I’m at an odd point in the repairs and renovations for my current home. I’m nearly finished. I guess I’m looking for either advice or commiseration. When do you guys think it’s best to look at your current place and say, “That would be neat, we’ll have to think about that in the next house”?
Some background…
We have a great little place we’ve been fixing up, a home built in the early 19-teens. It was our starter home and at the time it was 200$ per month less than what we were paying for rent in our townhouse (and that included insurance, taxes, etc.). When we bought it was a complete basket case.
Part of it is an old log cabin that had a Sears kit “addition” put on (1930-ish from some items in the attic). We discovered that when taking down some drywall and noticing the 10″x12″x20′ long timbers in the wall. A wrap around front porch was added later too (1960-ish from some notes on the wall in the basement and porch foundation). We repaired the first floor structure, replumbed the bathrooms and kitchen, added a bathroom, leveled the floors as best we could, insulated, repaired some area of the foundation, added parking, built retaining walls, put in a french drain, completely re-roofed, etc. The landscaping still needs work. I can pour a foundation but I can’t garden to save my life. Now we’re almost done. We haven’t really outgrown the place yet, but the bedrooms are small (typically 10 x 12) and the celings are low. The basement/crawlspace area is too whacked out to consider renovation and the height of the attic is too low to really consider using unless some seriously big dormers are added. There’s also the fact that the site is not the best for our kids or parking for friends. I don’t really mow my front lawn as much as rappel down the slope with some lawn shears.
I’m an engineer and I hate leaving something at “good enough.” The house is safe now, which is not something I’m sure I would have thought when we bought it if I knew then what we’d go through repairing the place. At most, we’ll be in the house another year. The project I’d like to consider is doing something with the attic so that the master bedroom has some space or a sitting/dressing area. And that’s where my wife said, “That’s a great idea. We’ll look for it in the next house.”
Any thoughts or stories of other beloved money pits are welcome.
Best Regards,
Chris
Replies
if you are in the house only for 1 more year. I would work on the landscaping. Curb appeal and first impressions will create more resell value.
Our back yard is flat for about 5-20 feet then steep. Part of an old driveway/roadbed, so hard with gravel. We originally tried to landscape it ourselves. After a couple of years we had our neighbor (a Landscaper) redo our entire yard. It is fantastic now.
If the yard is not your strong point I would go get a landscaper to do it for you.
Well our starter isn't as old as your's 1966, but it never was updated and the people that had it before us were very frugal or (cheap). We have been here for 17 years now and I'm still renovating, there are some things I would like to do before we sell (up for sale now) but at some point you have to stop. Things I would do now would only help to polish the house up and not really bring much resale return. I think for most of us we are really just caretakers of the houses we live in. So hopefully we can fix them up better than when we bought them and leave them a bit better for the next guy/gal.
Although as a general rule i dont converse with engineers i see your abbysdad so theres a soul there somewhere>g<.
The reality of my house is that some day someone will buy it for the lot and tear it down.
Only thing to do is work with whats there and make it comfortable..
very frustrating but have come to grips with it..
You may get back at me for that crack by saying i need more nails in my post;]
I resemble that remark!
One of the big lessons I've had with this house is building a few details that I had specified in the past but had never built myself. Like proper beam connections and shear walls. Now I know why a few people have given me dirty looks after getting the drawings.
And yeah, you need more nails & glue in your posts...
Chris
"That would be neat, we'll have to think about that in the next house"?
That is a good line! I'll have to try it on the wife someday
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i'm thinking...... the market will probably turn in ..oh, say... three years
is there any way you can option your next house at todays prices and sell your current one when the market turns ?
then spend the time making COSMETIC improvements to your current house
and getting rid of junk so it will show well when you put it on the market
Edited 7/6/2008 6:47 pm ET by MikeSmith