We finally closed on our home yesterday. Yes, I said FINALLY. After our closing, my husband and I went to lunch. We were able to get four tacos for $4.00, so we decided to enjoy some really good ice cream out by the fountain at the shopping center. Sure, it was January 31st, but it was about 68 degrees and the sun was shining. While we were sitting there enjoying our ice cream, I looked over and said, "Congratulations, we now own a giant piece of crap." I wish that were an understatement, but that pretty much describes this home.
We moved in last week because we attached an addendum to allow us possession prior to closing. Under normal circumstances, this type of arrangement would not be necessary; however, given the condition of this home, we couldn't have moved in here any other way. When we first looked at the house, we didn't notice much smell, and although things looked old, we figured it was because the house was built in 1953. We knew up front that the HVAC needed a new heat exchanger, but my husband and I are both handy around the house, and we figured it was not a big deal to repaint and fix it up, so we decided to put an offer on it after looking at it again. The day we looked at it a second time we noticed cigarette smoke smell, but since we were planning to paint the entire inside of the house and it didn't have carpet, we still didn't see this as a show stopper. We were in for a lot of surprises along the way, and that was the beginning of the journey.
We came out to the house the day that the inspector came and followed him around. He confirmed a lot of our suspicions about the house, but structurally the house was mostly sound. There was one prior repair from a previous infestation of termites that needed to be redone at some point in the future, but nothing that would be dangerous in the short-term. The same day as the inspection, we had the HVAC company come out and look at the gas pack. He checked it out and determined that the heat exchanger was cracked and the fan motor was seized up. He said with the unit being as old as it was, his recommendation was for a new unit.
My husband decided to go back to look at the house the day before we were supposed to take possession when he had to meet the gas company to have the gas turned on so that we could have the brand new gas pack put in. The prior owner's family was living here with no heat. They were using space heaters and during that particularly cold spell when my hubby came out to meet the gas guy, the prior owner's had nailed - yes nailed - blankets to the door frames! They were all huddled back in the garage turned rec room and had blankets on door frames so they could all huddle in one room at a time. He came home and told me about it, but for some reason the emphasis on how bad the situation was and how bad the condition of the house was did not sink in. So call me dense....
My husband got the keys to the house and got the HVAC work started on Tuesday, January 24, 2012. We had the movers come and move all of our heavy furniture and the few boxes of personal stuff we had left in our old home on Thursday, January 26, 2012 and we closed on our old house on Friday, January 27, 2012. I picked up our three kids from school on the 27th and drove the hour to our new community and our new home! Wow, was I in for a surprise. The first thing I noticed was the stench walking up to the house. As I went inside I noticed the lack of light in the place, and then I started noticing other things. You know how it is: you visit a home and miss all those little things, but they suddenly jump out at you when you have to live in it.
It was late, I was getting tired, and anyone who knows me knows what that means! I was punchy.....and not just a little bit. I was walking around the house with my oldest daughter, who is 13, and we were pointing out everything that was wrong and laughing hysterically. She opened the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and called out, "Hey, Mama!" I walked in the bathroom to see her pointing at the opened medicine cabinet with a wrinkled up nose, and I almost had to walk out because the smell was so strong. There were all kinds of open bottles of perfumes, colognes and who knows what else. She was shaking her head and I ran to the kitchen to get her a cheap garbage bag. She threw everything in there away except "The bunny rabbit ears." I walked back in there, and she was holding this robe hook on top of her head while saying, "I'm a bunny rabbit". I started laughing and almost peed my pants.
We had many funny moments that I cannot recount at this moment, but my favorite was the next day when I walked in to use the bathroom, sat down and looked out the door (yes, I confess I didn't shut the bathroom door - I was almost afraid to touch it!!!!). As I looked out the door, I noticed the vent cover to the air intake had been painted golden yellow, just like the hallway, but it wasn't a pretty golden yellow. It was a dirty golden yellow that looked dingy and grungy. I started laughing, and my hubby was wondering what I was howling about this time. I went in the bedroom and told him to come look at the intake vent. He said, "I know, it's painted." I responded, "That's not painted; that's ghetto." Suddenly, everything in this house was "ghetto". What I mean by that is dirty, grungy, dingy, and in disrepair. And that describes this house from top to bottom.
As such, this house needs cleaning from top to bottom. So what am I doing on here blogging? I need a creative outlet as I get ready to go back to my never-ending cleaning job! I have been cleaning since we got here, but I have taken time to leave and go run errands. My mother-in-law came Sunday and cleaned in the kitchen. She was here for about 5 hours, and she and my oldest daughter only got the top cabinets cleaned out and the outsides washed. I have spent my time removing every cloth item from this house including the shower curtain. Last night I finally finished putting up a new shower curtain and my kids all commented on it. My youngest little bit said, "Mama, you put up a new shower curtain? It's beautiful." The boy said, "Mama, I didn't know you got a new shower curtain. I really like it." and my oldest sweet pea said, "I love the bathroom. It looks 100% better already." I still need to get the curtains down from my girls' rooms, but since their rooms are upstairs, the curtains do not smell like the rest of the house. As a matter of fact, I keep threatening to camp out with them until I get this house in order. It is that bad. Fortunately, the smell-factor is going progressively downward. We do not smoke, and I cannot use air fresheners so we notice every odor that is in the house. It also makes getting rid of odors very difficult, but I think I have a solution!
My cleaner of choice right now is detergent and water mixed with plain white vinegar. I have been using a cup of vinegar in each load of laundry for quite some time now because of the deodorizing nature of vinegar, but I had an aversion to using vinegar to clean with. When I was in my second year of college, I lived with my grandma for a while. She cleaned with a spray bottle filled with pure vinegar. She sprayed it in the carpet to deodorize the carpets because she had a dog. She also sprayed it on every surface and wiped it. That vinegar smell would linger long into the night, and I quickly obtained an aversion to the smell. About two or three years ago, I decided to try to make a glass cleaner and I actually added vinegar to the bottle after finding a natural glass cleaner recipe. It worked wonders so I decided that if I can use that homemade glass cleaner with vinegar, then I can mix up an all-purpose cleaner with vinegar and accomplish a lot. Not only is vinegar deodorizing but it is also anti-bacterial, so this is perfect in this house where I was almost afraid to sit on my own toilet seat. We have since changed the toilet seats (thank goodness), and we are on our way to improving this home, although it is going to be quite the journey. I'll keep sharing, especially the ups and downs of fixing up a home.
The other reason I'm on the computer blogging right now is it took until today to be able to get back online. There are so many things that I have not been able to figure out because I have no way to research the community now that everything is online rather than in a phone book. So I'm on here to check email and do a little research so I figured what better time than now to start my blog. Now I can hopefully blog regularly whenever I get enough material to blog about. And since I now have a way to keep up with everything that is happening as it is happening (a word processor file saved is a great thing), I hopefully won't forget what I want to share! I really hope this blog will be a useful tool for anyone in the middle of, or considering taking on, a renovation project!
Happy Home Improvement!!! :-)
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