CC Flip This House - First Time Homebuyer

@Coralbrook, don’t I wish! It’s been 13 months since the flood!!!
Got a contractor this past March and work started in April. We asked for permits, per our attorney’s suggestion, because of new rules and meeting new codes-especially with electrical wiring. Also the flood damaged a lot more than we expected. We had to deal with a flooded area where the water heater was placed (elevated, of course!) with lots of plumber time, as well as the shutter doors’ damage in the laundry area plus . . . mold.
We also had the headache of the insurance company, who paid “nada”. Needless to say, they are history now.
Almost done with the flooded area’s baseboards. Waiting on more shutters :slight_smile: but other than that, we’re good to go. Next project: upgrade of the pool, spa and electrical lighting. Then we can address 1st floor (kitchen, family, living and dining rooms and fireplaces). Waiting until we get more cash to do those areas.

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$15k for carpet. Now I don’t feel too bad about paying almost 4 times that for our very complex metal roofing project that included new gutters and downspouts as well. We got three bids, and they were within $1k!

These youngsters are lucky to have @coralbrook working her magic.

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We have finished tearing up the floors, digging trenches, installing new ABS drain lines, sand around ABS pipes, close up trenches and pour concrete. Unfortunately, the original builder put the copper water pipes only 1" down from floor inside only 2" of concrete slab. The water lines are running through the concrete slab, rather than below the slab in the dirt. Guess what, we hit 3 water lines while trying to cut through the concrete slab. As far as I can tell, there is no rebar in this thin concrete foundation. But, there is no evidence of any shifting or cracks, so we just have to go with what they’ve got.

Still have to move some copper water lines for new bathtub and shower. It took 11 days because we had a long drain line going over into the garage for laundry and we had to replace all the sink and toilet plumbing also. The bathtub, shower and toilet locations moved and we had to tie everything into the existing iron vent pipes going up through the ceiling.

Next weekend we have to dig up the front yard, about 4 to 5 ft down to trench out to attach to the city line. That’s going to take 2 days x 3 guys.

I think the total cost will be $10,500. That is compared to the $23,000 a big plumbing company had quoted them for lining the pipes only and not going the last 10 feet through front yard. I have no idea how anyone could do this while living in the house. There were giant piles of dirt and rock in every room and wet concrete dust flying from the concrete saw. It’s everywhere on the walls. I’m guessing a plumbing company would convince homeowners that they could ‘re-line’ the pipes underground but when we pulled the old pipes out they just crumbled at the touch, not to mention they were cracked everywhere. I don’t know if lining would have worked.

I loaded some photos but they are not interesting :slight_smile:

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The owner can pitch in… help with digging the trench. :slight_smile:

At what age of house do you have to worry about old pipes crumbling?

The main issue with these cast iron pipes was that the house was vacant for 10 years. If water is not flowing the pipes will corrode and flake on the inside and start closing up. I’m sure it’s different in different regions of soil types and temperatures but I think 70 years is max

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Those photos are the most interesting IMO! :slight_smile:

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Following along with great interest here. Regarding cast iron pipes, I have some in my basement leading to outside drains that I would assume are original with the house, which will be 100 years old in 5 years. Rotorooter was here today, and stated my old clay sewer main should be ok for a long while yet.

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I’m very sorry Coralbrook that your trip is postponed again. It sounds like a fun group of ladies.

There is an original clay pipe in front yard that finishes last 20 ft to City main line under the street. Per the camera scope the clay pipe is in good condition except for a little root invasion. We have to dig out to that clay pipe and connect to it

We are finally done with the major repairs on this project. Here is what the owner asked for at the beginning:

Replace cast iron drain lines. Well, after two weeks of jack hammering, digging, plumbing and digging a huge huge 6 ft deep trench in front yard, we are done. What really happend is then it morphed into ‘let’s switch toilet location’, we need a bigger vanity (move sink plumbing), let’s replace the bathtub, we need to add a new water heater, we need to add a laundry sink and on and on. Original estimate was $12,000. Somehow we got it all done for $9,500!!! I’m very proud of that. We never did make it to the clay pipe. We had to stop digging at the sidewalk and tie into the original cast iron 4" sewer line.

Ground outlets. Ohh boy, this has morphed into the whole house being rewired, adding outlets everywhere, owner suddenly wants a 220 dedicated circuit in the garage for his tools, add 5 outlets to his garage, add fans and lighting to bathroom, whole new panel because now we have to upgrade for all the new circuits, etc. My original estimate was just $2,000 to ground critical outlets in the office and kitchen. We are going to come in around $8,000 for all the electrical work. That doesn’t even include installing lighting which I know they will add back onto our place because they claimed they were going to do that to save money.

Because of rewiring the whole house we became a swiss cheese nightmare with holes in the drywall and ceiling everywhere. It is costing about $2,500 to patch, replace drywall, mud, sand and texture. Once again the owners had announced that their brother could do all the drywall patching and mudding, but that didn’t happen so we are scrambling to get that done in order to install the flooring

We opened up the ceiling and installed a huge beam for structural support. For someone thinking of opening up their kitchen, the cost was about $1,100 for the beam and materials and about $1,200 labor. We had to buy six 4x4 posts in order to build a temporary structure to hold up the roof which we tore everything apart. Out of everything, the owner is angry that we didn’t use old existing 2x4’s lying around. We tried to explain we needed strong support. We cannot return the 4x4s because we had to cut them 2 inches to build the structure. These things just happen, it’s part of the job.

We kept one remaining post that is actually needed to create a shaft to bring the gas lines and electrical wires down into the new island.

Photos loaded

Cost so far: $30,000 but the owners are buying a lot of the stuff

I managed to get custom cabinets built in our time frame for $9,000 in a combination of natural maple and a beautiful Sherwin Williams Tempe Star paint color. The caveat was we had to agree to drive 2 hrs north to pick them up from the shop

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Love that color!

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The homeowners are so lucky you guys fixed the plumbing and were able to scour options to find nice affordable cabinets—they sure can be expensive! It’s looking great!

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The owner wanted to keep the wallpaper in the bathroom?! :flushed: :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

Yes, and the matching wallpaper in primary bedroom. To each his own. We touched it and it’s disintegrating. I’m just leaving it alone

@coralbrook: You’re amazing.

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I was surprised about the owner wanting to keep that original vanity. It’s painted plywood! My FIL had the same/similar cabinets. Their house was built in 1961 (Del Cerro area) They are horrible tacky cabinets.

As for the beams: they look strong and look like they will last a LOT longer than slimmer 2 x 4 wood that has been sitting dry in a drought, supporting rat feces.

That tacky wallpaper . . . . . . really??? Wrong time to be cheap a$$. Now that things can be done, they really need to put their money into something decent. Is the brother going to repair these walls “too”?
I grew up with limited means, but my Dad always advised us to put our money into our homes since we would be spending so much time in them and you want to feel comfortable in your own home.

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“Penny wise and pound foolish” describes this homeowner well.

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But IIRC, this homeowner is a young couple with no money. What else would you have them do??

From cb’s first post:

"The buyers have been looking for over 9 months desperately trying to buy their first home. They have been outbid or had to back out of escrows. This house was listed at $599,000 which is in an older neighborhood in an inland community called Fletcher Hills which is technically in the City of El Cajon. It is not the most desireable neighborhood, I would consider it mid range but pretty far inland in San Diego.

In order to get the house they offered $635,000 with no contingencies. It was the only way to get considered. They asked me to come look at the house after they went into contract. I took one look at the house and asked them how long it had been vacant. There were tell tale signs. Later they found out that the house had been vacant for over 10 years and it was never disclosed in the disclosures. That is a big red flag."

I think just making the place livable, clean and SAFE would be a first goal-that has been partially completed by @coralbrook .

Doing things piecemeal, when the budget allows, would work. They work full time and can only do things on the weekends. They’ve been relying on unreliable family help and have had to pay more, overall, because of it.

Trying to do things half-way, to cut costs, will only result in more costs. We learned that with our remodel and, in the end, appreciated the information when it was explained to us.

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