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be careful what you wish for
2 years ago
so after 3 long years of searching i finally managed to buy a house this month. its in a good neighborhood in a town close to work with two routes to choose from, as well as being in a town considerably smaller than where i currently live (am a country boy, i dont like living in big towns) but not SO small that you have to drive half an hour to get to civilization. the price was also fairly reasonable given all of this, so i felt pretty good about everything
until closing day ._. when the realization of what i just purchased truly hit me
the house i bought, is probably the least maintained in the entire neighborhood (i suppose this is better than being the one nice house in a crappy neighborhood, but still...) and was owned by people who were content doing updates in the 70s and then literally doing NOTHING for the next 50 years...letting the place get taken over by mice and mold and what not. also it turned out the house was a prefabricated home that was popular in the 50s to accommodate the post WWII housing boom (no not Lustron, would have been decent if it was that...) so it was built cheaply and quickly, which means having really odd features such as interior walls framed with 2x2s rather than 2x4s, plus very little insulation in the walls or attic (whats left after the mice had their way with it) not to mention the usual crap that comes with old houses like 2-prong outlets, round fuses rather than circuit breakers, and the potential for lead paint and asbestos (cant confirm the presence of either, but since the house was built prior to 1978 it cant be ruled out either) it also has a massive patio door/screen door combo as a main entry way rather than a proper front door, which is BEYOND unacceptable in 2023 due to being such a security threat...plus a 50 year old furnace, 40 year old fridge, 40 year old stove (which doesnt even work properly at the moment) and a 20 year old AC unit with jerry-rigged return ducts. nothing in the house was designed in a way that makes sense >.<
basically, i bought a fixer upper, and i think i may have bitten off more than i can chew ._. this is why i've hardly been active lately...been stressed out of my skull trying to get help fixing this place up enough for me to move in (contractors are super hard to get a hold of now, often telling you they wont get to your project for 6+ months) and i can only do so much myself. i dont have a truck anymore so i cant haul building supplies, cant haul away garbage unless i pay waste management a ton of money, and honestly...i dont have much real world experience with building maintenance. i know enough to be dangerous XD but certainly not confident (im a mechanic, not a construction worker)
that, and it takes an hour and a half to drive to the house from where i currently live...so doing anything after work means coming home at freaking 9pm only to have to get up at 6am the next morning for work. weekends are my only chance to get any proper work done but its hard to stay motivated when anything you do uncovers more problems >.< at this rate i have NO idea when i might be able to move in...at the moment the house is becoming a mouse-infested construction zone (though an exterminator is coming tomorrow...but mice suck, they leave so much piss and shit behind even after they're eradicated that everything gets left freaking filthy) and so far all i've been doing is demolition...nothing has been repaired/reinstalled yet! this weekend the moldy drywall in the living room has to come out...no idea how im getting drywall there to install it myself, or when i can get a contractor out there to install it for me >.<
i hear this is just part of what being a home owner is like, and the r/firsttimehomebuyer reddit (and just about all homeowners i talk to in person) are full of stories like this, so i'm definitely not alone...but god its still stressful, and expensive...havent been this stressed out since i was in college >.<
so yeah, if home ownership is something you really want to pursue, be careful what you wish for! O-O unless you're mega uber wealthy, your first home will ALWAYS be a fixer upper and a source of stress. if you can manage to focus on one project at a time rather than EVERYTHING wrong with the place, you should be ok, but when you're laying awake in bed in a pool of your own sweat wondering if you just made a horrible mistake...it can be hard for the logical part of your brain to overcome the emotional part ^^;
am definitely not ungrateful...just sorta pissed i didnt realize how much work this place truly needed before i signed on the dotted line >.<
until closing day ._. when the realization of what i just purchased truly hit me
the house i bought, is probably the least maintained in the entire neighborhood (i suppose this is better than being the one nice house in a crappy neighborhood, but still...) and was owned by people who were content doing updates in the 70s and then literally doing NOTHING for the next 50 years...letting the place get taken over by mice and mold and what not. also it turned out the house was a prefabricated home that was popular in the 50s to accommodate the post WWII housing boom (no not Lustron, would have been decent if it was that...) so it was built cheaply and quickly, which means having really odd features such as interior walls framed with 2x2s rather than 2x4s, plus very little insulation in the walls or attic (whats left after the mice had their way with it) not to mention the usual crap that comes with old houses like 2-prong outlets, round fuses rather than circuit breakers, and the potential for lead paint and asbestos (cant confirm the presence of either, but since the house was built prior to 1978 it cant be ruled out either) it also has a massive patio door/screen door combo as a main entry way rather than a proper front door, which is BEYOND unacceptable in 2023 due to being such a security threat...plus a 50 year old furnace, 40 year old fridge, 40 year old stove (which doesnt even work properly at the moment) and a 20 year old AC unit with jerry-rigged return ducts. nothing in the house was designed in a way that makes sense >.<
basically, i bought a fixer upper, and i think i may have bitten off more than i can chew ._. this is why i've hardly been active lately...been stressed out of my skull trying to get help fixing this place up enough for me to move in (contractors are super hard to get a hold of now, often telling you they wont get to your project for 6+ months) and i can only do so much myself. i dont have a truck anymore so i cant haul building supplies, cant haul away garbage unless i pay waste management a ton of money, and honestly...i dont have much real world experience with building maintenance. i know enough to be dangerous XD but certainly not confident (im a mechanic, not a construction worker)
that, and it takes an hour and a half to drive to the house from where i currently live...so doing anything after work means coming home at freaking 9pm only to have to get up at 6am the next morning for work. weekends are my only chance to get any proper work done but its hard to stay motivated when anything you do uncovers more problems >.< at this rate i have NO idea when i might be able to move in...at the moment the house is becoming a mouse-infested construction zone (though an exterminator is coming tomorrow...but mice suck, they leave so much piss and shit behind even after they're eradicated that everything gets left freaking filthy) and so far all i've been doing is demolition...nothing has been repaired/reinstalled yet! this weekend the moldy drywall in the living room has to come out...no idea how im getting drywall there to install it myself, or when i can get a contractor out there to install it for me >.<
i hear this is just part of what being a home owner is like, and the r/firsttimehomebuyer reddit (and just about all homeowners i talk to in person) are full of stories like this, so i'm definitely not alone...but god its still stressful, and expensive...havent been this stressed out since i was in college >.<
so yeah, if home ownership is something you really want to pursue, be careful what you wish for! O-O unless you're mega uber wealthy, your first home will ALWAYS be a fixer upper and a source of stress. if you can manage to focus on one project at a time rather than EVERYTHING wrong with the place, you should be ok, but when you're laying awake in bed in a pool of your own sweat wondering if you just made a horrible mistake...it can be hard for the logical part of your brain to overcome the emotional part ^^;
am definitely not ungrateful...just sorta pissed i didnt realize how much work this place truly needed before i signed on the dotted line >.<
We have no idea what we are doing.
I bet networking is your best bet here unless you're a semi hermit like me. Also sites like Angie's List might be good for this type of thing. I'm still envious of you despite the issues my dream is homeownership someday although I might be about to get into really nice newly built public housing (yay!) You can do this Sharkie.
they say theres a contractor shortage right now cuz not enough people are going into the trades...which i believe, but honestly i think the bigger factor are contractor companies not wanting to take on smaller jobs like residential work...preferring big commercial jobs that take longer and pay better. and i get it, we all gotta eat, but...people also own homes that need to be repaired...some jobs i cant do myself because its literally illegal for me to attempt them! somebody has to send contractors to private homes rather than commercial properties!
really feels as if you're truly on your own if you need major work done on your house as a homeowner...but i'm sure Taco Bell can get a renovation booked for next week while everybody else has to wait for months to get some drywall installed