The Super Official Homeowners Thread

[.RJ]

The kitchen reno was planned and we knew what we were getting into... money leftover from the old house was already marked for it. So its mostly just an annoyance.... buys expensive ass house, has to hand wash dishes and cook with a fucking toaster oven. Probably a meme for that.

Dont even get me started on the home warranty.

[Sijray21]

i was more referring to the irritation of not having a kitchen and dealing with those small issues. there's a lot of inconvenience with a full kitchen reno; worse if you have a toddler (would not recommend). the other hidden cost i didn't factor in was the amount of money spent eating out instead of cooking for 4-6 weeks.

ninja edit: wait, didn't you do a kitchen reno on your last home? you know how it goes, n/m

[.RJ]

I'm hoping our reno is done in half that time, but I havent figured out how we're going to eat yet.

Probably cooking ramen in my jetboil at this rate.

[Sijray21]

I'm hoping our reno is done in half that time

[.RJ]

wishful thinking maybe. you had one guy doing everything though, these guys have a bunch of subs they use, which is both good and bad.

[WRXtranceformed]

Buying older houses as fixer uppers (or even just to mildly upgrade) can be cool and rewarding, and then you realize most people either don't notice or don't care about the problems they have with their home. I think it's safe to say that the majority of Americans do not do proper maintenance on their homes or fix stuff the way it's supposed to be fixed when it breaks. This is coming from my construction background and the bit of time I was asked to help the service department.

Even with the big issues we had, I would definitely prefer building new again over an older home unless I could get it for a steal and assumed I'd need to replace roof / HVAC / windows / fixtures / flooring pretty much immediately upon moving in. Even with trash production home building methods, the energy efficiency and quality of even the "entry level" builder grade materials is worlds better than it used to be even when I was building homes over 10 years ago. The low-E / insulated frame windows I have in my house now were considered a costly upgrade back in the day.

[Apoc]

worse if you have a toddler (would not recommend).

I know it's a privilege to be able to do so, but we're 100% on doing any work on the next house before we move in. It will cost us money to do so, but I'm not living with a toddler during reno work - it's bad enough as two moderately functional adults.

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the majority of Americans do not do proper maintenance on anything

FTFY

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For my money, I'm buying a well sorted older home. Best of both worlds.

[WRXtranceformed]

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For my money, I'm buying a well sorted older home. Best of both worlds.

Yeah I mean in many cases with an older home, what you're really buying is the property, or the neighborhood / area.  If you are lucky enough to find and buy a nice house that's actually well sorted and cared for on it, that's the best case scenario.

My wife has hinted that we should move back to my family's farm eventually and fix up the big manor house my grandmother lived in.  And I look at it and I'm like man, it's a gorgeous house with a lot of history and probably the most perfect site on the property, but it would be probably easier and cheaper just to take a wrecking ball to the whole thing and build a house to my specs than try to bring this thing up to code / where it needs to be for me to want to live in it.

[Apoc]

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For my money, I'm buying a well sorted older home. Best of both worlds.

Yeah I mean in many cases with an older home, what you're really buying is the property, or the neighborhood / area.  If you are lucky enough to find and buy a nice house that's actually well sorted and cared for on it, that's the best case scenario.

I think we're spoiled in Seattle in that most houses are 40-90 years old and have been sorted in the last five years. We got lucky and found a house that was like 20% sorted, because we wouldn't have been able to afford the neighborhood otherwise. We've probably brought it up to 70% sorted and it's actually cheaper now to buy an even more sorted house than to continue doing ours. It's like climbing the reno ladder.

[Sijray21]

wishful thinking maybe.  you had one guy doing everything though, these guys have a bunch of subs they use, which is both good and bad.

i was mostly just joking. 3 weeks is ambitious, but shouldn't be an issue for a well-sorted out general contractor and no major issues during the reno.

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worse if you have a toddler (would not recommend).

I know it's a privilege to be able to do so, but we're 100% on doing any work on the next house before we move in. It will cost us money to do so, but I'm not living with a toddler during reno work - it's bad enough as two moderately functional adults.

100% agree on that. If we're able to renovate our next house before we move in we are definitely doing that.

[Evan]

For my money, I'm buying a well sorted older home. Best of both worlds.

We bought a 2 year old home from the original owner who was more anally retentive than Lee. The house is still new and ALL the minor annoying shit that the builders fuck up was already fixed 100%

Its SO damn hard to find good contrators that do good work. In all the work we have had done in our houses, we have about a 20% rate (if that) on work done properly the first time. Tried top Angies List contractors for $$$$ and also cheap craigslist guys. Ive probably had better work from the craigslist guys actually.
Absolutely no way I would sign up for a house that needs major rework. Id pull my hair out.

[Jewels]

So when I bought my Townhouse in January of 2015, it was brandy new. I picked out the paint, and the flooring and it was the first house I'd lived in that was brand new since my parents built when I was a little kid. It was awesome to have this brand new house, that I got to pick every detail out all by myself (and terrifying because I'd not ever done that as an adult). Lived there 2 weeks, got a terrible cold snap- the hot water in my kitchen had frozen. I could take a shower upstairs, but I couldn't wash a glass in the sink. The builders "fixed" it. But everyone on that side of the complex had the same problem. It never happened again until this last winter in the house. Luckily I sold in the spring time. My "new" house, is older. Its solid, but honestly, it has issues. Most have been tiny in reality. I needed to put new door sweeps on both outside doors because I could see outside when they were closed. I need to re route the dryer vent to the outside. I need new windows sooner than later. I need to break up the tiny little front porch I have, and add vents to the front of my crawlspace and then I'm hoping to build a nicer bigger porch. The trade off for me, is that I got a big fenced in back yard for Hannah and the doggo. I'm in a nice quiet little town, and I'm not looking to move anytime in the next 10 years. In the next 5 Years I'd like to capitalize on my equity and add an addition to increase the size of my master bedroom and add a master bath. Keeping in mind that I make a fraction of what most of you make, I'm pretty pleased to know that I have a house that I can fix up on my budget and its liveable in the meantime.

[Apoc]

For my money, I'm buying a well sorted older home. Best of both worlds.

We bought a 2 year old home from the original owner who was more anally retentive than Lee.   The house is still new and ALL the minor annoying shit that the builders fuck up was already fixed 100%

Its SO damn hard to find good contrators that do good work.  In all the work we have had done in our houses,  we have about a 20% rate (if that) on work done properly the first time.  Tried top Angies List contractors for $$$$ and also cheap craigslist guys.   Ive probably had better work from the craigslist guys actually.
Absolutely no way I would sign up for a house that needs major rework.   Id pull my hair out.

We've had good luck. We had our whole house rewired and the original floors refinished while living here. I also "have a guy" who does work for me on occasion who is meticulous AND cheap. The only company I haven't been totally happy with was our landscapers from three years ago. I found all ours on yelp, except the general guy - he was a personal referral.

[.RJ]

Buying older houses as fixer uppers (or even just to mildly upgrade) can be cool and rewarding, and then you realize most people either don't notice or don't care about the problems they have with their home.  

I dont understand how the guy that lived in the house before could DGAF about all this shit.  The house that I sold was 100% everything sorted and working even stupid little stuff but I also dont pay contractors for much.  

People also move in and then dont do shit and argue about what color to paint the powder room for 5 years, too.

[WRXtranceformed]

Buying older houses as fixer uppers (or even just to mildly upgrade) can be cool and rewarding, and then you realize most people either don't notice or don't care about the problems they have with their home.  

I dont understand how the guy that lived in the house before could DGAF about all this shit.

I stopped wondering about people who DGAF a while ago when I watched a guy park his shitbox van next to a brandy new Rousch Mustang (90 day tags) in a crowded parking lot, proceed to kick open his door as hard as he physically could into the door of the Mustang, get out, inspect his handiwork on the Mustang's door, and then walk casually into Michael's or wherever he was going.

[Steve85]

i was more referring to the irritation of not having a kitchen and dealing with those small issues. there's a lot of inconvenience with a full kitchen reno; worse if you have a toddler (would not recommend). the other hidden cost i didn't factor in was the amount of money spent eating out instead of cooking for 4-6 weeks.

ninja edit: wait, didn't you do a kitchen reno on your last home? you know how it goes, n/m

I second, well third, that. It was not fun. We set up a makeshift kitchen in one of the living rooms with a hot plate, a microwave and a quesadilla maker. We were going to put it off since we had a 1 yr old and two teenagers. Then one day my wife was like..."Good morning honey, we need to do the kitchen in the next 9.5 months or we wait 18 yrs."

Trying to keep up with that house over the last decade has made me appreciate the new build we are in now.

[Evan]

Buying older houses as fixer uppers (or even just to mildly upgrade) can be cool and rewarding, and then you realize most people either don't notice or don't care about the problems they have with their home.  

I dont understand how the guy that lived in the house before could DGAF about all this shit.

I stopped wondering about people who DGAF a while ago when I watched a guy park his shitbox van next to a brandy new Rousch Mustang (90 day tags) in a crowded parking lot, proceed to kick open his door as hard as he physically could into the door of the Mustang, get out, inspect his handiwork on the Mustang's door, and then walk casually into Michael's or wherever he was going.

What. The. Fuck.

[G.Irish]

All of your trials and tribulations makes me feel a bit better about the reno we did in our new house. Redid kitchen and master bath and I'm finding stuff here and there that wasn't aligned properly or was flat out wrong. Already thinking I'm gonna have to totally redo cooktop exhaust ducting at some point =/

[.RJ]

Most times that I think a contractor will do it better or smarter or cheaper or faster than I will I've been proven wrong save for a few exceptions. So just accept that and move on and there's no secrets in home building. These guys for the most part arent doing anything we cant do, except for the drywall guys, those guys are fucking wizards.

I am excited about the kitchen job though, I feel like I'm hiring a good GC and if its not done right they'll fix it.

[Apoc]

How much a kjob cost?