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When working on your bathroom floor tiling, you should always tile the floor first and then refit the toilet afterward. This has both practical and visual advantages—the tile will have a better seal, and the installation will look cleaner.

On the other hand, when you try to cut the tiles to fit around the toilet, you’re putting yourself at a disadvantage. It’s a lot more work, it’s hard to be precise, and mistakes or miscalculations can lead to future moisture damage to the tiling, grout, and subfloor.

First, check that you have cut off the water supply to your toilet. This is a project that can only be done safely if running water cannot reach your toilet fixture. If you're seeing water trickle out after you've confirmed that the water supply is shut off, you can probably rest assured that what you're seeing isn't a problem. It's common for leftover water to spill out when you're removing your toilet's fill valve. If something goes wrong while you're working on your toilet, you'll need to look at your home's policy to see if your homeowner insurance covers water damage.

Toilets typically connect to your main vent stack, a vertical pipe that runs through all finished levels of your home and exits through the roof. It’s located behind the walls, but if you have an unfinished basement or a utility closet, you may find a portion of it running the vertical length of the space. Some basement toilets use an air admittance valve instead, which is a small vent located in the wall directly behind the toilet that extends upward a few feet from the drain.

Yes, frozen pipes can cause a toilet to stop working correctly. If the pipes are frozen, water cannot flow, which can lead to two main problems. First, the supply line to the toilet tank may be frozen, which prevents the tank from refilling with water after you flush. Second, the drain pipe itself can freeze, blocking water from flushing away. As a temporary solution for a non-refilling tank, you can manually add water, but this is not a long-term fix. To clear a frozen drain pipe, you can try pouring warm water into the toilet bowl or tank and then flushing, as the warm water may help thaw the ice blockage. Ultimately, the best course of action is to unfreeze the affected pipes to restore your toilet to full functionality.