Our first house which we will be moving out of in a month. WHAT?! After having it listed for 7 months and just meeting our 2 year mark of ownership before moving out, we're moving on. What we'll do next is to be determined. Just when I was finally coming to terms with staying where we are and considering all the positives of that decision, we get an offer that works for us.
Coming up will be a few posts that describe how the foreclosure process worked for us and details of all our renovations. As we move on to an apartment for now I'll be sure to bring posts of our First House DIY details as I reminisce.
Let me start by saying that although our house had a lot we didn't like, it was ALL cosmetic changes. There was nothing structurally wrong with our house. We consulted a few family members during the process who helped confirm that this was a good choice. After the inspection we felt even more confident with just some minor things we needed to fix once we bought her. Of course they kind of missed the leak, but it was winter so we agreed to forgo that part of the inspection...Lesson learned. I'll detail that another day.
Entry Way and Half Bath
Welcome to our house, the land of teal carpets. We were kinda digging the open steps in such a small place. Each floor is about 500 sq ft. So being able to see into the living space from the entrance (and having an open kitchen) was a perk. A half bath on the main floor was also nice. Everything had been winterized so we spent a lot of time trying to get those stickers off everything. Eventually that builder grade cabinet gets thrown out, yay!
Oh, Hey living area!
Basic, basic, basic bath
Living Space
First up was covering the back sliding door. We LOVED these curtains and planned all along to have a matching orange wall across from it (leading into the kitchen). We threw in all our combined furniture and pulled a futon from my parents that use to be in my basement/hang out area in high school. Please note the velcro above the futon. Velcro was EVERYWHERE as well as scotch tape just taped to the walls. More teal carpet and it was horribly stained but you can't really tell. She's quite the eye-sore.
Dark orange curtains
clashing with bright orange futon and blanket
Sigh, so glad this is gone
Kitchen
Beautiful beigey appliances (I believe use to be white) clashed with beige cabinets. It's so odd because my friend lives in this development and has much nicer cabinets, makes me wonder who lived here that actually picked these. The floor was pretty gross under all the appliances to the point where the gross stuff was peaking out underneath. Yuck! We couldn't wait to get rid of these appliances. It was definitely first on our list.
Look how gross the floor is
Too much beige
Master Bedroom
This space is nice and open. The windows let in a lot of natural light and all the upstairs ceilings are vaulted. We had some old-school brass light fixtures throughout the house, chandelier types in the bedrooms, which we switched out. Some people might not like ceiling fans in their rooms, but it was definitely our thing. A HUGE perk was the double closets. My husband and I were not looking forward to sharing a closet as it was our first time living together. I have a lot of clothes. I still have a separate dresser for many items and my shoes take up half the closet (same size) int he front room, but that's OK. We managed to share, SCORE! Again we had velcro and tape on the wall. The tape was NOT fun to find after taping. It was so hard to see by itself but when you painted you could see shiny spots. Peel off, little piece by little piece, then paint again. Here's a good example of the carpet stains....don't ask!
Lots of closets, big window
Tape and velcro on the walls
Eww, stained floors
Upstairs Bath
On the upper level we had a full bath that was connected to both our room and the little hallway. It was nice because I can get in and out from my room easily but it's also accessible to guests. Don't want guests walking to the basement to shower. Believe me, we did that for a month while renovating this space, and it was not fun. I am seriously upset we never got a picture of the wallpaper border in this room. The plan was to keep a small piece and frame it to keep in the bathroom closet just for fun, but during the tearing down process we forgot. Better it's gone I say. This bathroom got an overhaul under a year ago to give us double sinks. More info on that because it was quite the task involving plumbing, that my handy man husband took on. Remember how we showered in the basement for a month....
To the left is the little toilet nook and closet
Front Bedroom
I usually call this the front bedroom of the second bedroom because it is (go figure) at the front of our house. Usually it's the store things bedroom and more importantly my craft/scrapbook room. I loved this room because of the little nook on the side. Gave me a dedicated space for my scrapbook stuff while still letting this be a guest bedroom. It's a bit cramped and only gets one side table (sorry Dad) but it works for the few guests we get. Here's one of our
Teal carpets to enjoy
Brass fixtures
Gross walls but nice window ledge
Garage
Not a 2 car garage like we really wanted but it allows for a lot of storage and my car. My husbands fits in there too but it's a lot tighter. Another reason I claim full parking rights in there. But really I told him that in the winter it's mine or else he can get up at 5:30 am and spend 15 minutes cleaning it off when there is snow/ice. It all works out. :)
I WISH it still looked this clean (the garage not my car)
Basement
This basement is a LIFESAVER. It's an extra 400 (approx.) square feet of space. We don't spend much time down here but it holds all our left over items. OK, we have a storage unit too, but it we weren't selling this would probably have ended up a cluttered mess. The washer and dryer is down here, one of the reasons I do laundry so infrequently. We have a full bath. Many units in our development don't have the bathroom just the hook ups. There is nice storage space under the stairs to throw all the junk no one needs to see. After putting up some shelves the middle area is pretty open. We've hung out here some when our house was just too hot in the summer, since our AC was never really up to snuff in cooling. We had to patch a lot of holes in the basement bathroom. We think they kept an animal in that room and it bit through the drywall. We had dreams of fixing this up and were days from actually starting the process when our offer came in. Things always work out!
Lots of room under the stairs
Bathroom in the far back right corner
Nice open space
Kinda cramped laundry area
Well that's pretty much it. The good, bad and ugly of our foreclosure. Although I must say many more "goods" were to come as we upgraded. I can't wait to share all those updates with you. But for a basic rundown, here is what we ended up doing.
Entry Way - tile floor, paint door, new carpet on stairs, cling on side of door window so we have no peepers, paint walls, new fancier baseboard
Half Bath - tile floor, new sink/cabinet, paint walls, new fancier baseboard, hang artwork, paint door
Living Space - laminate wood floor, paint walls, new fancier baseboard, new couch, chaise, kitchen table and chairs, bigger TV, make shelves, hang art
Kitchen - tile floor, paint walls, baseboard, new appliances to install, accessorize, new backsplash and granite counters, cover hole in ceiling, retexture to match
Master Bedroom - new carpet, paint walls, reinstall baseboard, hang curtains, get more storage, ceiling fan, retexture ceiling to match where leak was, paint door
Upstairs Bath - tile floor, new sinks/cabinet, plumbing related to double sinks, tear down wall paper and paint walls, reinstall baseboard, make towel hanging fixture, remove old mirror and hang new ones, removed old light fixture and hang new one with related wiring involved, paint doors
Front Bedroom - new carpet, paint walls, reinstall baseboard, rehang closet doors, hang curtains, ceiling fan, paint door
Garage - add place for shoes, hook up freezer, add shelves, hand a coat rack, paint door
Basement - new carpet down to basement, install washer and dryer, add 2 large storage shelves, patch bathroom walls and paint, put down a large area rug, hang bedsheets to section off space (for listing), get a winter clothes/coats storage unit, organize house supplies in boxes,
Which makeover are you looking forward to reading about the most?!
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