Contestant(s) #2

I met with the second GC I'm considering. This was a pair of brothers who are in the business with their dad. They are friends of a friend of mine. They went though my RFP in detail, asked great questions, made notes, took photos of the place and measured windows. They don't do foundation work, so I'd still have to call in a specialist (I was holding off on that because all the foundation specialists charge a fee for doing a site visit to provide the quote, which I really dislike!), but they said they know someone who could come over without charging me. They'll send their roofer over tomorrow to get his quote nailed down for the entire bid.

I was really pleased that they did not offer any wild and crazy suggestions, like adding a bathroom or totally rearranging the house. I told them I have a short term plan and a long term plan, and they were cool with that.

When I asked questions about the possibility of certain things, they explained what might be a problem with doing that depending on what we discover on the other side. They always offered alternative suggestions that I could consider in the event that it's not feasible.

All in all, I liked them, so I'll be interested to see how their quote comes in.

And I took pictures while I was there! As soon as I can find my camera cable, I'll post them.

Contestant #1

I love my agent. She's awesome. I called her today to ask a question, and before I could even do that, she said, "I have a contractor coming out to look at your house today. He is someone I have used for work in my house and his work is good. I told him you don't have a lot of money to spend, so he has to do nice work for you without charging you a lot."

One of the cool things about Nora is that as a native Spanish speaker, she can access a lot of the contractors in the Latino community that most gringos would never consider. As a result she gets fine craftsmanship at fiercely competitive prices. She's amazing. And I'm sure they love her because she continues to give them projects.

So, I met Nora and Ramon out at the house this afternoon. He says I'm very brave to take on this project, but that if we do it right, it could be very cute. I gave him my RFP with my list of tasks to be done, a not-to-exceed amount and timing details. We talked at length about what needs to be done. He has some really great ideas about the things on my list and had suggestions for other stuff that I told him I might consider after I see a quote for it.

There were a couple of instances where it sounded like he was suggesting some shortcuts and cheaper approaches to doing something, so I needed to take a pretty strong stance on the fact that I'm not trying to put lipstick on a pig here. This is my HOME, and I want to make sure we do the work properly because I will be living here for the next 5-10 years. I think he got it eventually.

All in all, he was a nice guy who has some great ideas, so I'll be interested to see his quote. I have two more contractors lined up to come out to look at it. My friend Jen lives in this neighborhood and she's getting ready to do a whole-house remodel (add a second story), so she's shopping for contractors too. We've been joking that we should get a discount if we can get the same one to do the other's job, which is a mere 5 blocks away. right. Like that would ever happen.

I had my camera with me, but sadly, did not take it out of my bag to snap some pics because we jumped right into it. I promise to be better about that in the future.

The 5 cent tour

Here's a quickie tour of the place from the photos that were used to market the property on the MLS. It should be pretty clear that they did nothing to spruce up the place for the sale. There was a renter in the house for the past 18 years.

I'll be sure to bring my camera with me whenever I go so that the progress will be well-documented. Until then, these will have to do.

Front:
This is the living room as seen from the front door:

And as seen from the dining area of the kitchen:

In general, though it is small, the house is nice and bright. It has a LOT of windows (cha-ching! on the window-replacement budget).

Here is the kitchen:

That door on the left beyond the fridge leads to the hallway. The smaller bedroom comes next on the left side of the hallway:

Yes, that is mold on the walls. However, it's not the sort of mold that will kill you. It's the sort of mold that grows in a house that has no ventilation because the foundation has settled so much that none of the windows open. This room has a walk-in closet (at the far right).

On the right side of the hallway is the bathroom:

Note the awesome retro-funkilicious tile. Pity the bathroom sub-floor is rotted so the whole bathroom needs to be ripped out. I would have found a way to keep it--I love the retro-funky.

At the end of the hall is the larger bedroom:


Again, mold where furniture was against the wall. This room has windows on both sides. The window you can see in this picture will likely become a glass-paned door to the back yard.

The hardwood floors have popped up in places in both bedrooms due to the settling of the foundation. As much as I'd like to, I don't think I'll be able to preserve them since it will likely reduce the foundation labor bill if I agree to rip out up the floors instead of sending workers down the hatch into the half-height crawl space. They may not even be in a condition to withstand sanding and refinishing. I'll sort that out after I get some more info on the matter.

There you have it! More photos will follow whenever I pay a visit to the property.

GAME ON!!!!!!!

After several hours of dithering on the details, I have a signed contract on my own little termite-infested, sinking into the ground, uninhabitable single family home (pictured at right). It may not look like much right now, but I have a plan for it. I have vision and, shall we say, cojones that many others do not.

First action item is to have a foundation specialist come out and figure out what the heck needs to be done to correct the settling. The floor slopes in a north westerly direction (not literally. That's my way of saying the floor slopes away and to the left from the front door). I am certain that a marble placed at the front door would roll quite rapidly across the living room and rest in the far outside corner of the dining area. It feels like a carnival funhouse. No joke.

I will be calling Engineered Soil Repairs of Walnut Creek to come out this week. When I was doing some investigative work a few weeks ago to determine how much it's going to cost to make this place habitable, the folks at ESR (and specifically Chris Wilhite) were far and away the NICEST, most helpful, professional group I talked to.

I'd also like to acknowledge Ward Construction in Richmond, CA. They don't serve my area but were kind enough to give me the names of some folks who do (one of which was ESR).

Next up is to get some contractors out there to provide some quotes on the rest of the work to be done. I'll let you know how that goes.

Call me crazy...

This crazy Bay Area housing market can cause people to take some desperate measures to become homeowners. I was really lucky (smart?) that I bought a 1 bedroom condo in 2003. It's small, but it has been a great experience and after four years, it has appreciated enough to make me think about selling and trying to make the jump into a single family home. That's a BIG jump around here. However, I also wanted to jump up to the mid-peninsula area, which is also a fairly large jump as the mid-pen market is quite a bit more expensive. I am, in essence, making a HUGE leap. But I am determined. It is time.

With my budget, what this really means is that I'm shopping for a fixer upper where some TLC (in this case, that means Tender Loving CASH), sweat and patience will yield a decent ROI in several years. The property I've targeted is less of a "fixer upper" and more of a "total dump that needs to be gutted and rebuilt" If the lot were any larger, it would have sold right away to be torn down for construction of a ginormous new home. Fortunately for me, it's a teeeeeny-tiny house on a teeeeeny-tiny lot, so no one has wanted to touch it and it's rash of problems. But I see lots of potential.

The neighborhood is delightful, and the location meets my needs. This little house is definitely the ugly little sister in a neighborhood of lovely, modest homes, many of which are being expanded and updated. It's also a mere three blocks from a very chic-chic neighborhood, which is definitely helping drive the value of the area upward.

My third offer on this property is on the table and I expect a response this afternoon. The seller seems to be wearied by the fact that this property has been on the market for nearly 2 months (average in that area is 15 days),and should be realizing that he's never going to see any offers remotely close to the asking price. At two months on the market, buyers know there is something wrong with the property (MANY things wrong in this case), and their offers will reflect that. Mine certainly did.

If they don't accept my offer, I'll wait another two weeks and resubmit it. I certainly doubt they will see anything better in the interim.