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I Bought A Neglected House!
- Thread starter LumbermanSVO
- Start date
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This week I clean up the mess I made in the backyard, then I go inside and replace some more termite-eaten wood, add some drywall, and pressure wash the inside of the garage!
One roomie moved out last week, we knew he'd be a short term renter, he was just there during his summer internship. He was in the first room I got ready for renting, between him and the first guy that room has brought in $2575 and I spent $1276 on it. Because he knew his move-out date before moving in, he paid almost all the rent up front, that money went right into buying A/C units.
The other guy is moving out as well, he bought a house. Again, we knew he'd be a short-timer. He moved here for a job from Akron and didn't want to move his family until he bought a house. I think he'll be out by end of next weekend. His room has brought in $2227 and I spent $1285 on it.
So overall, the rooms have been profitable. They are back on market, it took about 3 weeks to fill them last time I had them listed.
One roomie moved out last week, we knew he'd be a short term renter, he was just there during his summer internship. He was in the first room I got ready for renting, between him and the first guy that room has brought in $2575 and I spent $1276 on it. Because he knew his move-out date before moving in, he paid almost all the rent up front, that money went right into buying A/C units.
The other guy is moving out as well, he bought a house. Again, we knew he'd be a short-timer. He moved here for a job from Akron and didn't want to move his family until he bought a house. I think he'll be out by end of next weekend. His room has brought in $2227 and I spent $1285 on it.
So overall, the rooms have been profitable. They are back on market, it took about 3 weeks to fill them last time I had them listed.
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Interesting video as always. Looks like you got quite a few tasks accomplished. Question for you on the pressure washing of the garage. It looks like there is an outlet on the wall that you pressure washed. Were you at all worried about pushing water into that outlet?
Good luck finding new renters!
Good luck finding new renters!
The line running from the house to the garage sub panel is broken, so no power out there. Also, most of the electrical work in the garage was done so poorly that I'm just ripping it all out and will start over after I run a new line.
This weeks video is short:
With the intern moving out it was time to advertise the room. I went back to Craigslist and figured I might as well make an account there since I’ll be posting again. After making the account I posted the add exactly as I’ve posted it before. After a week I had zero bites, so I logged back in and found that CL had deleted my add before anyone could see it. I tried again and it was removed immediately.
So I waited a few days, then posted the add anonymously. This time the add stayed up, and within the first hour I had two people reach out. By the time I took it down I had seven people contact me about it.
While waiting to figure out what to do with the CL add, I started an account on roommates.com. It took a few says, but three people reached out, and I ended up renting it to one of them, he moves in the second week of next month.
With the intern moving out it was time to advertise the room. I went back to Craigslist and figured I might as well make an account there since I’ll be posting again. After making the account I posted the add exactly as I’ve posted it before. After a week I had zero bites, so I logged back in and found that CL had deleted my add before anyone could see it. I tried again and it was removed immediately.
So I waited a few days, then posted the add anonymously. This time the add stayed up, and within the first hour I had two people reach out. By the time I took it down I had seven people contact me about it.
While waiting to figure out what to do with the CL add, I started an account on roommates.com. It took a few says, but three people reached out, and I ended up renting it to one of them, he moves in the second week of next month.
Thanks, I have good days and bad days. The frustrating part is that the doctors don't know what is going on.
When I put the first room up for the first time I tried Facebook Marketplace and in under 24 hours I got nearly 100 relies. That sounds great and all, but most were people just clicking the "Is it still available" button. On top of that, FB makes it difficult to check out their page to see if they are a looney toon or not, most were.
So I tried CL and the number of responses went way down, but the quality went up. I figured making an account was the way to go, but apparently CL didn't like that, go figure. Roommates.com isn't free, but booking the room after three contacts is pretty good. I'll try it again.
I am renting out two rooms. The other guy has moved most of his stuff out, but hasn't finished yet. He also hasn't been around in a couple weeks, so it's like he is already gone. A dude who pays the rent but is never home is ideal, lol.
Yeah, I don't like FB marketplace. If you get that good of a response on that roommates site, then it sounds like the way to go.
So how many bathrooms are functional now? there are 3 bedrooms? Do you see yourself fixing up the garage enough to live there and renting out your room?
So how many bathrooms are functional now? there are 3 bedrooms? Do you see yourself fixing up the garage enough to live there and renting out your room?
Looks like I spoke too soon, the new guy decided to ghost me. So now I need to repost the ad…
Right now there is one fully functional bathroom, the pink one. There is a toilet room in the basement next to the furnace as well. The blue bathroom is currently torn apart, I worked on the framing for it this weekend, it is almost ready for a new subfloor.
The house is listed as a 4 bedroom, but you could easily make the argument that the IT room is a bedroom as well, making it a 5 bedroom house. Right now there are three functional bedrooms. After the house is finished I’ll turn my attention to the garage, that includes making the loft a living area for myself, allowing me to rent out all four rooms.
Right now there is one fully functional bathroom, the pink one. There is a toilet room in the basement next to the furnace as well. The blue bathroom is currently torn apart, I worked on the framing for it this weekend, it is almost ready for a new subfloor.
The house is listed as a 4 bedroom, but you could easily make the argument that the IT room is a bedroom as well, making it a 5 bedroom house. Right now there are three functional bedrooms. After the house is finished I’ll turn my attention to the garage, that includes making the loft a living area for myself, allowing me to rent out all four rooms.
as soon as I saw that "bird" flying around, I knew it was a bat. ha you never did say how you got it out. Fishing net works great. THat's how I get the hummingbirds out of the garage.
Lot of progress, looking good! Before you started on the electrical, I thought that since you had the walls ripped down, why not replace. Glad to see you do that. So are you worried a local person might see it and wonder why no visible permits? (not sure but don't you have to get the electric inspected?)
You definitely have more energy towards this than I would have. And don't you wish that you could clean up as fast as the sped-up video shows?
One more month and it will have been a year! This is cool how you are documenting it. I am amazed at your skill at figuring things out like those joists. Me? I would have been lost and not got anything done.
Lot of progress, looking good! Before you started on the electrical, I thought that since you had the walls ripped down, why not replace. Glad to see you do that. So are you worried a local person might see it and wonder why no visible permits? (not sure but don't you have to get the electric inspected?)
You definitely have more energy towards this than I would have. And don't you wish that you could clean up as fast as the sped-up video shows?
One more month and it will have been a year! This is cool how you are documenting it. I am amazed at your skill at figuring things out like those joists. Me? I would have been lost and not got anything done.
Link for the curious:
I'm pretty sure this is my longest video, I really should have cut it half and split it between a couple weeks. I was rendering the video and writing the YT description when I realized how long it was. It could have easily been 20 minutes longer, but the YT views drop significantly when I go over 30-ish minutes, and I blew right past 30 for this one!
Thanks, getting some new circuits in feels GREAT! It feels like I hit a big milestone.
Ha! So I was able to corral it into the back room and had the door open. I was swinging some folded cardboard at it, trying to herd it towards the open door, when I hit it with the cardboard. I knocked it into a nearby wall, where it then fell to the ground. It was still alive, but really dazed. I managed to get him on to this bag and then I set it outside. He was gone in the morning.
With only 219 subscribers, I'm not too worried about anyone stirring up trouble.
I wish I could stomach school work, I likely would make for a good mechanical engineer. I can look at things and just see how they work, how a loads goes through them, and failure points, it just comes naturally to me. This has always helped me when working on stuff, wether its cars, houses, or building jumbotrons.
So when framing in the corner I can see where the stresses are, and now that corner is super solid. And when the last joist hung up, it was easy to see how I needed to lift it, then it was just a matter of mentally going through my tool inventory to find the right tool for the job.
For the one-year video I think I'm going to mimic the original walk-thru, share expenses, and maybe answer more questions.
I'm pretty sure this is my longest video, I really should have cut it half and split it between a couple weeks. I was rendering the video and writing the YT description when I realized how long it was. It could have easily been 20 minutes longer, but the YT views drop significantly when I go over 30-ish minutes, and I blew right past 30 for this one!
Thanks, getting some new circuits in feels GREAT! It feels like I hit a big milestone.
Ha! So I was able to corral it into the back room and had the door open. I was swinging some folded cardboard at it, trying to herd it towards the open door, when I hit it with the cardboard. I knocked it into a nearby wall, where it then fell to the ground. It was still alive, but really dazed. I managed to get him on to this bag and then I set it outside. He was gone in the morning.
With only 219 subscribers, I'm not too worried about anyone stirring up trouble.
You definitely have more energy towards this than I would have. And don't you wish that you could clean up as fast as the sped-up video shows?
One more month and it will have been a year! This is cool how you are documenting it. I am amazed at your skill at figuring things out like those joists. Me? I would have been lost and not got anything done.
I wish I could stomach school work, I likely would make for a good mechanical engineer. I can look at things and just see how they work, how a loads goes through them, and failure points, it just comes naturally to me. This has always helped me when working on stuff, wether its cars, houses, or building jumbotrons.
So when framing in the corner I can see where the stresses are, and now that corner is super solid. And when the last joist hung up, it was easy to see how I needed to lift it, then it was just a matter of mentally going through my tool inventory to find the right tool for the job.
For the one-year video I think I'm going to mimic the original walk-thru, share expenses, and maybe answer more questions.
You do have an impressively wide range of skills/abilities. Probably the thing I enjoy most about your videos. You make pretty much everything about home repair look easy. Not that I'm planning to do anything similar at my house, but it is a great way to learn about home repair in more detail.
Man, you kicked some serious butt in that video, nice job. 💪
Happy to see you had some good days to get through it all.
Good idea. Been a while. A before/after progress video would give good perspective.
it's a bit of a complicatedly designed house for us non-split-story types.
My biggest regret about not splitting last weeks video into two is that a lot of stuff got cut, and some of that showed the struggles of getting all this together, as well as my talking to myself as I tried to figure out the spider web of electrical above the kitchen/dining rooms. But the next video will show something going wrong!
Last week a had a solid three days in a row with no symptoms and it was glorious! Today I can barely walk, it's frustrating, I wish it was at least predictable.
Good idea. Been a while. A before/after progress video would give good perspective.
it's a bit of a complicatedly designed house for us non-split-story types.
I watch a few other DIY home channels and it is hard to keep up with their layouts as well. I think it's just a problem inherent to filming in a real house and not a multi-cam sitcom house, and I don't know how to solve it.
I loosely follow your projects on here, haven’t commented yet, until now. I have to say, with the amount of skills and knowledge that you have, you have the potential to make loads of money doing what you do on the side. Most people only dream of being able to even mentally map and understand how to deconstruct and then make something work with using no guides to improve their homes like you can do in these videos. Pretty impressive stuff.
And if I recall correctly, you even said that you have automotive experience, which is a another skill set on its own.
Nah it’s cool, we just stack boxes on a slab in HouTX. Or on stilts further south.
I started by working on my own bicycles way back when I was still in elementary school.
I got my first car at 17 and the second day of owning it, it caught on fire. I had spent all summer working for that thing, so instead of throwing it away I fixed it. It wasn't easy because it was a carb'ed engine run by a computer, with a vacuum system between the carb and computer. If I wasn't a car guy before, I definitely was after. Since then I've modded them and built engines.
I have a similar thread to this on a racing forum and one of the guy there commented that working on the house isn't all the different than a car, just different materials.
wow! that's scary about that one burning up like that. Those are interesting switches that you used instead, might look into them.
That sound deadening material you laid down, where did you get that? Hope when you are done with those rooms you show us (if possible) how much sound it deadens.
Have you thought about wiring the rooms with speakers so that if you had a roommate in his room, he can listen to his music in his room through the speakers?
That sound deadening material you laid down, where did you get that? Hope when you are done with those rooms you show us (if possible) how much sound it deadens.
Have you thought about wiring the rooms with speakers so that if you had a roommate in his room, he can listen to his music in his room through the speakers?