I Bought A Neglected House!

[A.Goldberg]

Congrats. Looks like a big project but I’m sure the end result will be terrific.

My fiancée and I bought a condo in a brownstone building a couple years ago in the Boston area, built in 1897 IIRC. It was last renovated in the early 2000’s but still had a lot of original woodwork and such. We did a fairly big renovation, mostly on the kitchen, living room, and one of the bathrooms. We didn’t do the work ourselves but I will say it’s nice to be done with it.

It’s definitely great to create your own space to your liking. My only complaints so far is the Kohler faucets in the kitchen and bathroom sinks both have had issues with their valves- within a week of each other, requiring replacement parts. I would expect a $600 faucet to last more than a couple years. Our Miele dishwasher has also had problems twice with some drain part. The dealer we used has been great but said this seems to be a common problem.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

Congrats. Looks like a big project but I’m sure the end result will be terrific.

My fiancée and I bought a condo in a brownstone building a couple years ago in the Boston area, built in 1897 IIRC. It was last renovated in the early 2000’s but still had a lot of original woodwork and such. We did a fairly big renovation, mostly on the kitchen, living room, and one of the bathrooms. We didn’t do the work ourselves but I will say it’s nice to be done with it.

It’s definitely great to create your own space to your liking. My only complaints so far is the Kohler faucets in the kitchen and bathroom sinks both have had issues with their valves- within a week of each other, requiring replacement parts. I would expect a $600 faucet to last more than a couple years. Our Miele dishwasher has also had problems twice with some drain part. The dealer we used has been great but said this seems to be a common problem.

Thanks!

I'm a person who needs projects to work on, sitting idle doesn't work out well for me, so I have the next several years of projects now!

Finding solid reviews on home fixtures is difficult and I don't know why. Maybe because part numbers change too fast?

 

[velocityg4]

Interesting thread. I did this a few years ago with my current house. Then did it immediately again with my old house to increase the value and sell it.

Didn't really think of doing a room by room approach. I did it in phases.
- Install temporary Wireless security system
- Demolition
- Cleaning
- Subfloors (Mainly encapsulation as the prior owners had many large dogs and never let them out. I'm still haunted by the appearance of the underside of the carpets. 🤮)
- Wall placement
- Plumbing/Electrical/Gas/Low Voltage
- Doors/Drywall
- Painting
- Flooring
- Trim
- New cabinets and counters
- Finishing touches (sinks, toilets, light fixtures, faucets, mirrors, &c)

Mainly I had to get all the living spaces ready. As it's a huge inconvenience to do afterwards. I left the garage and basement for later. As they needed a lot more work and weren't necessary to get done before moving in. Plus I needed to get done and moved ASAP. To get the old house ready for sale.

 

[Huntn]

I had been working for a live entertainment company in Texas for several years and rode the wave of it growing from 30-ish employees to over 200. Along the way the company got bought out by an investment firm and they took away everything that was great about working there. So I started looking around for another growing small company. I found one in SoCal and left Texas on New Years Eye for California.

I started on January 6th and things were going great, all the promise I saw while interviewing was looking like reality. I managed to lower my cost of living while increasing my quality of life, things were looking good. Then on March 11th I was laid off because EVERY show the company had was cancelled. Well, technically I was bumped to part-time, but with no hours, so I could keep my health insurance. But there were just no shows, in the span of a week my entire industry came to a screeching halt, something that has never happened before. Thanks COVID!

I sat around for weeks waiting to see what would happen, nothing. Then about 8 weeks into doing nothing I saw a job opening for my skillset on a FB group, so I sent in my resume, and sent the guy a message introducing myself. A few weeks later I was on a plane for the interview and a week of work. I eneded up getting the job, and a few weeks later moved to Cincinnati. I threw my stuff in storage and just rented a room until I could get the lay of the land.

One day my boss and I were driving somewhere and we went past some small houses. I mentioned that I'd love a house that size, but with a huge garage. He said that his grandmother just moved out of her house and it had a two car detached garage. I didn't think much of it at the moment. Then the next day the homeowner where I was renting sent me an email, he was giving me 30 days to leave because he wanted to move back in, so I asked my boss about his grandmothers house.

I looked at it that day, and boy was it in bad shape. I've done remodels before, but never on my own home, I've never actually owned a home. While this house looked bad, it seemed solid. So I made an offer that turned out to be right in the ballpark the flippers were giving. They decided to go with me because I'd actually live in it. I moved in on Sunday(my birthday!) and started the cleanup process right away.

I've decided to make a YouTube page showing the work as I tear into this project. The first video is a tour with commentary about the condition and plans for fixing it up:

I've been living in it almost two weeks and made another video a week into it showing my progress:

It's a solid house, but with a bunch of problems and needs a LOT of work. I really like the idea of doing things my way and seeing where it leads me. I have an overall plan, but just like work, I'm expecting to be thrown off track several times, and for everything to take longer than expected.

Good luck with this project! Does the roof leak? That looks like it’s on it’s very last legs. Is there a basement? Would this be called contemporary (style)?

 

[Apple fanboy]

Interesting thread. I did this a few years ago with my current house. Then did it immediately again with my old house to increase the value and sell it.

Didn't really think of doing a room by room approach. I did it in phases.
- Install temporary Wireless security system
- Demolition
- Cleaning
- Subfloors (Mainly encapsulation as the prior owners had many large dogs and never let them out. I'm still haunted by the appearance of the underside of the carpets. 🤮)
- Wall placement
- Plumbing/Electrical/Gas/Low Voltage
- Doors/Drywall
- Painting
- Flooring
- Trim
- New cabinets and counters
- Finishing touches (sinks, toilets, light fixtures, faucets, mirrors, &c)

Mainly I had to get all the living spaces ready. As it's a huge inconvenience to do afterwards. I left the garage and basement for later. As they needed a lot more work and weren't necessary to get done before moving in. Plus I needed to get done and moved ASAP. To get the old house ready for sale.

We lived in ours whilst we did it. We moved out for a few weeks whilst they relate the floors (we had underfloor heating put in). But I can still recall the smell of wet dog the carpets used to kick up. Still get a whiff of it when I clean the vacuum cleaner!
That and the meals we prepared in the manky kitchen. No matter how many times you cleaned the worktop, you never wanted anything that was going in your mouth to touch it! All good now though as we are more or less there with the project.

I'd have loved to have been able to live elsewhere whilst the project was being done.

But to move after finishing it and do it again? No chance. I'm leaving here in a box.

 

[Apple fanboy]

Video this week:

Thanks!

Sorry the gutter didn't solve your issues. But at least you've found out before you repaired all the dry wall and decorated. Keep the videos coming!

 

[LumbermanSVO]

Didn't really think of doing a room by room approach. I did it in phases.

I've participated in two of these projects before, this is the first one where I'm financially responsible! The first we did room by room, and the second we gutted the whole house and started over, we were living in both the whole time. let me tell you, room by room is the way to go, by a long shot. Once you've gutted the whole place it is WAY too easy for it to feel overwhelming. Doing it in smaller chunks makes it much easier to stay focussed on the task at hand and feel much more doable.

Good luck with this project! Does the roof leak? That looks like it’s on it’s very last legs. Is there a basement? Would this be called contemporary (style)?

I don't know what style you'd call it, at the moment "ugly" seem appropriate, lol. The roof does leak, but I don't know how much of it leaks yet. It has a small basement that has the utilities and what used to be a single car garage. It also has a creepy shower room and a toilet room.

Sorry the gutter didn't solve your issues. But at least you've found out before you repaired all the dry wall and decorated. Keep the videos coming!

Yeah, it's a bummer about the gutter, but at least I know now. I also know what I'm in for when I do the rest of ther gutters. Now I need to decide how to handle the roof. This week I'm going to try and get above the pink bathroom through the blue bathroom and see if I can find where the water was coming in there. If all the water is coming from the upper section of roof I'll probably just throw a second layer of shingles on it for $300-400 and then do a proper tear off in a year or two.

I priced out the materials to do the roof and it look like around $6500, and I think I could do it in under a week by myself.

 

[A.Goldberg]

Thanks!

I'm a person who needs projects to work on, sitting idle doesn't work out well for me, so I have the next several years of projects now!

Finding solid reviews on home fixtures is difficult and I don't know why. Maybe because part numbers change too fast?

I like having small projects, but renovating an entire house is probably a bit out of my league and time commitments. Growing up my parents owned their main house, a beach house, 2 rental beach houses, and at one point a ski condo, so I learned some handy skills. Being able to do things yourself definitely saves a ton of money. The one thing I was not prepared for was the amount of bureaucratic time wasting caused by my towns permit department.

The crazy thing when it comes to appliance reviews specifically is that the ratings seems to vary tremendously by year. One year a company might be in the top 3 and the next be all the way at the bottom.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

The one thing I was not prepared for was the amount of bureaucratic time wasting caused by my towns permit department.

I was REALLY happy to find out that the house is a block away from the city, so I only have the county to deal with and not the city.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

This week I demo my way through the blue bathroom:

 

[LumbermanSVO]

This week I make the place a little more comfortable and do some plumbing so I can finish tearing out the bathroom:

 

[LumbermanSVO]

This week I start getting Bedroom Two ready to rent out, and clean up the rest of the stuff left behind by the previous owner:

 

[iapplelove]

Stumbled upon the thread, ended up watching almost 2 hours of content lol. Good luck with the house

 

[LumbermanSVO]

Stumbled upon the thread, ended up watching almost 2 hours of content lol. Good luck with the house

Thank you very much!

 

[ucfgrad93]

Wow, pretty good stuff. Keep the updates coming.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

Thanks for watching!

 

[Apple fanboy]

This week I start getting Bedroom Two ready to rent out, and clean up the rest of the stuff left behind by the previous owner:

Keep going. Soon you’ll be putting stuff back in which is the fun part. Once you have a room or two done it will start to feel more like home.

 

[rafark]

Congrats! House looks decent and the area looks great. (Lots of tall trees).

 

[LumbermanSVO]

Keep going. Soon you’ll be putting stuff back in which is the fun part. Once you have a room or two done it will start to feel more like home.

I got the room primered and it feels SO much better already!

Congrats! House looks decent and the area looks great. (Lots of tall trees).

I'm from the Pacific Northwest, where a 100ft tree is absolutely normal, so I really appreciate the trees around here. It pains me that I might have to remove the tree in front of the house.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

This week I get Bedroom Two ready for paint and make a couple other minor improvements.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

This week I move the fiber line, clean up some vegetation around the house, add a security camera, and replace the putty around two of the windows.

 

[Apple fanboy]

This week I move the fiber line, clean up some vegetation around the house, add a security camera, and replace the putty around two of the windows.

My experience with glass and putty is less successful than yours. Definitely a job I leave to the experts these days. Your lack of gloves when removing the glass though made me wince.
Keep up the good work.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

My experience with glass and putty is less successful than yours. Definitely a job I leave to the experts these days. Your lack of gloves when removing the glass though made me wince.
Keep up the good work.

The gloves things is a genuine struggle with me, I just really like to be able to feel what I'm doing. If it helps, I was fully prepared to drop the glass and let it shatter if I needed to.

I was also remembering an interview I did once where they told me that they lost an employee about every 18 months due to bleeding out from glass injuries.

 

[LumbermanSVO]

This week the first half of the video is working on computer stuff, then I do some work in the bedrooms:

 

[Apple fanboy]

This week the first half of the video is working on computer stuff, then I do some work in the bedrooms:

Living in the house you are doing up is the worse. We stayed in ours for the first 2 months, then moved into an AirBnB for about 6 weeks. That way I could go do stuff in the evening's after work, but then head to the other place for a wash and relax in a clean environment. Its the dirt and the dust that's the worst. I recall days before we moved out when I would get home and take my coat off and realise there was no where clean to put it down! That was probably about a year ago today. But once they had to put the underfloor heating in we had to go. As all that was left was a shell.

The bit I hadn't factored in was how long it would take to dry. Plastering, new floor screed, floor tiles, paint. All just needed time. Unfortunately I couldn't just put the heating on as we had to give it a few weeks for the floor tile and grout to dry. Not finished everything, but close enough. Next project for me is getting some curtains up (we have blinds). Lots of big windows here.

Oh and we have the fence guy starting next week. I'm too old to dig holes for fence posts. There is a lot of fence to do as we are responsible for 3 sides of it.