My house.
For the first time in my life I get to use that term, my house, MY HOUSE. Buying a house is not for everyone, but for me this was something that I have wanted for a long time. When I was 16 I moved out and ever since then I wanted a place that was mine. I went to college with things like a sewing machine, Kitchen Aid mixer, and Williams and Sonoma gadgets because that is what I liked to save up for as a teenager. I longed to have a house and slowly accumulated all the things for it, knowing it would eventually work (Levi would interject here that this was SUPER annoying since many of these "things" ended up in our office. On the plus side, our office was very homey!). Between what I had stored in our office and had in my current rental, I had enough furniture to completely furnish my 3 bedroom house (actually perhaps too much, I have this thing for chairs, it drives Levi nuts but I can't seem to stop!). I have no idea what it is like to buy furniture because you need it, like a good pair of shoes, it finds me at the randomness of times.
The house buying process was the worst thing I have ever gone thru. The seller was, pardon my french, bat-shit crazy. I never met her, but from what I gathered she was in her mid thirties, worked a lot, had three HUGE dogs, didn't care about cleaning, "fixed" things the most ineffective way possible every time, loved the color green, and is one of the most difficult people to deal with. To put things into perspective, here is a timeline of events:
11/2 saw the house, put in offer (with 24 hours to accept)
11/13 got a contact to sign for the first time
11/14-12/4 I signed THREE addendums to the contract
01/10/18 Finally closed
Normally you know if your offer is accepted and you draw up a contract within a matter of days and close within 30. We closed over two months later! She changed the close date three times, wanted to rent from me then changed the date so she wouldn't have to pay me, drew up addendum after addendum to take things from the property like the dishwasher and chandelier, would take days--if not weeks--to get back to us about a simple question, and overall just took me for everything she could. It is a sellers market so every time I had a question or wanted something they would come back with "we have 4 other offers, take it or leave it."
The seller also had a horrible winter. Right before she listed the house her fiance died in a tragic accident. But, she didn't tell her realtor and had him list it way before she needed to leave. I felt so bad for her, we gave her so much space and I requested that the realtors don't push her too much. But then she was horrible to deal with and it made me feel guilty that I was frustrated with this person who was going thru so much. I broke after she removed the chandelier at the last minute and refused to put up a light and left the house DISGUSTING. I also feel a little bad that the only reason I got the house is because I offered over asking and was first, the realtor was happy with our offer and went with us first because he didn't want to overwhelm the seller with a bidding war. The house had something like 5 offers the first weekend on the market.
Now on to the better parts. Here is the green beauty that was built in 1906. (the photos are from today, exactly six months since moving in).
To understand where I stared, here are some images from the listing before I bought it:
And here are my grand plans:
Also, here's my disclaimer--I am currently storing NOTHING in closets or the garage, so basically everything is out and as one of my friends said when they came over, "are you sure you aren't a hoarder?" I might be borderline, but once I have closets you won't even know!
Laundry Room:
This room is the first project out of sheer necessity. Because of the damage to the wall behind the washer I opted to re-do this before I hooked mine up. The plan was to rip out the plaster and then run electrical that made sense, replace the windows and door (that thing was GNARLY), add insulation, add sheetrock, paint, and cabinetry.
However,
when I started ripping out the plaster we quickly realized that NOTHING was done right. There were no exterior walls (we assume they slapped siding on a porch), no headed to hold up the roof, no real doorframe, electrical didn't make sense, no insulation (which makes the laundry pipes prone to freezing), you name it and it was wrong. Now the plan is to: re-do the entire thing except the roof and floor. Praise having a cousin who let me hire him to do the work.
Once the construction is done I will paint, match the window molding and baseboard from the living room, and have custom cabnits made for the back wall (with counter) and then above the washer/dryer.
Kitchen:
This was quickly done to sell the house, it is the cheapest material and doesn't utilize the space. I want take down all the upper cabinets, center the sink between the windows, extend the windows to countertop height (they are there, they boarded the bottom up), ditch the range for a cooktop and double oven, finish the floors, close off the bathroom and do a huge wall of cabinetry with a double oven and small counter. So far all I have done is remove one chunk of counter to put my fridge in a normal place.
Dining Room/Entry:
New windows, new window frames (to match dining room), replace the poorly done chair-rail with something better, paint (done!), new front door.
Living Room:
New windows, paint (already done!), repair plaster damage under windows, figure out which of my travel photos to frame around my sweet custom wood map (made by Gray Skunk).
Downstairs Bedroom:
Remove carpet, replace window, get custom door for the rounded doorway, rip out closet and build a new one where the long wooden table is (this will have cabenit storage above and then a normal clothes closet with linen closet on one side).
Downstairs Bathroom:
This bathroom was such a poor design. They built a HUGE wall to encase a jetted tub (that isn't grounded none-the-less) that makes the room feel so small and blocks the window. I want to take out the wall/tub, close off the door to the kitchen, replace the vanity with a counter that is the full length of the wall, get a free-standing tub and do a lot of tite work.
Inspiration:
Stairs:
Remove carpet, re-do scary closet.
Upstairs Bedroom:
Extend the room into the attic space, replace the plaster with sheetrock, make a closet in the back, add a main light. And yes, right now, this prison cell size room is just storage...
Upstairs Bathroom:
Straighten the wall out so I can have a pocket door, move all the fixtures, add a shower. Basically everything.
Landing:
This is one of my favorite projects but will cost a lot so it will be later. I want to remove the gross closet and carpet and then extend the room out into the attic and create a dormer. This would make it a fairly large space, let in sunlight and make it possible to move the bathroom door. I want to make this a library/sitting area with built in bookshelves (with a ladder, thats a must and dream!) and an amazing window seat.
Master Bedroom:
ADD CLOSETS! This room has one very tiny closet that you have to almost crawl into (kicker at the bottom that makes it super weird). I want to wall off the current closet and then add closets on both sides of the room in the unused attic space. Then remove the plaster, redo the electrical, add an overhead light/ceiling fan, add insulation and sheetrock and get more than one outlet. And yes, I am not oblivious to the fact that I have way too many clothes. When you are single you get to do whatever you want, that's the perk, right? So yeah, one day if I find someone who wants one of my custom closets, I suppose I can address the issue and get rid of a thing or two...or 50.
Also, I feel like I should say that all my "window coverings" are just quick fixes, I need to do all of those too... (I feel like I mostly have to say that since I can't believe I have a chevron print in my house...that needs to go sooner than later!)
Exterior:
Well that's a whole other post! I have started some of the yard work, but it will take a long time to get things to the point where I can do fun things and not just tame what is already there.
The garage needs a lot of tender love and care, it is basically a large shed. I will add exterior lights/outlets for the patio area when I redo the laundry room and eventually I need to do something with the back yard, right now it is a shit show (literally, there is so much dog poop smashed into the ground made all nice from the heavy snow).
These projects are my dreams for the house but I am sure they will evolve as I live there and change based on the costs. I don't have a timeline so we will have to see how far my money and credit card rewards (I cash out for Home Depot gift cards at every chance I can get haha) can get me! And if you are ever in the area and feel like you need a project, by all means, stop on by.