Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Hammer Time

Tonight I got to smash some shit. Well, I got to smash some mirrors. See these uglies?



SMASHED and GONE!!




I'm not quite sure why they added corners on the left... and I'm not sure if we are going to remove them or not. I think we'll smash the other side this weekend.

Jordan took apart the other shower ... I helped! I offered the suggestion of using a xacto blade to slice through the silicone. Worked like a charm! Behold!



Action shot of me unscrewing curtain rod thingies from the wall? Check!




We also removed some tiny shutters from the built-in next to our fireplace and pried off the wood that was there for them to install the shutters.





And bye-bye shutters that frame our window into the kitchen. We think it makes the place look a little bigger. Wow, I can breathe easier already!

Before




After



We have A LOT of cleaning to do. It is dirty DIRTY .. REALLY dirty in there. I keep finding silverfish in the bathroom. Gross.

Until next time.

Monday, June 25, 2012

Nitty Gritty

I know that we've had our keys for a week but tonight was our first chance at being able to actual do any work! With limited daylight hours and limited lighting in parts of the house we didn't set our goal too high for tonight.

1. Remove stuff from the walls: I unscrewed a few curtain rods, removed a few nails, a cheapo hanging mirror from a closet door, a lock that you find on a public restroom (SO weird), and a few other odds and ends. We also took down an accordion door that we knew we were destroying when we first viewed the house:

Now you see it.....



Now you don't!!!



And how about this shower that needs some work? I assisted Jordan in removing the doors and track. I can't wait to clean this baby up.





Sorry about these photos. Little light and an iPhone don't work too well.

2. Anyway, Jordan also swept because we set off "Adams Plus Room Fogger (Pack of 3)" and there were definitely some dead critters laying around. I HATE bugs. So he got to do the dirty work. That's all we got to tonight!

I did shoot this from our back yard. The color was pretty!


Goodnight!

Thursday, June 21, 2012

From Renter to Homeowner

So, we got our keys, signed the last of our papers and may have freaked the F out for an hour last Monday. Jordan and I went from your average renters to full blown homeowners.

The gravity of the situation wasn't real until it was real, do you know what I mean? As we walked through the, finally, empty house, we saw every nook and cranny that wasn't visible before. Now there are plaster chunks missing from some walls where furniture was screwed in. We can see the damage on the wall that was behind the fridge. We can see how dirty the carpets are - not that those would have a fat chance at staying anyhow. The good news is that it looks like our hardwood floors are in pretty good shape. Deciding on what we want to do is proving to be hard at this point in time.

We are meeting with a handyman this morning to see about our master bedroom wall that needs to be kicked down... And probably will end up asking him a few other "can you's" and "how much"? I will try to take some pictures so that I can properly document the transformation our new "baby" will slowly be going through. Oh man, I hope this guy gives us good news - the last news we heard was that we have to tent our house, ugh.

There are few gems that we've found and loved. In the laundry "room" there is a little ironing board that comes down from the wall. If we just recover it ... Maybe I will actually iron something! Also, the front door handle is pretty great. Who knows if it's original since the house was built in '47 but it will definitely look nice when it's all clean and shiny!

Okay! Time to start the day!

Monday, June 11, 2012

No Case of the Mondays Today..

This morning we signed our loan/Escrow documents. By the end of the week (or sooner!) we should have our keys in hand! We can't wait to get in there to see what we have to work with. The sellers had a lot of furniture and personal items inside and it was difficult to see the entire space. We are hoping that everything goes to plan this week so we can get started!

At the end of last week I couldn't control myself and had to make a piece of "art" for our new house. I spent some time finding the fonts and figuring out how I wanted to lay this out. It's definitely nothing new to the Internet but I had some fun putting this together. I "taped" off where it says our address at the top. And I already had this frame with the matte from ikea so it cost me nothing! I'm looking forward to getting dirty with some housework and getting creative with design. Here we go!

Saturday, June 9, 2012

Breaking News

We found out 2 days ago that the sellers are no longer staying in the house for a full month after Escrow closes. While this is neat for us, since we get to get in there and start our work while having an extra month at our apartment, it sucks for them because instead of 1 month to pack they have a week. They are scheduled to be out a week from today.

More on this later!

Monday, June 4, 2012

The List

The countdown is underway. From today, Escrow should be closing in one week! This means that next Monday we should be sitting down in an office to sign a lot of documents and officially become homeowners. I cannot believe that this is really happening! We've decided that we need to start figuring out what needs to get done first once the seller is moved out of the house. Over the weekend we came up with this list as a first pass at our thoughts:

1. Contractor:

• Bedroom wall removal: What we are calling our master bedroom has a small walk-in closet that was build into the room. In order for our bed to fit in the room we will need to tear the closet wall down. It will add about 3-4 extra feet that is much needed. Currently, there is a TV mounted on this wall, which should mean there is electrical running through. We thought it was a safer choice to bring a contractor in and seeing what can be done. While he's there maybe he can help us with:

• Steps in the back room: There is an addition to the house and it's not part of the raised foundation. There are steps from the bathroom and also from another bedroom that lead down into this addition. Both sets of steps are uneven and a little unsightly. If it's in the budget we'd like to get those fixed while we have a contractor.
• Wall behind the washer & dryer: The home inspector said there was some damage to the wall behind the w/d so, once the house is ours, we can go in a do another once over to make sure we need this to be patched up.

2. Plumber:
• Re-pipe the whole house: the water pressure in this house is really low due to 3 different types of piping under the house. A chemical reaction between the different materials has caused a rust build up that kills the water pressure. We were told it's probably not going to work out to have more than one thing running at a time, which is a huge problem if we both get ready at the same time in different bathrooms in the morning!
• Install a new water heater: I honestly forget why we are getting a new one but I'm pretty sure the current water heater has seen it's life through.
• Fix the dishwasher air gap: When the dishwasher runs it spews water all over the counter. Ew.
• If we find affordable fixtures for the kitchen sink/bathrooms and need help installing them we may have the plumbers help! Otherwise, this is on the wish list for another day.


3. Flooring:

• Remove the kitchen/laundry room floor: The cement pavers are definitely not the cutest flooring that I've seen, plus, JB does most of the cooking and is suggesting we go with a softer and more even floor option. I can't say that I was bummed to say goodbye to the cement.
• Carpet: There is carpet in 2 other rooms; the little room that will become our walk-in closet/utlity closet, and the 2nd bedroom. These will be getting new carpet. We're deciding if we should put carpet over our wood floor in the master, TBD. Also, the addition, where the steps need to be fixed, needs new flooring. If we can afford it the tile, that we do not like, will be GONE, probably by our own hands to cut down on labor costs, fast! Once those are gone we are probably going to be putting down some cozy carpet and turn the place into a den/office type of room. The addition room is also on the wish list.
• Bathroom: Both bathrooms need some work but if we are getting a deal on flooring and we can make it happen we might be able to smash up both bathroom floors and get something installed a little more to our taste.

4. Paint:

• No hired help for this one, that I foresee. Maybe we will bribe a friend or two with free pizza and a frozen treat.
• The entire interior of this house will be painted. Ceilings, walls, the main entry doors, all of it. We don't entirely know what we're doing, so Google will be doing some research for us along with the helpful people at the local Home Depot or OSH. If you have any wall, ceiling, or door-painting tips PLEASE send them my way.


So this is our list of things we want to do before we move in. Obviously, painting our master would take priority over painting the rest of the house but I can hope. Have you been in this situation? What was your plan of attack?

Until next time...

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