I closed October 17th in a vault... literally. Afterwards my relator, John, came by to let me in and pose for this picture. This 1894 duplex was all mine. Within the hour after closing I was half moved in and a contractor was on site to estimate some work. Apart from the what's detailed below, we had two dual-flush toilets installed, started a couple compost beds, replaced both garbage disposals and one water heater, demolished most of the basement walls, got a new main drain pipe, and hosted a housewarming party. We also hung some decorative lights and got a deep freezer so I could stop hoarding food in all my friends' freezers. I've learned some property management skills by renting out the four rooms downstairs, and two garage stalls. I'm working now on creating a studio and office in the basement. All while doing regular unpacking and moving in stuff.
For the show and tell portion of the post: the house hadn't had a washer and dryer... in its 122 year history. So that was fixed first by running some pipe (shown left) and then we got a shiny new set :)
I also got lockers for everyone so they could put their laundry stuff in there.
Next came time to demo what we were thought were hideous kitchen cabinets. Turns out they weren't actually cabinets, but individual pieces of wood L-bracketed together. So it took Lindsey and I six hours to remove them. We hoped to remove just the bottom cabinets and head out of town, but soon realized everything was connected and we had to start demo from the top and work our way down. During demolition we discovered a door! Lindsey and I were excited until we realized that the house had settled to the point of making it a load-bearing door so we couldn't open it. It appears to have been the original basement door when the house was a single-family dwelling. The nice ship planks were a nice surprise too!
We had primed and painted some new unfinished cabinets. After setting in the new cabinets with some Victorian-style door knobs and drawer pulls we realized just how badly the floor looked. Which meant the floor was my next project.
Meanwhile, I called around looking for a dishwasher for each unit. I requested white, stainless steel tub, internal controls and a third rack. I was informed this was my option and it'd be $200 off the following day. I said great, I'll take two! (Received skeptical pause on the phone.) No really, I need two dishwashers; I do a lot of dishes. Installing dishwasher into a house that's never had them turned out to be a larger task than I estimated. New pipes, new electrical boxes, and for downstairs, also a new fuse. But, they work wonderfully!
So while I expected some surprises with an old house, each task is definitely taking longer than hoped. I look forward to having my housemates settled into a space that's not a construction zone extremely soon! On to the next 40 days!
Acknowledgements: Lindsey & I want to thank these Dee, Amber, Jesse, Julianne for their help moving. And thank these humans for their help with random things from sanding cabinets, pulling up, running electrical, hanging lights, drilling holes, reassembling small kitchens, making countless trips to the hardware store/Habitat for Humanity and the like: Tay, Julianne, Kelsey, Chloé, Claib, and Dee. Thank you to Jane for all your time spent drawing up sketches and paying for random things as they've come up in addition to the things I thought I budgeted for!
