Projects

[piqaboo]

This year we must replace any termite damaged wood not noted by last year's inspection (turns out they missed documenting a LOT of locations, that we are now finding.). Ugh.
However, maybe all that fresh new wood will motivate us to paint, and change the current <shudder> color. That would be a good thing.

And that will also help us reset the gutter, which has a low spot a few yards before the downspout,
and that will....
it will become a huge project. I am afeared.

Good luck analog & schmeelkie!

[analog]

thanks Ms Boo...

good luck with yours !!!

termites, huh? Aggravating pests... used to be a product called "Woodlife", a brush on wood preservative. It worked wonders in South Florida. When I was a kid my Dad made a picnic table from fir, Woodlifed it and it lasted forty years outside. We treated my little plywood boat with it and it looked like new after twenty years, no rot... The stuff was sudden death to any bugs or shrubs it dripped on - active ingredient i think was pentachlorophenol. Probably can't get it anymore..

anyhow i believe in chemical warfare against termites. One could treat boards to render them unpalatable then varnish them to seal the stuff in....

a.

[Shapley]

active ingredient i think was pentachlorophenol. Probably can't get it anymore..

I believe pentachlorophenol is still available, but you have to jump through hoops to get it. You might be able to obtain through a professional exterminator.

[Schmeelkie]

Well, we may have found the perfect house. Actually had 3 bedrooms (excluding the larger master) that were of equal size - that's really had to find. We keep finding 4 bedrooms, where the 4th is tiny... (btw, not planning a 3rd kid, but 2 academics need a decent sized office) Anyway, this house will extend my commute by about 5 min (and tack on 10-15 more min to get to my parents and brother & sister-in-law), but otherwise, it's great. Husband will be about 5 min from work, thus also 5 min from daycare. (and Pumpkin might get someone he knows in his new school as many in summer daycare - some of whom he's known since a toddler - live in this town) Think, if we get it, will turn the formal dining room into a play room as there is more than enough space for table in the kitchen area - and that area is right in front of the sliding glass doors to the deck. Nice. It's also only 8 years old, so the chances of something falling apart are pretty slim. We did notice some slight dampness on a portion of basement walls, but the rug nearby (which certainly looked like it's been there forever) wasn't wet and didn't smell yucky, no stains on the floor. We have had an extrodiarily wet year - something like 8 inches above normal rain for the year and a record-setting wet July, so I'm not too concerned. there's a gutter that goes underground near that corner - might need repair or redirection - I wouldn't even ask that the current sellers do it - I'd be fine doing that ourselves. Of course, will get the opinon of the house inspector on that one.

Anyway, right now there is a contingent offer on that house with the option of a bump notice. That is, someone else made an offer, but it hasn't been formally accepted as the buyers haven't sold their house yet. So they can be 'bumped' by people like us who have sold our house (and hopefully are offering more money). The current 'possible' buyer will have 3 days to respond to the bump notice if the sellers pick us - I think they'll have to sell their house in that time period. So, not to be mean to them, but we're praying/crossing our fingers as much as possible that we can get this house. We're really cutting it close on our timing - don't want to move our buyers back - know they're in an apartment and probably have planned to be out by the end of September - our current closing date is 9/25. We did look at 2 other houses this weekend - both with tiny 4th (and in one, 3rd too) bedrooms, one backed up on a highway, both had pools (this summer people have probably been in pools maybe 10 days - not necessarily worth it to have one up here - seems like too much work for little reward to me!)...just didn't feel right.

Glad we don't get termites much around here. We're always fighting the ants in our house - I can temporarily keep them away by spreading some dry grits near where we think they get in. Don't want to use chemical ant traps in the house with little curious kids.

[Schmeelkie]

got a verbal yes on our offer...might be a while to get signatures as husband seller is in Oklahoma and wife seller is in California. Fun. Can't celebrate yet - have to be sure we can bump the other buyers - they'll have three days - so I'll let you know by Friday...

Want to celebrate, but must...hold...self...back....

[piqaboo]

got a verbal yes on our offer...might be a while to get signatures as husband seller is in Oklahoma and wife seller is in California. Fun. Can't celebrate yet - have to be sure we can bump the other buyers - they'll have three days - so I'll let you know by Friday...

Want to celebrate, but must...hold...self...back....

BS. Make them fax the form to the sellers, and have the sellers fax back the signed form.
That works for the FDA, ought to work for a contract.
They then bring the originals with them, or mail them, so that the originals can be appended to the contract in addition to the faxed ones that got things rolling.

I'm guessing they're using location to buy time, so they can work the other buyer. Its their right.

Still, best wishes to you!

[Schmeelkie]

Arg - wrote a paragraph or two and lost it somehow....

Anyway, I hope you're not right Piq - also hope the other 'buyers' don't take the whole 3 days to say they haven't sold their house yet... did inspection today - nothing major, nothing that needs to be taken care of immediately, so we probably won't ask anything of the sellers. That should speed things up there at least... Just want to be able to close on both houses 9/25 and not have to do the one we'll move into later....

Thinking positively - checked out Pumpkin's school online - got lots of forms and info including the 1st grade supply list. Now just have to wait for Staples big 'back-to-school' sale.

[dai bread]

got a verbal yes on our offer...might be a while to get signatures as husband seller is in Oklahoma and wife seller is in California. Fun. Can't celebrate yet - have to be sure we can bump the other buyers - they'll have three days - so I'll let you know by Friday...

Want to celebrate, but must...hold...self...back....

BS. Make them fax the form to the sellers, and have the sellers fax back the signed form.
That works for the FDA, ought to work for a contract.
They then bring the originals with them, or mail them, so that the originals can be appended to the contract in addition to the faxed ones that got things rolling.

I'm guessing they're using location to buy time, so they can work the other buyer. Its their right.

Still, best wishes to you!

My sale and purchase were both done on line. My lawyer got me to sign a form authorising her to do it, and it was done. Anything that required a signature was sent as an attachment, printed out, signed, scanned into the computer and sent back. All done & dusted between Auckland and Cambridge without any fuss whatever.

I believe the Evidence Act was amended to allow for electronic transactions. For once, the legal profession is up with the play.

[Schmeelkie]

That would make life easier Dai... Our realtor is able to set up a service with our specs for what houses we're looking for and we get automatic emails whenever there's a new listing or something gets sold - and can look at all listings online. He has a secretary scan forms, email them to him and can print out whereever he is. Our house inspector uses a PDA-like device (with wi-fi, other cool features) to 'write-up' his report on the spot and take pictures, then he can email it to us after only some minor tweaking on his laptop. The report has color pictures and links to sites to help with home repair. Pretty cool.

But, 'the system' still requires physical signatures...which is part of why realtors are on the road all day...and we'll have to do the awful sit in lawyers office for 1-2 hours signing stuff at closing. Fun. At least we don't have to attend the closing on the sale of our current house - guess once we've signed the contract we're pretty much done signing stuff.

[jamiebk]

That would make life easier Dai... Our realtor is able to set up a service with our specs for what houses we're looking for and we get automatic emails whenever there's a new listing or something gets sold - and can look at all listings online. He has a secretary scan forms, email them to him and can print out whereever he is. Our house inspector uses a PDA-like device (with wi-fi, other cool features) to 'write-up' his report on the spot and take pictures, then he can email it to us after only some minor tweaking on his laptop. The report has color pictures and links to sites to help with home repair. Pretty cool.

But, 'the system' still requires physical signatures...which is part of why realtors are on the road all day...and we'll have to do the awful sit in lawyers office for 1-2 hours signing stuff at closing. Fun. At least we don't have to attend the closing on the sale of our current house - guess once we've signed the contract we're pretty much done signing stuff.

Schmeelkie: The last house we bought was a rental (taking advantage of the hugely reduced prices in our area). The woman who sold the house did so on a "short sale" because she was underwater on the house and could not keep up her mortgage payments. It took MONTHS to get a response to our offer. After it went to her, it had to be accepted by two mortgage holders, who's desks it sat on for weeks. We were very pleased to have been sucessful on the offer and did buy the house, but oh...what a hassle. (and it was worth the hassle when it was all said and done. The house last sold (2-3 years ago)in the $525M range...we were able to buy it for $279M. Our son is living there as "rental agent" and we have the three other rooms rented out as well, for a nice positive cash flow of about $1300/mo above the mortgage service. The normally taxable income, can be offset with depreciation expense on the home).

[Schmeelkie]

We looked at one house that was a short sale - but after hearing the explanation from our realtor that 'short sale=this is going to take forever to close' - we've stayed away from them (as we have a child we'd rather not move from one school to another mid-year). Another that we wanted to look at, we heard that a buyer had put in an offer 6 WEEKS ago and hadn't heard back from the bank about whether it was accepted yet. Usually when you're working with real people, you give them 24-48 hours to accept or decline your offer. Ran away from that one too...
So, you can get a deal on a short sale, but you have to have the time to spend waiting for it to go through.

[jamiebk]

We looked at one house that was a short sale - but after hearing the explanation from our realtor that 'short sale=this is going to take forever to close' - we've stayed away from them (as we have a child we'd rather not move from one school to another mid-year). Another that we wanted to look at, we heard that a buyer had put in an offer 6 WEEKS ago and hadn't heard back from the bank about whether it was accepted yet. Usually when you're working with real people, you give them 24-48 hours to accept or decline your offer. Ran away from that one too...
So, you can get a deal on a short sale, but you have to have the time to spend waiting for it to go through.

Absolutely true Schmeelkie...it is a very trying experience. One of the lenders on our deal was Countrywide...need I say more?

[piqaboo]

Schmeelkie,
if you were trying to sell a house, wouldnt you wait til the 73rd hour to admit it wasnt sold, hoping the while that an offer would come in, so you didnt have to admit it?

[Schmeelkie]

btw - we did get the house we wanted...and the previous 'buyers' signed away their offer when they got it - so we knew right away! It's in the hands of the mortgage banker now...Likely won't make the 9/25 closing, but we should be able to get Pumpkin into the school there anyway. May have to come up with over $1000 in tuition if we close after 9/30, but it's worth it (they'd pro-rate a refund based on our actual closing date) so he doesn't have to switch schools. I decided to do no house-related activity (other than meeting with the mortgage broker) for the rest of August - will start packing in Sept. got out to the beach, local renaissance festival, planetarium and general relaxed playing at home the last two weekends....AAAHHHH....

[Schmeelkie]

Well, we got our mortgage committment today - woo hoo! Unfortunately, we're still waiting around for our buyers. they got denied at bank #1, on to bank #2 (after having received a large cash gift from an aunt) - should know by the end of Sept. The cash gift makes me hopeful - I'm not worrying too much... Pray, cross your fingers or whatever for us, please, as we REALLY don't want to have to put our house back on the market!!!

What with all the waiting, haven't gotten around to doing much packing yet... maybe this weekend...

[piqaboo]

You need a weather change. Then its easy to start packing as you put all the summer stuff away.
Once you're started, its easier to keep going.
Having kids about does mess w momentum tho .

I have so many projects on my list that I freeze up and can't do any of them.
Am working w sister to design a different look for the front yard.
Am working w my dad to design shelves for Altoid's room.
OT refinished Altoid's soon-to-be-new bed, and it's glorious.
Here's the tree to give Altoid that bed:
I recover a couple couch cushions
OT drives couch to charity shop
OT takes recliner apart and moves it from Altoid's room to where couch used to be
We buy mattress (We'd buy it now but there is NO room to store it)
OT takes old bed apart, and moves it to short term storage
Friend takes friend's piano out of our garage so it can be painted black
OT takes old chest of drawers out of Altoids room and stores where piano was (optional, but desirable)
We move bed into Altoid's room and put the clothes away.

I am tired just thinking about it. I have everlasting admiration for the huge projects documented
on this thread, like barfle's house re-making.

[Schmeelkie]

Well, I don't feel too bad about not starting packing yet, as our buyers are not getting a mortgage. So the house will be back on the market in the next few days, we've got to do the major cleaning again (already got my parents on tap to get the kids out of the house Saturday am). Going to set up a meeting with our mortgage broker to see if there's any way we can close on the house we're buying asap... know we have enough in savings to cover closing and the mortgage on the 'old' house for 9-10 months...but she had said we had to have enough in savings to cover BOTH mortgages for 6 mo (we have enough for about 4 months for both), which doesn't make much sense as we can obviously pay the new mortgage out of our earnings.... Anyway, it's worth a try and I'd rather spend the money and have the move over with (and save my husband an hours' worth of driving and me ~25 min worth of driving every day). Can't imagine what this would be like if my husband wasn't on sabbatical this semester! Though the stress gets to him sometimes and he's not getting as much work done as he'd like... Anyway life here is still crazy - I just want this to be over!!

[Shapley]

Sorry to hear it. Hopefully, you'll find a new buyer soon.

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

I just want this to be over!!

You have my sincerest sympathies - which helps not at all - and I'll cross my fingers, and my toes, and my eyes and wish you the best of luck with the mortgage elves. Maybe you can set out a bowl of cream at the new house and bribe the brownies?

I despise moving. With a flaming purple passion. Add in the fallen-through deals and the skittish mortgage elves, and it'd be an even worse case of cranky. I'm going to go back to crossed eyes and cross-continent elf coaching, now.

[jamiebk]

Schmeel....so sorry that thigs collapsed on the buyer's side. Things are hard enough today. Have you considered renting the house instead of putting it on the market right now? Things will likely improve over time and it may be easier to sell it to qualified buyers.