This is my first post to this blog. I want to start by explaining this blog a little and how it has come to exist.
My family and I moved to the Triad area of NC from the Eastern part of NC in 2013. It has been a journey to say the least. My husband had lost his job of 8 years in heavy highway construction. He and I had already made a home that we loved by remodeling almost every single thing in it. We had made the house the way we wanted it, only to end up having to sell it and move away. After 16 months of him being unemployed and myself a real estate broker, he had to take a job that was about 3 hours away from home. We were very lucky that we had friends that lived in the area, and he stayed with them during the week and traveled home to see our youngest and myself on weekends. This went on for 3 months, before it was more than our family could handle, and we made the move to the Triad with him. Our 18 year old was living in my friends dining room, myself, my husband, our now 7 year old, and our two dogs were living in their unfinished basement which had no windows, and one side door to exit the property. There we lived from end of September to February 28th. It was a LONG five months for everyone. We are very grateful to our friends for helping us out, but that is a stressful situation, blending families under one roof. We had to wait for our home in our old hometown to sell before we could even think of getting another one.
We searched for months for a home. Some days it seemed as though we would never find something in our financial rage that would work for a family of 6 with dogs. We just didn't want to rent something either, we wanted our own home that we could make the way we wanted it to be.
To be honest, I was that client that every broker hates to see come in....you know, the one with a list a mile long of must haves, and only the money to afford half the list, but wont give an inch on the list... I am so thankful that our broker couldn't quit on us, hahahahha.
House # 71 was the house. I had our three daughters with me, my husband was working and we had 4 houses to view that day, the last house on the list was the one. We didn't know what to expect as this property was a foreclosure, not much information about it listed, and couldn't get anyone to return calls. In fact, they had it listed as a 1400sf home, well, it was definitely more than 1400sf. When we walked into the home, and started going though, it had 3 bedrooms already, 2 full baths, a half bath with laundry, it had 2 living areas, one which had the fireplace that could be converted from gas to wood burning, it also had a large enough dining area. I immediately called my husband and told him I thought we had finally found the home we needed, not only did the house have the basics, but room to make more of what we needed. It has a large lot, plenty of parking (as we had a camper and trailers), and it was county, not city.
This was the start of an emotional roller coaster. Since it was a foreclosure, it was also a bidding war online for the property. We REALLY wanted this house, but knew we could not go over a certain price and still be able to afford all the work it was going to need. You will see in the pictures that this house needed much work to be done to it.
The house was very outdated as it was built in 1978, and only a few minor items changed in the early 1990's. It was horrific with some of the things, such as the 1978 carpet that was still existing downstairs and the 1993 carpet upstairs. The counter tops are still from the 70's. And don't get me started on the wallpaper in every single room except the den which is brown panel walls. The wall paper had started falling off the walls in some rooms, the kitchen ceiling had leaked around the skylight at some point and the roof was fixed but the brown stains were left inside. The popcorn ceilings are coming apart and peeling off. These are just a few of the items that were wrong with the house.
You will see some projects covered on this blog by description of what we have done, and just pictures. Other things I will actually post short videos to explain and show detail of how to do this project.
My husband and I are firm believers, that if you can do it yourself, why on earth pay someone else to do it. We live on a budget as we have 4 kids, 2 in college, one in high school, and one we are homeschooling. Money goes fast so why waste it. That is our moto. Besides, when you do the work yourself it is SOOOOO much more satisfying when you see the finished product and know that you did that.
We, my husband and I have talked about for years how we should have a TV show or a website that shows people how to do the DIY projects on a home for the average homeowner. We are not millionaires and we do not have the money to put into a $50,000 kitchen remodel, nor do we have $140,000 to add on to a home. We are average, middle class people who have to do things on a budget that is reality. I told my husband Brian that we needed to document every little thing we do on this house and I will make a blog for it. Then as we took pictures of everything we were doing, and this class I am taking this semester had a final project that had to be done.... You guessed it....this blog is my project, but it will continue even after this semester until the house is complete. We have a maximum budget for everything we will do on this house, including a new building in the back yard of $30,000 or less. This will include a remodel of the kitchen, all three baths, new flooring though out, paint inside and out, new lighting, and the expansion of building three more rooms to the house.
I hope that everyone enjoys our journey through this blog to what we hope is our forever dream home.
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