You can also mix in food coloring with this. Makes it way easier to see where you’ve already sprayed.

Nice tip. As a former licensed pesticide applicator, a couple notes: Don’t throw that bottle in the recycling. Put it in the trash after it’s triple rinsed. Also a good idea to poke a hole in it to prevent reuse as a water container. Second read the label. The label *is* the law. Also pesticide laws are state based so check on your state to see what the requirements are. But in general you got it right: doing it to your property is allowed even for restricted use pesticides most places. Be careful folks. And more PPE never hurt anyone.

OK, I'm a certified Pest Control Operator, definitely agree: Integrated Pest management: exclusion, mitigation, control. Tips: - Yep, home owner can purchase for their use. -Use Warm water to mix while slowly add to mixture. -Spray on concrete prior to putting framing, then spray on all sides of the wood, or two coats if you can't get to both sides.(low pressure sprayer) -Spray all the wood to prevent dry wood termites and wood bores. -read all label Good vid!

A tip here from a former Pest Control person, mix up the Bora Care with hot water. It mixes a whole lot easier and thoroughly that way.

I like to take pictures of all walls before the drywall is installed. Makes installing or fixing hidden wires so easy.

A few years ago I was having a house built. And when the brick masons had started laying bricks and while the walls were still only a couple feet tall I liberally sprinkled Diatomaceous Earth in the cavity. The subdivision was built on a previous cattle farm. All my neighbors had problems with spiders and bugs, but not ours. This sounds like a good idea too.

Tips from a pest control professional. Mix in a dye. Helps to make sure you don't respray as well as to make sure you make a good covering of the areas being treated! Using warm water will make mixing the boracare easier as well. I used to apply this all the time when I lived in Florida. The only major downfall to its use is the bottom of the studs can't be treated this way so its not a 100% coverage. But it helps to prevent a lot of subterranean termite damage!

Dynamite pre-wall install detail. I'm a 35 yr 3rd Gen. tradesman and its hard to get my folks on board with preventative measures such as this because they all want speed speed speed! I'm trying to get people to understand the importance of forward thinking like you and your one of the best I have seen. Thanks Matt for your influence.

Matt, I learned from pro- caulker’s in the Nashville Tn area some 25 years ago... cut your tip at 45*, and push FORWARD, in stead of “pulling your caulk out” backwards. It will eliminate the need for a (cold wet) finger to smooth the joint, you have WAY LESS waste, and the job goes much faster, looks cleaner and professional. I enjoy your very informative videos. Keep up the great work, I would like to see you using this method of caulking, I’m sure you’ll agree it’s the way to go!

I worked in the pest control industry. I always loved how they were like these products are %100 kid and pet safe after spraying it . But you had to wear a hazmat suit to mix and spray it. Something does add up about that.

Hi Matt, I just wanted to let you know: the Bora-Care treatment alone can be used around all materials including PVC, Pex, metals, etc. However, the Bora-Care with Mold-Care cannot be sprayed on anything other than cellulose based materials(wood)- it is corrosive and over time will eat away at any wires, plumbing, iron pipe, ductwork etc. If you were to apply Bora-Care with the Mold-Care, it would need to be done before any systems entered the home, not as shown here. I love your content, but almost made this critical error on my own home, and knowing you are all about quality- I hope you will revise this process to let others know, as I have seen other KZfaqrs mention your video as inspiration for applying it in the same manner.

Here in Florida when a licensed pest contractor uses the Boracare they can issue a five year termite bond which the gets renewed annually. We use this product on all of our multi-family homes and our zero lot line ones as well. The current development that we are finishing up took over 7 years and haven't heard of a single case of any termite damage. Good product

boric acid powder, boric acid bait tablets, and diatomaceous earth are all great for keeping your house bug free. The Bora-Care is new to me and will go into my "if I build a house" file.

OR... You can invest $20 in 20 Mule Borax Soap. I covered my baseplates 15 years ago before I drywalled. Still no bugs and I live in Florida.

Just a tip. Put some food coloring in it and you can see where you sprayed a lot easier.

Years ago I worked with a cellulose insulation company which made the blown cellulose from newspapers. At the time we were mixing borax in as a fire retardant. Good to know bugs don't like it! Great video, Matt. Thanks for posting.

I worked in pest control for years and these are all very good steps to eliminate problems before it’s a problem, $200 is nothing compared to the thousands of dollars later.

Great tips! Finally someone in your profession to provide some basic steps to all homeowners on how to help take preventive measures towards mold and bugs. Nice.

I’ve been treating like this for 20 years. Hit the underfloor framing before insulating and subfloor, hit the studs and sheer inside and out and keep at it to under and over on the roof decking. Toward the end, the air begins to taste a little salty. Cheap ounce of prevention. One better is to treat with an earth-contact insecticide after the rebar inspection. This really reflects my laziness; don’t want to deal with repairs.

They sell a specific dye you can use with the boracare so you can make sure you don't miss any areas. I found that VERY handy, but then again, I was doing a much larger house, so I had to mix several batches, and the room structure was complex, so it made it much easier. The dye was cheap, so I'd do it even for a smaller house.

Ha, I first saw this video almost 2 years ago. We''re remodeling our bathroom. And this is what I'm doing before the drywall goes back up. Thanks for your wisdom.

When my dad built the den onto the back of the family home I watched him mix a pound of borax into a five gallon bucket of cheap (watery) cedar oil. First he thinly painted the top and outer edge of the foundation. When the base was laid he painted it tool. We never saw bugs on the foundation, and despite a ladder knocking a hole in the corner.

A better approach to sealing the sole plate to the floor when framing a house is to put the sealant under the sole plate before it is nailed down. If memory serves, in most Canadian jurisdictions this is a code requirement. Builders frequently use a compressible foam plastic gasket strip instead of a caulking compound, but it achieves the same result of preventing cold air and bug ingress. Applying the caulking to the sole plate as shown in this video is second-best when remodeling, but better than nothing.

This video is perfect timing, I'm just before the stage where I'll be ready to do this. I plan on doing all these steps in a 30x40 barn I'm building. Thanks!

When I win the lottery, I am going to buy a Risinger custom built home. Matt, your homes are LIGHT YEARS ahead of what most other builders are producing.

Is this guy great, or what? Always clear and concise. Factual and fun. Matt is an excellent teacher.

i just have to say that i love your channel! the way you lay out all the ideas and details of everything you do, especially for free, is absolutely awesome! you do an excellent job of explaining things for those of us who arent in the business, and i for 1 really do appreciate it!

I have used these ideas, I also sweep ant and roach powder under the sill plate before sealing with caulk. Boracare with mold treatment will actually reverse the process in wood that has had some exposure but is not rotten yet. Two coats, and check it after two days When it's dry the musty smell should be totally gone, and the surface clean to touch. Like he says a respirator is important. Great topic and we'll done!

Big time prevention, and a great video. Tim-bor is my favorite borate in Florida, but prevention without fumes is the name of the prevention game. Thanks.

...otherwise we'll see you next time on THE BUILD SHOW!!! So much heart in that outro, Matt. Great video as always!

You've earned a sub with this one. My wife is extremely sensitive to mold, and that treatment you sprayed in the first part of the video - never heard of it before. Thank you.

I have been using borates,, 20 Mule Team normally, for decades. I also have been a proponent of seal all the easy spots. Base of the wall is a classic place. I think your entire video is spot on. Everyone, every house should have a similar pre-treatment.

Thanks for the upload. I wish I had known this three years ago when I gutted my house. For some reason termites infest this whole area, and bugs are really bad as well. These old brick houses weren't built correctly and they leak like a sieve

Hi Matt. I was recently asked to do some drone work in Thailand. The property I was supposed to film had a spring-fed moat flowing around the house. It was about 18" wide beside the base of the footers and it kept ants and crawling bugs out of the house. Analogue pest control.

Great advice ! Just did this in remodeling a townhouse that was partially burned. The hint below about dying it so it can be seen is also great idea !!!

I've used bora care on all my houses for the last ten yrs. it's awesome. I add a dye to my solution to see that I have uniform coverage. Yes it will trash your sprayer if not cleaned out. Nice video

I have used a drywall texture hopper gun with air compressor to fog powder insecticides into attics. I used use diatomaceous earth, Timbor, and Boric acid. Use a respirator and tell the neighbors your house isnt on fire or do it at night as the fog will leak out your vents. Bought a rental house that was infested with roaches and fogged the attic and inside of the house after all the demo and it is bug free 5 years later with no regular pest control in Florida.

I like to put Boric Acid under cabinets, Fridges and Stoves. It also works great on Fleas. So much so that I have not used any flea medication on my 3 labs for over 10 years.

Glad you covered safety. One overlooked safety hazed (for the DIY’r) is Dermal absorption.

Matt - Absolutely awesome video with easy DIY recommendations ... right up my alley ... thanks!

My house had a problem with aspergilus fungus, bleach was only temporary. Then I used 20 Mule Team on the walls and no more fun guys. Where I had ants I drilled 3/8" holes in the drywall and wooshed boric acid powder into the voids, helped tremendously. Sealed up a lot of cracks. Our cat wondered what was swarming all over her food dish, ants, fixed that.

Good tips Mark. It's been my experience with leaky homes in the hill country that we don't have a cockroach or cricket problem. The scorpions get them. I'd rather have cockroaches...

Matt; Thanks for the info about Bora-Care. I had not heard of it previously. But..... I am ahead of you on the dusting. Over 35 years ago I used Boric Acid (Roach Proof) and Seven dust, 50/50 mix. Sprinkled behind the base molding (walls were already up, I was doing new floor) and 35 years later only found a few, very few, bugs, all dead. Spreading your word,... again.

Great video, I'll have to do this in the entire old house I'm remodeling to make it my home. The roofers did a lousy job at tapping and I got so much water and mold before they got the new roof is ridiculous. ....thanks for posting Matt !!

Another simple/inexpensive tip to reduce bug spread in the walls IF you have wooden studs is to put a squirt of expanding foam in each hole where pipes or wire go through the studs. Keeps the bugs from using them as a "highway" to travel down the inside of the walls. Be careful when you foam the outside of electrical boxes to make SURE no foam enters the box.

Please note! If you’re thinking of using this in a boat, just remember borate treated wood has very poor adhesion to epoxy, polyester, glue, paint and sealants. Constant water exposure will eventually wash the wood treatment out. But this treatment is excellent for what this video topic is about.

Great videos always a pleasure to watch them. I like how you take time to add all the links to each videos! Thanks !

Definitely agree on the warm water to help mixing, also the various colors of dye help locate the spray better than just clear water. Great product too, works well unless the structure has a water leak/flood or the like. Reapply after that.

Speaking from experience, boric acid only works as long as it's powder dry to stick to bugs exoskeletons. Once damp even a bit they'll run right over it and go on about their bug day.

While you're correct that Boric acid is totally safe, keep in mind that arsenic and asbestos are also "naturally occurring minerals." "Natural" by no means conveys safety.

This one is great. Second time in my feed, watched again.

Every week I look forward towards your videos as a electrician and weekend builder your ideas have saved me tons of money and most of all time, not as young as I used to be. I am currently in planning stages for a off grid timber home up north and this product will certainly save my investment once my walls are up thank you

I'm building a house right now and this info is very useful.

Every time I install new cabinets I pour Boric acid ant and roach powder under them. Great place for the critters to try to hide. 🐜 🐜 🐛

This is actually pretty helpful, thanks for the video!

I had never thought about ANY of this stuff. Thanks for the video.

Boric acid (sodium borate) is also used to make wood fire resistant.

..i'd just keep Spraying tho, until it was all used up.. higher up the Walls, do the Ceiling, whatever..

Awesome video. Will be doing this on my 1891 rehab.

Thank you Matt, you are very generous with your knowledge. God bless you

For termites I think it's better to use Termidor SC (or Taurus SC) and let the termites take the chemical (fipronil) back to the colony and destroy the colony because it doesn't kill them right away. One treatment lasts for 10-15 years and costs about $100 for a large bottle and anyone can do it by digging a trench around their house and pouring a diluted solution in.

Matt, Death Valley is in California.

Thanks, I've got a lot of remodeling and this should be great for this project!

Awesome tips, I actually replaced the flooring at home, before installing the baseboards I plan to put Borax between that inside space of drywall and baseboards, I might also put Diatomaceous Earth mixed with Borax. Thanks!

Pretty good video. Great job! Building in October God willing and soaking up all your videos. Do you still stand behind the advanced framing? What would walls look like with that? Not very straight?

Arizona builders take note: all of this will help prevent scorpions from getting into your home.

I'm glad you tooled the caulk, it frustrates me when I see other builders in my area who use caulk to meet code but don't bother to tool it. If you don't tool it, you can't ensure you actually filled the whole void

Thanks for these tips. I'm building a geodesic dome this year and thought I had everything covered until I saw this video.

Boric acid is also my go-to treatment for ants in California. Works great for pretty much any insect, really.

Love boric acid. Completely ridded my shed that was full of roaches.

Good video and excellent info on products and how to apply. Thanks again, Matt.

Excellent video with thorough explanations. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

Hey this was really helpful. But I would put caulk down before laying the sill plate of the walls which would be even better.

BTW, I've found diatomaceous earth works great as a substitute for boric acid. It's usually available in big box stores.

I would love to see more of this house. That’s about the perfect size.

Thanks on all the info & education on building!!! Keep making awesome videos!!!

"It was mined in death valley, but it's also mined in California" Death Valley is in California :p

take some of that powder and hit the wall receptacles boxes....roaches love warm places and will go to the warm wiring...they love being around fridge compressors also..

When my parents bought our house in TX, it needed new carpets and some drywall work. we used a shop vacuum to blow borax into the walls before the carpet went in. We had no roaches for the time we lived there.

Thanks for the great info, I just ordered the Boracare and the hotshot powder as suggested.

These is really great ideas! Hard to believe he didn’t recommend paperless drywall though?! I’ve been using plain 20-mule team borax for many decades, to prevent bugs of all kinds. There’s a bunch of ways to use it. It’s very low-toxicity, but it can be toxic, if used wrong. It’s commonly used in lumber industry, to kill some weeds. It definitely killed creeping thyme, where it was contacted with borax solution used to wash patio chair pads. It failed to kill off grasses, and chamomile kept living...so it gets rid of some, but not others. Borax does nothing to repel rodents though...but Pennyroyal sure does...can plant that all around house footings, and it grows in same seasons rodents try to access the house. Or can use the essential oil of it, in water, as a spray inside the house--smells minty. Borax is strongly alkaline. So is washing soda, and, so is baking soda....bugs hate all of those. For sugar ants or any bugs trying to get in around doors or windows, simply spread the powder in their path...they leave and usually stay gone a long time. I used that under and around the kitchen door, to get rid of ants and carpenter ants, and it worked for a few years, than needed reapplied...was out of borax, so tried washing soda...same result...a few years later, was out of both of those, so tried baking soda...and stunningly, that worked, too!! I’ve used each of those to get rid of mold in rescued cloth items, too...fails to remove all of the staining, but got the mold out, coupled with drying them in sunlight. MOLDZYME liquid also does a terrific job, and, seems to stay as a mold deterrent, for some time...it’s only enzymes, completely non-toxic, even safe for many with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity [MCS] Mold hates Borax, too...that’s part of the good it can do. Borax does something the sodas can’t--when spritzed using a fine-mist water sprayer, just enough to dampen it, it hardens and makes a “crust”. OR, you can make it into a watery solution just dissolving it into water...dissolve as much into the water as much as possible. Then spray as he’s doing. Let dry. CRAWLSPACE: “semi-permanent” termite control: 1st make sure ALL crawlspace vents are capable of keeping rodents, cats, dogs, etc. critters, from accessing under the house. THEN...commence to spread 1/2” thick layer of borax powder, solidly all over the crawlspace floor, over top of the vapor barrier. Make sure it kisses-up top all foundation blocks and perimeter foundations. As you lay that layer, spritz fine-mist water over it, so it hardens into a crust. Work from the farthest corner, backwards to the exit. Once out of the access door, make sure it’s up to that edge too, and close that access. Then, you’re done. But I like his thing about spraying a thick solution and letting it dry. IDK about the mildecide in it, though...that’s more toxicity....since Borax is already a pretty strong mold inhibitor. There is “paperless drywall”--always use that, if you can, because what molds on drywall, is almost always the paper covering. I’ve put borax powder into the bottoms of wall bays, and no bugs, no carpenter ants, no termites, no spiders, no ants, no roaches....maybe I’m lucky? All that said....IF you are getting chronic skin and breathing contact with borax, hours-per-day, for years, it CAN cause health problems, and, there’s one child I know of, who may have been born with his organs reversed [situs inversus], related to his father being heavily exposed, as described, while working for 9 years in a glass factory that uses borax as a glass release-agent; borax powder residue was all over the offices, so he was pretty heavily exposed for all that time. The baby was born just after the father had to quit working there because he had become ill from it. IDK what it might do, to people living in a house treated in this manner...but, borax is far less toxicity than the usual bug control chemicals!!!...and, it’s all sealed into the walls, so there’s no skin contact at all. Just words of warning.

If you spray with the anti-mold stuff before you build, you will need breathing protection when you cut that wood. The wood dust will carry that stuff into your lungs. To me this means that pretreatment is not such a good idea with the possible exception of coating the ends and maybe the footers. That stuff would have helped my house. It has melamine siding that ended right at the bottom of the footer. The bottom was never painted. As water splashed up the bottom flaked away from the back first. This let water splash on the footer which now need to be replaced in a few spots. Of course the rest of the envelope was poorly done too. I plan to do fiber-cement cladding. I will be doing a "bomber" seal on things first though. And I will never buy another house made by KB.

Very good video. Thank you very much. I will be lining my basement and attic with this stuff

Your awesome. Wish more builder gave it that personal touch

Why doesn’t every home builder do this on all new construction? No roaches? That would be wonderful!

Save your fingers and use a Metal Ball Fondant tool to push the caulk into the crevice.

As a rookie builder I’m on my 3rd new build I been watching your vids and learning alot thanks keep it up I wish I be ay our level hopefully some day

Awesome, awesome video. Thanks Matt, great job 👍

Brotha Risinger If we want to use the best practices, should we not use the products before applying exterior sheeting/shear paneling?

Why don’t they use borax treated lumber when framing, as they do in Hawaii?

Thank you so much! Just in time for my remodel.

My kids have a cabin shell that’s on blocks I think doing inside and under home should help them keep those Texas termites at bay and hopefully they will have no issues the life of their home 😁 thanks for this tip

would you add diatomaceous earth to the list of things you can lace your walls with before sealing them up.

Hey aren't you supposed to use pressure treated wood for the bottom plate when it's in contact with concrete. Seems like the ones in the video are not PT.

Bamboo ash, or rice husk ash finely ground and added to paint makes it completely mold and mildew resistant. It's the silicone carbide particles that continue the anti-fungal operation, you could also buy SiC whiskers and add about a half cup per gallon of paint. It's low cost, and I have over 20 years of painting it into problematic older bathrooms with 100% success.

Epic! This is priceless information. Thank you!

If your concern is just bugs, save yourself all that money and just buy a couple boxes of Borax. Mix with warm water and spray. easy. If you want/need to prevent mold, you can buy mold inhibitors for about $30 bucks and under to add to it. People really need to read labels before buying this expensive stuff. More often than not, you will find the active ingredients are in some other product you can buy for pennies, like.....Borax.

Nice tips , but the bora care instructions tells you for termites you have to mix it at a 1 to 1 ratio , you were using it at a 1 to 5 ratio which only works for mold it won't help with termites .

The original site and still being mined in Mohave off of the 58 between Barstow CA and Mohave off of 20 mule team road.

I'm totally doing this on the Shed I'm building this year.