Quote Originally Posted by rockhound View Post
as a former remodeling contractor I have found hundreds of poorly installed electrical fixtures, outlets, or whatever, O once gat a call to come out a nd finish a kitchen behind another contractor that had walked out on a job. he had taken the old panel which was behind the fridge, pigtailed to every circuit in order to in stall a new panel, then filled the entire old panel with drywall mud over the wiring and pigtails etc in order to finish the wall. I turned that job down, no way was i going to tie my name to that cluster in any way.
YES! Dangerous and destructive things are hidden in the walls of older homes (20-120 years). There are/were a lot of DIY electricians out there, some meet code, most do not. While code revisions are meant to keep everyone safe, the new electrical codes (and many other building codes) have increased material costs which drives up home prices in the long run.
I grew up in a time before GFCI, ARCs and childproof outlets were thought of. Getting shocked by poking things in an outlet was a right of passage, I used the prongs at the end of a set of ww2 surplus headphones! One of my first memories, sigh!