I am staying away, but i'll go have a peek this afternoon.
AB and I have been working on the old house for about a month now - mainly him, every night, after work, chipping, clearing, removing, rumbling. It should save us a bit of money. Yesterday was our last heave-ho, and I have to say, i'm happy to be at home today ( at the flat ) in my jammies. Resting.
Here's some pics:
Firstly, to give you some bearings, the R/E brochure from when we bought the house, in 2006:
And the floorplan:
They couldn't sell this house, you know?
The pics look ok, but there was crap everywhere and people just walked around sneering and grimacing. The owners also tried to save money by selling at Christmas when no-one was about.
Right after we bought it, the property market here went BOOM! and a condemned lot across the street sold for $250k more than what we had bought this only 6months prior.
Lucky.
Above: the old bathroom ( will be a WIR )
Below: the boy's bedroom.
Below:
Master Bedroom, main living area, and some kitchen rubble up the driveway.
Below: the old kitchen, which will now be a hallway.
Below: the old laundry, which will now be a butler's pantry/laundry off the new kitchen
( the middle pic is where I used to take my selfies .. hee hee :)
Below: the Playroom, or according to the map above, a 3rd bedroom
This will now be my kitchen, and that doorway will lead into my butler's pantry/laundry.
So that's it for now.
Basically what happens next is the floors and ceilings come down. That stupid playroom is the main reason for the reno - the way it cut into our usable space for no good reason. However, it does keep the house up, so a steel beam is going in the roof to replace it. We are also putting in the foundations for a 2nd story in the roof, which we can't afford right now, but since they have to take off the ceilings anyway, it makes sense to do that now.
This means, in 4yrs time, we can just pop in some stairs and a pre-fab 2nd story, and boom: separate rooms for the boys before high school. Neato.
Because, yes, even after this reno, we will still be a 2bedroom house, which is probably crazy by other people's standards. I'm ok with that.
What do you think?
Feel free to offer me any advice, or discounts from your Uncle Dave.
xx
Lea
