I bought a foreclosed home and it came with two satellite dishes and four things called "Digital Satellite Receiver", e.g., Sony SAT-B55 with an "Access Card" in the slot in back.
What would you do with these four satellite receivers?
I should mention I can call DirectTV to ask them to take them back but does Direct-TV actually come to my house to get them (which is a pain) and will they insist on removing the two antennas on the tile roof?
I don't see anything useful I can do with the four Direct TV satellite receivers so they can have them but I don't want anyone crawling on the tile roof to break even more tiles (I already have to get dozens of broken ones fixed, presumably from their installers).
In summary, is there anything "useful" I can do with these four direct TV digital satellite receivers (what would YOU do with them?)?
I see them all the time in second hand stores. Someone must want them. Actually I think electronic hobbyist buy them.
Jimmie
I'd be on the lookout for an E-waste recycling event. With most DBS subscription services the equipment is included, which diminishes the value of old equipment. It may be of some value to hackers to engage in criminal activity.
Maybe someone can tell me what good these are.
Here are the four that were left, cordless, in the house (all with cards):
What would a typical person do with these 4 boxes (and the two dishes on the tile roof)?
Search "completed auctions" on e-Bay and you will find a bunch of them that have sold. That should give you a pretty good idea of their value. It appears that the majority of them bring somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 each.
Don
Good for nothing unless you subscribe to DTV service and activate the units. Likely they would send a new card (?) for the boxes.
Acquire "satellite" signals from space, for your television viewing.
Are you certain the dishes are mounted on the roof?! They sometimes need adjustment, so going on the roof is burdensome. In my town of 2 million people, I've never seen one on the roof.
Check to see if they are mounted on the fascia board with lag bolts, and not on the roof. Simple to remove using a ladder and hand tools.
If you bother to post an ad, make sure you call the satt company and see if they can be activated first- that is the first question the potential buyer will ask. If the magic number off the box or card has money owed on it, all it is good for is parts. I buy them for the hard drives, if they are DVRs. I wouldn't go ebay, shipping is absurdly high for the few bucks you will get. I'd go local ad paper or Craig's List.
-- aem sends...
Forget about the roof stuff. Anything attached to real property becomes part of the property.
If I were you, I'd carefully remove them - If you do it yourself, you can make sure no further damage is done and removing them will curtail any temptation to further fiddle with them.
To echo what another poster said, don't mount sat dishes on the roof, chimney, etc. (unless necessary to clear an obstacle). better is to mount them on a deck railing or on a post anchored in the ground.
I travel extensively between Omaha-KC-OKC-Dallas-San Antonio and very frequently see dishes mounted on rooftops. I'm not sure I've seen them on tile roofs, however. That does sound unusual.
I take the stuff off them, and use them for bird feeders and bird baths. Maybe a "water feature" with cascading water from one to another. Electronically, they are worthless. Maybe a buck's worth of copper in all of them.
Steve
What exactly do I ask the DirectTV company? Do I ask "can these be activated?"
And, how would I know if money is owed on them? I suspect if the previous ownes were foreclosed, they didn't pay their DirectTV bill (I heard the gardeners were never paid so they broke all the sprinklers as revenge.)
The one good thing about hard drives is I use the curved magnets on my refrigerator so it will be interesting if they have decent hard drives in them.
But do the satellite dishes do anything for me (perhaps in the future)?
Oh. You're right. Both are mounted at the corners (two opposite corners) on the wood vertical boards. A 28' ladder might get to them w/o walking on the tile roof so your suggestion is a good idea.
I'm inclined to leave them (in case I need them in the future, but, w/o the receivers, I'm not sure what good the satellite dishes are).
It was my mistake. The two gray DirectTV dishes are actually on the boards at the lip of the roof (not on the tiles themselves).
Lots of tiles are broken so I figured the guy who put them up walked on the roof as the wires are draped across the roof, but maybe he used a ladder.
I'm wondering if I should leave them there (perhaps they are of some use somehow to me, no or in the future?) or have the DirectTV company pull them down.
What would you do with the two dishes on the boards near the lip of the roof?
Interesting. Are you saying the two dishes attached near the roof are mine by virtue of being sold with the house while the four receivers are not because they are not attached to the house?
What about the propane tank that was attached to a concrete slab. When I called around, nobody could tell me who owned it but I didn't call all suppliers. There is nothing in the paperwork about the attached propane tank.
If it were me who purchased a house with a couple of dishes installed and I had no intention of using them now or in the foreseeable future, I'd remove the dishes and caulk the mounting holes.
To me, they look ugly. Even more so if they aren't being used. Secondly, when the wind blows, the dishes are putting extra stress on the boards on which they're mounted.
That's what he's saying. I can't personally verify whether that's true, but it sounds reasonable.
Since the receivers are not part of the property, it depends on who they belonged to before. If they were leased from DirecTV, they belong to them, but they may not care about getting them back (used boxes probably aren't worth what they would pay someone to go pick them up). If they belonged to the previous owners of the house then I guess they are yours and as far as I know you can sell them. Probably most useful to someone who's box has failed so they don't have to buy a new one.
Yep Engadget has a build your own bi-quad using the dishes picks up wifi 30 miles away and using this bi-quad as digital antennas for tv are ten times more stronger because of the huge surface area of the collector concentrating the signal to a focal point verse an array!
Hooked to rotor you can get local stations twice as far away ,as an array,without pixelization!
That is true of thing like light fixtures, doors, windows, etc. The dishes, though, could come under the accessory category, not a permanent mount. You don't get pictures hanging on the wall.
If you plan to get service, it may be good to have them there to avoid the hassle of a new install. I have no idea of their life though.
The propane tank is possibly the house property, but that is rare. State laws may vary, but it is typical that the tank cannot be filled by anyone but the owner, making it tough to change suppliers. Most will have a sticker on them by the company that supplied it.
That's the general rule of Real Estate law. There are, obviously, exceptions but the exceptions have to be raised by someone other than the (new) real property owner. The presumption is that if it's permanently attached to the property, it's part of the property. Some exceptions, possibly involving the propane tank, may be covered by local law. In the case of the propane tank, one resource to check is a local real-estate agent. You are probably not a pioneer regarding this issue.
Myself, I can't see much practical difference between a propane tank bolted to a concrete pad and a buried oil tank. Or a car port.
Even IF the original owner maintains some claim to the satellite dishes or the propane tank, you can reasonably assume he's abandoned them.
In the case of the satellite dishes, again, I'd remove them, doing it carefully.
My son found a dual-lnb dish set out for heavy trash. He scooped it up, took a picture, and sold it on Craigslist. Got twenty-five bucks for the thing.
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