More Photos! Wood! Stairs!

Ok, I just finished stripping paint for the day and I'm really happy with the results so far. I have all of the spindles done on three sides and have four of the backs done. I shot a few more snapshots because I'm really excited to see so much woodgrain going on!


Notice the laptop on the stairs. The ipod decided to take the 'dirt nap' (as my professor calls it) so the headphones had to connect to something!


Too bad the house smells like old, melting paint. Sorry roomies!

I believe I've made a decision...

I'm going to sell the house. I'll be working hard to get it ready to list in May. Plan to see big changes; big inexpensive changes.

My Realtor came over today and we sat down to talk about selling the place. She had a list of homes on the market now that would be comparable to my house once I make those fixes I posted a few days ago. Her estimate fell about where I expected it. Basically the value is higher than when I bought it, but the fees associated with the sale cancel out most of the increase. If I got my asking price I could make a little pocket change, but not too much. There'd be even less if anyone asks for closing costs.

Basically, I just need to not have this liability in North Dakota when I'm in New York, Paris, Milan, etc. What if I couldn't find renters? The furnace breaks down? Renters damage the house? Just too much to worry about.

Now for some news that's a little more fun: I'm working on the staircase today. Blasting off that paint with my best friend and favorite tool. See it there? Sitting on the newel post. Just waiting to play!

The two whitish spindles are the ones that, for some reason, someone decided to sand and prime before painting. Jerks! This is one time I'm glad that the P.O.'s were too lazy to do things the right way.

I found that a box works really well for dropping the hot paint scrapings into. The cardboard is easier to scrape against to get the stuck-on pieces off instead of newspaper or paper towels.

Anyone for some delicious chips? Paint chips? Now featuring 30% MORE lead!
Scrumptious!

The Realtor Said I Could Sell Easier if I Kept Stripping...

The staircase, people. The staircase. Although, if it raises the value any, some other arrangements could be made ;)

I had a Realtor come over yesterday to help me decide what to do with the house. She is awesome and I wish I had worked with her in the first place. Direct, to the point, honest, and EASY TO COMMUNICATE WITH. Even a sense of humor. Perfect.

She walked through the house with me and told me what changes were worth my time and money if I plan to put the house on the market this spring/summer. Things like, don't bother with the ceramic tile but instead replace the vinyl tiles with more stylish new ones. Things like that.

I don't think you'll be seeing the 1920's inspired dream bathroom that is bouncing around my imagination. It's just not worth my time/money. Like I stated earlier, she did think it would be a good idea to finish stripping the banister, so that's on the to-do list. Here's that progress pic I promised you:Gotta love the 'Flame Thrower' and it's magical abilities. I just feel like the wood grain can finally breathe! Once I get the rest of the spindles all toasty-warm and paintless I'll go back with the chemical stripper and get the rest of the paint off.

I guess I'll also post the photos of the dining room trim all painted and the blinds FINALLY up.




Basically, the things I need to get done to put the place on the market would be to:

* Paint the kitchen cabinets a fresh white, replace hardware
* New vinyl tiles in the kitchen and downstairs bathroom
* Paint the walls neutral colors and the trim a crisp white
* Replace a couple light fixtures
* Finish replacing the missing trim
* Refinish the hardwood floors (argh!)
* Paint the front door
* Get the upstairs plumbing working again
* Find remnant to replace the carpet on the stairs
* Find a vinyl flooring remnant for the upstairs bathroom
* Either find carpet remnants or refinish floors in the bedrooms
* Repair broken bead board on the porch ceiling (porch swing fiasco)
* Replace shower curtains with ones with bright colors or patterns. They will distract the potential buyers from how much the bathrooms suck. This is also why she liked my roommates bright paintings.

She said she was going to go back to the office and run some comps from my area. She hoped to get back to me today with an estimate. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will be enough to cover the costs associated with selling the house (realtor commisions, etc.) and pay off the mortgage. A little extra in the pocket so I don't have to beg for change in the subway would be nice too!

Crazy Crazy! Gotta Get Going!

Oooo! Life's getting crazy! I have less than two months to get everything straightened out here in Fargo. I'm starting a big push to get as much done with the house as soon as possible.

You'll have to forgive my lack of photos (camera's at my Fraternity house) but I've actually gotten some stuff done! I painted the trim in the dining room (except for the trim that I haven't replaced yet: crown moulding, baseboards, cap around doors/windows) and I started stripping the paint off of the banister.

Yup, I broke out the flame-thrower! Yesterday I accidentally took one of those Sunday afternoon naps that goes a little too long. What was intended to be an hour nap turned into a 6 hour slumber. One of those times when you wake up and the sun's just gone down, but your body says 'Good Morning!' I pulled paint off of the newel post and the first four spindles. I will still need to get some citristrip on there, but for an initial stripping I think they look pretty good. Here's a before:
I'll make sure to post a picture of the progress as soon as I can.

I'm going to get a Realtor over here this week to give me an estimate of what I could get for the house if I decide to sell it this summer. I'll get an idea of what would need to be upgraded to get my money back out of the deal. Then maybe estimates from contractors? I'm not sure what I'll do yet but I'm trying to keep my options open.

Gah! I wish there were three of me right now!

Howdy, Neighbor!

Last night I volunteered to help with the Good Neighbor Campaign at NDSU. Greek Life, along with a couple other organizations at NDSU, meet with the Roosevelt Neighborhood Association to put up doorhangers that list off some general resources for homeowners and renters in our community. The Roosevelt neighborhood is the part of Fargo that extends from downtown to the university, and is where a lot of college students rent apartments and houses. This event has been put on to help ease some of the problems that occur between the perminent residents and the, often rowdy, student rentors.

I had the opportunity to meet with some officials from the Roosevelt Neighborhood Association and discuss some topics that I have concerns about for our neighborhood. I'm pretty sure that I'll be becoming involved in some way with the RNA (not to be confused with the NRA) in the coming months. It was really just nice to meet some other homeowners in this community, since most of the people I know around here are just students renting.

After my last post I did end up making my way to the basement to strip those storm windows. I took the glass completely out because the glazing was so terrible so now I need to make a trip to 'the Depot' to pick up some more glazing compound. One of the windows has some pretty bad rot on it so I'll be playing with some wood filler too.
One last thought; With everybody moved into their bedrooms (for the most part) we were able to start arranging the living room to NOT function as bedrooms. Check it out, it's like we have a real living room now!

Today's Special: Quick Projects.

Today was pretty productive considering how little time I had to be messing around with the house. After staying my first night in my bedroom (as opposed to the living room for the last 2 months) I went to my first class... a difficult feat for this sleeper-inner. Afterwards, I came home for a couple work hours before my second class.

During that two hour span I changed out the light fixture in my bedroom and replaced the lightswitch. The lightswitch was dirty and yellowed, so I replaced it with a nice new white one that looks ten times better with the crisp white trim and coverplates. The fixture that was hanging in the room was pretty small and generic; it looked like this:



I decided that I would prefer something more like this:The old one is still in usable condition so I'll donate it to the ReStore this week. I'm actually pretty excited about that because most of the things I've removed from the house are in such terrible condition that nobody could use them.
This little quick task also had one bonus; I know which breaker turns off the second floor now! It only took about four tries, but I got it! Is it weird that the whole second floor is on one breaker? I guess I don't know too much about electrical systems, but I think that's kind of unusual.

After my second class, but before my dinner engagement at 5:30pm I removed the thick plastic covering the exterior of a couple windows. This was found on the north window in the dining room, the window on the stairway landing, and the little window to the right of the fireplace. I'm sure the reason it was on the windows was because the storm windows leak cold air like crazy in the winter, so I removed them so I can re-glaze and repaint them before it gets too cold out.

I'm gunna bust out the 'flame thrower' tomorrow and take 'em down to bare wood and pull out the old glazing compound so I can redo the glazing after work tomorrow night. That's of course if I can hold off on firing up that heat gun that I love! Here are the two from the fireplace wall. When finished they'll be the new trim color, so I couldn't just do the bad one, they wouldn't match and I'd freak out. Anyhoo, here they are (can you spot the rot?):
THEN, after I finished supper I came back and installed a storm window I salvaged off a demolished house onto the window on the landing. I finished that before my 7:00 meeting! Woo hoo! Now you can actually see out of the window, whereas before the plastic was so thick all you could see was a blur. You can kind of make out the stained glass landing window of the neighboring house/apartment conversion. (which should be restored... another story altogether)Upon further thought, I think I might just start stripping paint tonight. Is it weird that I love it so much? I'm such a loser!

Stripping Progress, More Pictures

Well, I finished stripping the majority of the paint off of the second salvaged door, although the interior of this door was much more difficult to strip. The door was originally hung in a bathroom, so the interior had many more layers of paint than the exterior. This wouldn't have been such a problem, but the bottom layer of paint turned to a super sticky glue from hell. You can see this paint on the bottom layer of the scrapings in the photo. I couldn't get as much of this putty-colored crap up as I would have liked, but I'm hoping it will cooperate with the chemical stripper I'm using tonight. Wish me luck.

I took a little trip over to the house to take a couple photos now that my camera is working. I've included here a photo of the porch, the arts and crafts door I have high hopes for once it's refinished, and a sad little attempt at catching an interior image. That's me in the glare.

Here are a couple photos of the exterior. The first photo is with the refurbished basement window leaning up on the porch. Now imageine all of the trim that color. Something about that picture makes me like the white trim, but I suppose that is because it looks so clean. In real life? No, yuck. I've also included photos of the side entry and the back of the house. Look at that weird roof situation in the back! Why would you do that? I guess it's kinda funky & cool; it's definatelly the only roof like that on the block!





In other news, there's a light at the end of the tunnel. Well, more like another, much longer tunnel at the end of the tunnel. But anyways, I'M CLOSING ON MONDAY!!! Yes! I can finally get that 'Before' album started. Good times!

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures!

I figured out how to use my camera, even though the LCD screen is broken. That one was a little alcohol+game involving movement+pavement+camera issue... I learned my lesson.

The good news is that I took pictures of everything I've written about but been unable to show you. I'll start off with the salvaged basement window I cleaned up, put new glazing compound on, and painted green.

I'll have to go the house and prop it up on the porch so you can see what the color looks like in it's proper application. Taking pictures from the middle of the street I guess; just more weird behavior in front of the neighbors. They'll have to start expecting it at some point.

Here's a photo of the one of the doorknobs I got from my 'parts house' (Rest In Pieces!). Check it out, 3 bags full! They've just been riding around in my trunk with me for the last couple weeks.

I read that if you put hardware like this in a crock pot full of water overnight, the paint comes right off. I'll try it sometime before we start working on the house, just in case these get called into play

I worked for three more hours on the first salvaged door, removing all of the paint with the heat gun. I'll probably use a chemical stripper to remove the stubborn paint from from the cracks and crevaces. That should take care of the rest of the varnish too. I'm a little concerned about the stripper because I've never tried anything like it before. I should be able to manage if everyone else can. Anyone have any suggestions on which one to use?

Before I get to that I need to attack the second door. Oh, picture provided! Yes! We have door #1 on the left and door #2 on the right. We also have about five hours of heat gun and scraper on the right. Boo!

Did I fail to mention that Fargo hit 100 degrees today and is really humid? Just the perfect temperature to spend a few hours with a gun blasting out 950 degree air. Fantastic idea. Ranks right up there with wearing shorts and flip-flops with searing-hot sticky paint chips dropping to the ground. I felt the heat on that one a couple times! I also inadvertantly bumped the hot tip of the gun with my thimb. Ouch! It was quick enough though that I didn't burn it really. No blister at least! It's still my favorite tool.

That's about it for now.

Salvaged Supplies = Hours of Restoration

Well, I finally got around to paining the basement window I salvaged and reglazed. As I was applying the green color to the sash, my friend Andy walked out of the house and commented on how he can create that color after a long night of drinking. Thanks. Luckily, once it dried, it looked less like pea soup and came closer to the sage green I was hoping for. As an Architecture student I like to think I can make a good color selection, but this trim color made me second guess my skills! So far so good though.

I drove over to the house and leaned the newly painted window against the siding so I could stand in the street like a crazy person and evaluate the color choice I made for the house I don't even own yet. I think the neighbors must already think I'm crazy. I walked around the house with my little window and looked at it in different lighting conditions and in different areas of the house. How's it work with the brick? How about the shingles? How's it in the shade vs. in the light?

Last night I had my buddy Andy help me pick up two doors from my 'parts house' that's going down today. They match my house's doors EXACTLY! I whipped out my heat gun last night and got to work stripping off layers of white paint. I only finished the one side of one door, but I'll be doing some more work tonight. The original finish of the door I started last night must have had some sort of waxy varnish because the paint was barely bubbling under the heat, but this varnish became the consistancy of honey (just as sticky) and smelled like crayons. If anyone has any ideas about what this is, let me know! It worked out well because the varnish liquified and the paint just came off in sheets (after I got my technique down). I'm not sure what kind of wood the door's made of, but I think it may be oak. All of the upstairs trim is painted right now anyways, so I don't have much to compare it to. As long as I can get the stain to match across the board, I'll be fine!

My camera is broken, so I unfortunatelly don't have any pictures to share, but hopefully I can get it fixed soon so those who read blogs like I do (skimming through pictures, reading where the pictures are interesting) will have more to look at! I definatelly will have a camera by the time I close!

Take care, fellow bloggers