Electrical Fire In The Wall. Electrician is coming, what should I look for?

Question

We are renting this house. This morning my daughter was vacuuming and the outlet caught fire and began to burn. I threw all the breakers in the house. And unplugged everything from that particular outlet. When my hubby came home we called the landlord who said he was sending out an electrician that day (by the way he never came). And we began to see what rooms we could turn on in our house and mark the breakers because they were not marked. What we discovered was that the breaker that carried the outlet that caught fire also carried half the kitchen, den, diningroom, livingroom, bedroom, and laundry room.
Now I don't know much about electricity but isn't that too much? What should I make sure that this electrician when he come tomorrow, does?
I have to keep the breaker to all these rooms off because if I throw them on the fire starts back.

Answer 1

The electrician may replace the receptacle if the wires aren't already fried, and will definately tell you to not use this outlet for the vacuum. Once he does this, you'll be able to turn things back on, but you definately have too many thing on the same circuit.
If the house is old, then it may have been code (legal) to put so many things on the same circuit.
New construction however mandates many dedicated lines, especially in kitchens and bathroom.
Have the electrician look around for a low load circuit or dedicated line that may already be wired to an outlet somewhere.
Unfortunately, vacuums, hair dryers, toaster ovens are all notorious for tripping circuits.
Additionally, when people use vacuums, sometimes thecord gets extended to the point where is pulls the outlet and either cracks it or shorts it out.
Hope this helped.

Answer 2

UH, yeah that seems bit excessive to me too. I would think the electrician would notice it too and suggest to the land lord upgrade the electrical in the house. yeah that can be costly.. but losing a home, its contents and possibly a human life are worth it. you really should call the firedept to come out and use thier thermal imaging device to make sure there is no smoldering fire in the wall. Better safe than sorry... they may actually have to let the city zoning dept know about the electrical problem and force the lanlord to upgrade if he wants to continue renting his property

Answer 3

That seems like there maybe to much load on that circuit.
How many of thse items on that circuit were running at the time? leave them off If possible.

Answer 4

call your local fire dept or call your local board of health on your landloard when i was 17 our rental burned down for almost the same reason we lost everthing