a letter that said he had so many days to remove the wood stove or they wouldn’t insure the house anymore. He tried to figure out why but ended up just taking it out.

If anyone would like to experience real property insurance lunacy come to Florida.

 

[Ranger850]

They declined to quote anything related to inserts. He said the prefab fireplace would have to come out, and a masonry box built to contain the insert. Going to see what some other folks say.

They will probably all say the same thing. That's about par for the course. Your Fireplace is mostly for looks, being in Bay County Florida, the NEED for a fireplace is almost 0%. Construction companies don't mind adding them to houses down here, because the profit margin is huge. If somebody says they will rip out the old pre-fab and replace it with real brick & mortor, they will buy a new truck with the money they get from you. If you can do it yourself, and be up to code, you will save about 2/3 of the cost, but then sourcing the materials at an effective cost will be the next issue.

 

[Chapap]

They will probably all say the same thing. That's about par for the course. Your Fireplace is mostly for looks, being in Bay County Florida, the NEED for a fireplace is almost 0%. Construction companies don't mind adding them to houses down here, because the profit margin is huge. If somebody says they will rip out the old pre-fab and replace it with real brick & mortor, they will buy a new truck with the money they get from you. If you can do it yourself, and be up to code, you will save about 2/3 of the cost, but then sourcing the materials at an effective cost will be the next issue.

Any idea what the codes are? Given enough time, I could build a whole house, but I have no idea where to start with a fireplace.

 

[franklin2]

Any idea what the codes are? Given enough time, I could build a whole house, but I have no idea where to start with a fireplace.

It can be complicated. You have a local inspector that looks at things, and he may be able to help you. You also need to talk to your insurance co. Like was mentioned, whether the fireplace is good or not, it's up to them if they want to insure it or not. It all comes down to money versus risk.

 

[oldgeek]

 

[Ranger850]

Any idea what the codes are? Given enough time, I could build a whole house, but I have no idea where to start with a fireplace.

No idea what the codes are, but . . . This . Not sure if your codes are different than Leon County Codes since you're on the coast and I'm further inland.

It can be complicated.

You have a local inspector that looks at things, and he may be able to help you. You also need to talk to your insurance co. Like was mentioned, whether the fireplace is good or not, it's up to them if they want to insure it or not. It all comes down to money versus risk.

As a chimney Inspector/Cleaner, I can tell you if it's "safe to use", without even knowing the "codes". The extent of the repairs and parts replacing we were allowed to do was limited, but the boss made sure we didn't have anything we wereen't allowed to have. I think a Home Inpector would know the codes, and as far as I know, the chimney has to pass inspection before the home can be sold. I've done many cleanings just so the home could pass inpection.

"Safe to Use" - does everything work and move like it's supposed to, and does it draft upwards and out. No visible cracks or damage.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

Sadly, most of the home inspectors around here couldn’t find their arse with both hands and wouldn’t know what to do with it if they did. Had one take umbrage at a junction box in the basement floorboards that was sans cover plate but strangely ignore the snap switch that hasn’t met code for years. Also completely ignored the deck and step railing that was a blatant code violation here. Among other things. No idea how they get away with it.

 

[Chapap]

I found hearth.com and did some reading. It looks like there's 3 types of fireplaces.
1: old school- masonry from the slab to the chimney.
2: alcove (maybe not the actual term)- specially engineered masonry fireplace. Can contain a cast iron insert or stove, then stainless chimney pipe out the roof
3: prefab- more commonly known as Zero Clearance. Complete, drop in fireplace that can sit right up against studs, then stainless chimney pipe out the roof.

Most newer houses have #3. There is no modifying them and it's incredibly dificult to find inserts that are compatible with them... you get what you get. Any change requires ripping out the old one and installing another #3 or #2.