Your Valuable Home

Hosted by Ron Melk

Business Education

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Episodes

150

Latest episode

Jul 2025

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About the show

After years on the radio, host Ron Melk has flipped the switch to podcasting! The Home Improvement Replays can spark ideas about projects for your home. The Horror Stories can help you avoid one and my Featured Segment draws in experts from across the country on everything from new building products, maintaining a healthy home and leveraging home equity, to choosing the right contractor, adding value to communities and so much more. Your Valuable Home is not about DIY or flipping. It is about building wealth with real estate, choosing the right contractor to do the right job at the right price…improving communities. The show is packed with valuable education for homeowners and landlords who believe that knowledge is the path to wise decisions.

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60 recent

July 11, 202525 min

Shopping for Replacement Windows? Learn All of the Features that Make ProVia vinyl Windows a Tremendous Value

In our final interview about ProVia products for the exterior of a home, Chris Baker, ProVia®’s Director of Sales for Windows, walks us through when to replace old windows, and the many reasons why you should choose ProVia vinyl windows, including an outstanding limited, lifetime warranty. In the Bad Guy Bulletin today, Marc Furber from the Bucks County Pennsylvania DA’s office shares the good news of a Digital Forgery Bill that was just signed by Josh Shapiro, Governor of Pennsylvania. PA now becomes one of a few states in the country to protect it residents from AI-inspired scams. In the Feature today, Ron Melk, Producer and Host, extends a heart-felt “thank you” to the listeners, sponsors, contributors, engineers and distributors who have enabled us to produce nearly 600 episodes of Your Valuable Home over 11 and ½ years. THANK YOU!!!

June 27, 202530 min

This Week’s Episode Is Dedicated to Keeping You and Your Family Safe from Carbon Monoxide: an eye-opening Interview with America’s Healthy Home Expert.

Caroline Blazovsky, America’s Healthy Home Expert, shares her thoughts and expertise on all aspects of the odorless killer, carbon monoxide: what it is, what produces it, how it affects the human body and the technology you can need to protect you and your family at home and when you travel.This in-depth focus on carbon monoxide, was prompted by the untimely death of a famous actress at her daughter and son-in-law’s home in Bucks County, Pennsylvania over the 2025 winter holidays. We originally posted the episode on 5/16/25. Because of the importance of the subject to so many of our listeners, we felt compelled to re-run it now.

June 20, 202555 min

This week, a compelling wakeup call about the dramatic shortcomings of electric grids in countries around the world.

The Your Valuable Home Podcast presents a two-part interview with Mehdi Seyedmahmoudian, Professor of Engineering in the School of Engineering at Australia’s Swinburne University of Technology. Parts 1 and 2 center on the professor’s hypothesis about a weather-related phenomenon called “induced atmospheric vibration” being the root cause of tens of millions of people in Spain, Portugal and southern France experiencing a massive blackout in the spring of 2025. We also discuss, a significant, little-publicized blackout the professor personally experienced in Indonesia about the same time. In these two broad-ranging interviews, Professor Seyedmahmoudian also pinpoints factors that are straining grid capacities around the world and possible solutions that need not strain the budgets of central governments. Will the U.S. and other countries heed the call to address the shortcomings of their electric grids. We can only hope. In this episode, Ron also completes the explanation of why he decided to drop American Home Shield.

June 13, 20251 hr 8 min

Today, a Short Course on the Importance and Value of Trees, and which Species, like the Ash, are Imperiled.

In our best practices segment, the well-known landscape architect, Carter van Dyke, explains the plight of certain species of trees in the U.S. The Ash, for example, is in danger of extinction. Dead Ash trees become brittle and break from the top down, posing to hazard that can be very expensive to deal with. In our Bad Guy Bulletin today, Marc Furber from the Bucks County DA’s office is back with a warning about a scam about Bad Guys posing as law enforcement officials to separate you from your money. Our Feature today concludes a series on Americans who have rental properties in other countries. This interview involves a rental in London.

June 6, 202549 min

Design Your Exterior Home Remodel like a Pro with ProVia’s Online Design Center

If you can get overwhelmed by product choices... especially when it comes to a major exterior home re-do, you need to check out ProVia windows, doors, vinyl siding, manufactured stone and metal roofing, using the company’s incredible, online Design Center. You can even scan in photos of your home’s current exterior to see how it looks with a ProVia Perfect Exterior makeover. Jerome Zenoby, ProVia’s Director of Creative and Design, explains this wonderful online tool that he participated in developing. In our Bad Guy Bulletin today, Marc Furber from the Bucks County PA DA’s office gets into the clever ploys that keep income tax scammers busy long after taxes have been filed. Our Feature today is with Josip Rupena, CEO and Founder of Milo in Miami. This mortgage firm simplifies the process of qualifying for a jumbo mortgage by allowing Bitcoin as collateral. Amazing!!

May 30, 202540 min

From Windows to Custom Staircases with an aggravating Horror Story mixed in

In our best practices segment today, Chris Baker joins us to cover all the high points – and there are many – of ProVia® exceptional roofing products. Our Horror story today, involves Ron’s struggle to get the home appliance insurer American Home Shield to live up to its coverage. This time the hassle was over a DOA dishwasher in Ron’s rental unit. The last time, the hassle involved a clothes dryer in Ron’s house. After four visits from American Home Shield appliance repair people, the dryer still took two hours to dry clothes. In our Feature today, Amos Fisher, head of Vintage Millwork and Restoration, a sister company to Mid-Atlantic Timberframes, who we had on last week, walks us through the company’s exquisite products – from interior doors to custom staircases.

May 23, 202544 min

Today: An introduction to residential water treatment systems and timberframe homes

In our Best Practices segment today, Rebecca Edawards, Staff Writer for SafeWise.com, covers water filtration systems for faucets and for the whole house. Yes, some systems do filter out troublesome PFAS – “Forever Chemicals.” In our Feature, Mike Banta of Mid-Atlantic Timberframes fills us in on this very appealing method of home construction.

May 17, 202530 min

This Week’s Episode Is Dedicated to Keeping You and Your Family Safe from Carbon Monoxide: an eye-opening Interview with America’s Healthy Home Expert.

May 10, 202529 min

Splitero: an Intriguing, New Way to Leverage Equity in Your Home or Rental Property

In our continuing series focused on products that make for the ProVia®-perfect exterior, ProVia’s Product Manager for Manufactured Stone talks about the eco-friendly way the product is made, it’s many exterior and interior uses and its value compared to natural stone. In our Feature today, Michael Gifford, CEO and Founder of Splitero, talks about his company’s fresh approach to joint real estate ownership. Spliterocan turn the equity in your home or rental property into cash for college tuition, a new car or a solution to credit card debt.

May 2, 202552 min

It’s Never too Soon to Learn About Home Care.

In our Best Practices segment today we discover how rejuvenating versus replacing kitchen cabinets can save thousands of dollars in kitchen renovation cost. Cabinet rejuvenation doesn’t mean simply painting the cabinets. It’s a process that includes new doors, drawers and hardware and spray painting the cabinet bases. Our Horror Story today is about an Apple Pay shakedown that involved Ron. He got an email stating that his Apple account had been charged $139 at 3:00 a.m. that morning. That alone was odd. There was a number to call for more information. After calling the number and asking a few questions, Ron reported the incident to Bucks County Consumer Protect Weights and Measures. As it turned out, the number was for a “burner” phone. Don’t get caught in this trap. In today’s Feature, we talk with Dan Townsley about the difference a family run home care company can make. The Townsley’s Living Care Home Services offers compassionate home care across a broad swath of Pennsylvania.