Remodel day 7: Out darn* smell!

Most of the house work time was spent at Home Depot writing down prices and looking at flooring samples. It was great to find out that Home Depot's carpet installation beats Costco and even Empire for the platinum plus carpet! Still trying to figure out hard surface flooring. We are looking at laminate, but a Home Depot salesperson showed us vinyl wood flooring as an option. More to research...

At the house we swept up the dust and debris and mopped with a vinegar water solution to help sanitize and deodorize the house. More layers of bleach and kilz primer to come. We also measured the exterior to get an estimate for lap board siding.

As the tear out and clean up stage is coming toward the end, we are getting exponentially more excited about rebuilding and making this house OUR home. :)

Remodel day 6: Linoleum scraping and HVAC

Our HVAC guy is amazing! Very thankful for the great service and great new equipment. We'll need that AC working this summer!

While that was being installed, Brandon and I took turns tediously scraping up approximately 350 square feet of linoleum--entry, kitchen, dining area, a bedroom, and a closet. We also worked on taking out some moldy drywall in the master bath, taking out old shelving, and pulling hardware out of the walls. Currently working on siding bids.

It's been a busy week, but we can't wait for the next steps!

More demo clips

Remodel day 5: master bath gone!

Master bath went today! Lots of trash... The lights in the garage were raised and attached to trusses. The pantry/ Laundry room (plus it's moldy walls) went too! Tear out is almost complete!!!!

Remodel day 4: Fast forward

The downfall of the popcorn ceiling and carpet came early! Super Joe knew a guy we could pay to take them down. Money well spent. The drop ceiling in the garage, the garage floor tiles, and the furnace came out today as well! We gained a half week of schedule. We got a great echo in the house! We hope the smell of the house begins to improve with each step we take from this point on; you can see how grimy the carpets are!

Our next targets are master bath tear out, linoleum removal, disinfecting, and siding solutions/estimates.

Remodel day 3: a dirty job

The thing about remodels is that things get worse before they get better..

Found some nasty stuff while taking down the dated drop ceiling in the garage and popping off baseboards. The grossest of which was a rat tail.... Ugh! We also had a casualty in the remodel (not the rat), my iPhone screen shattered. :(

But Thank goodness for "super Joe", our reno guru! Today's lesson: taking out doors. 

From the iPad of:

------------------------

   Jenny Prior

Remodel day 3: a dirty job

The thing about remodels is that things get worse before they get better...

Found some nasty stuff while taking down the dated drop ceiling in the garage and popping off baseboards. The grossest of which was a rat tail.... Ugh! We also had a casualty in the remodel (not the rat), my iPhone screen shattered. :(

But Thank goodness for "super Joe", our reno guru! Today's lesson: taking out doors.

Remodel day 1: Reclaiming the garage

Day 1 was motivated by the exhilaration of getting the keys. Electrical plates removed and demo in the garage to take down the wall!!!

Demo video

Brandon is a demo maniac!!!

Before...

Here are several photos of how our house looked at our first showing... 

**Update 3/20/2016**

It was listed for about $160k in an affluent area of northern CA where the median priced home in 2012 was $670k!!! Anyone who knows real estate would understand the value there. Seeing numbers is a very different reality than seeing photos... So you tell me, would you be brave enough to take on a fixer like this? (cue Joanna Gaines) 

The siding was crumbling away all around the house. There were exposed wires from diy cable installations and weeds everywhere... The trees hung over the house making it so dark.

 The bedrooms..... I think most people would have run out screaming and looking for some hand sanitizer or maybe a counselor at this point. 

Aside from the mess, horrible paintings, and smell, there was such a dark, heavy feeling in those rooms. You can almost see what Brandon is thinking as the gravity and scope of the project sink in on this walk-through. 

And then there's the dark and dated kitchen and bathrooms...

I wish I had taken photos of the garage... It had been converted (without a permit of course) into a laundry room and another bedroom. Those were on the top of the hit list once we had the keys!

Thankfully, my family has a background in real estate and a great family friend who I refer to as "Super Joe" who offered to do a lot of the work alongside Brandon for free! So with my dad and grandpa urging us to buy it asap and a plan to fix it up, we took it on.

The next chapter: our first home

Today we got the keys to our new home!

**update 3/20/2016**
Welcome to our blog! This post only marks the beginning of many adventures in renovation, parenthood, and more...

We had no idea what we were getting into with this house project! We cranked out the major renovation with the help of friends in only a few months! We got the keys at the end of April 2012 and were able to move in (the kitchen wasn't done yet) by July 4th.

The transformation in our house and our block has been astounding and I'm excited to begin sharing those stories--past, present, and future.

As a taste, here are some old before & after photos (we've done more since this post).

I believe God is in the business of transformation... and so many times while something physically begins changing in small ways, there are huge spiritual shockwaves that we aren't aware of...

So even though with 2 kids in this 1100 sq. ft house, I was hoping our story here was done and it was time to find a new home... we aren't finished here, God's not finished here...

I hope you enjoy the journey with us!