Gross toilet leak PLEASE help!?
Question:My fiancee and I live in an apartment and our toilet has started leaking at the base,onto the floor. Not just water but like gross yellowish brown stuff and it makes out bathroom smell so bad even though I clean it often to get rid of the smell. We hate our landlords and only want to call them if we HAVE to..so can we just put a sh*t load of caulk around the toilet or do we have to have a plumber come and fix it. The smell is just so gross! Please help!
Answers:
Yes you will have to call the landlord. The wax seal has failed and it is allowing sewer gas to enter your apartment.
The water will start to rot the floor and cause mold. You can fix it yourself if you want. It is really not that hard you just need a new $5 seal.
You can find a lot of websites that show you how to do it on Google.
you have too, your landlord needs to come out and fix it, especially if it is his responsibility,
For Crying Out Loud.CALL THE LANDLORD!
By simply caulking the base, you force all the water under the toilet, causing a MAJOR flooring problem. THis can come back and bite you for damages, because YOU DIDN'T CALL THE LANDLORD!
DO IT NOW!!!
My Dad had something like that happen and it was the wax ring that is at the base of the toilet had started to disintegrate. We put in a new toilet, but you can buy just the wax ring if that is what is wrong. If that's it, it's not expensive if you do it yourself, but to hire a plumber at $80 an hour ... it can be expensive.
Since you live in an apartment, I would call the landlord. It is his responsiblity.
Just remove the toilet, and replace the wax ring that forms a seal between the toilet and the sewer pipe. Its not hard. The ring would cost about $5.00, I would recommend using two.
If you just caulk around the toilet it will still leak and probably ruin the floor and since you caused it by not properly fixing the problem you could be held responsible for repairs.
Or you could just bite the bullet and call you landlord to have it fixed.
Bea Bea has the right idea and that more than likely will fix the problem. But call the landlord first. Get him to fix it or give you the OK to fix it and take something off the rent. If you don't call him you are leaving yourself open for trouble later on.
Pull the toilet and replace the wax ring. Make sure it seats properly and tighten it back down. Not to hard unless there are other problems and you end up with no toilet to use till it does get fixed.
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