A little over two weeks ago, we put an offer on a house. It's this cute little craftsman house built in 1913. Yep, it's 100 years young. I went all nerdy on it and started researching it's history, and found out that the original owner built it in 1913 for $3,500. Yeah, you read that right. $3,500. Stupid inflation, we could have paid cash for that house. Le sigh.
Turns out the original owner was a harness maker and worked for the Minneapolis Fire Department's repair shop. Now I'm picturing those steamy fire fighters on Chicago Fire...think he was anything like that? Doubtful.
Anyways, it's in foreclosure, which means it's owned by a bank, which means we get work with the bank. SO MUCH FUN (sarcasm). Banks have a tendency to be suuuuuper slow about things sometimes, and we've already started to experience that. We put our offer in over two weeks ago. They verbally accepted our offer, and they changed the status of the listing on the MLS, but they have yet to sign and return the paperwork.
This puts us in a really weird position. You see, technically, we don't have an accepted offer on the house until it's all signed and legal. But, we also plan to do a bunch of renovations that have to start immediately when we move in. We're going to be hiring a contractor to do all the big things (build a garage, add new plumbing, re-wire electrical, fix a part of the roof), and then we're going to do everything else ourselves (remodel the kitchen, add a master bathroom, build a third room, finish a basement...the list goes on).
In order to allow the contractor to start right when we close, we need to make a lot of design decisions now...before we even have the home. Yeah, makes me a little nervous too. I feel like I'm jinxing it whenever I sit down and start designing. A lot of the renovations we'll wait on and do later, but we have to have the kitchen all planned out, as well as the master bathroom, so we know where the plumbing rough-ins will go.
I'm not going to reveal any before pictures of the house until we have signed paperwork and we've passed inspection, because I don't want to get too ahead of myself and get too excited before anything is official. You will, however, get a glimpse of what I plan for the house via upcoming blog posts over the next few weeks (because those ideas could be translated into a different house should this one fall through).
Okay, I lied. I'll leave you with one picture. And spoiler alert: there may be a few other sneak peeks popping up on Instagram over the next few weeks should you be really curious.
Turns out the original owner was a harness maker and worked for the Minneapolis Fire Department's repair shop. Now I'm picturing those steamy fire fighters on Chicago Fire...think he was anything like that? Doubtful.
Anyways, it's in foreclosure, which means it's owned by a bank, which means we get work with the bank. SO MUCH FUN (sarcasm). Banks have a tendency to be suuuuuper slow about things sometimes, and we've already started to experience that. We put our offer in over two weeks ago. They verbally accepted our offer, and they changed the status of the listing on the MLS, but they have yet to sign and return the paperwork.
This puts us in a really weird position. You see, technically, we don't have an accepted offer on the house until it's all signed and legal. But, we also plan to do a bunch of renovations that have to start immediately when we move in. We're going to be hiring a contractor to do all the big things (build a garage, add new plumbing, re-wire electrical, fix a part of the roof), and then we're going to do everything else ourselves (remodel the kitchen, add a master bathroom, build a third room, finish a basement...the list goes on).
In order to allow the contractor to start right when we close, we need to make a lot of design decisions now...before we even have the home. Yeah, makes me a little nervous too. I feel like I'm jinxing it whenever I sit down and start designing. A lot of the renovations we'll wait on and do later, but we have to have the kitchen all planned out, as well as the master bathroom, so we know where the plumbing rough-ins will go.
I'm not going to reveal any before pictures of the house until we have signed paperwork and we've passed inspection, because I don't want to get too ahead of myself and get too excited before anything is official. You will, however, get a glimpse of what I plan for the house via upcoming blog posts over the next few weeks (because those ideas could be translated into a different house should this one fall through).
Okay, I lied. I'll leave you with one picture. And spoiler alert: there may be a few other sneak peeks popping up on Instagram over the next few weeks should you be really curious.
Sounds like you've got some projects in your future! Good luck and I hope everything goes well with the bank!
ReplyDeletei LOVE finding sweet houses like this around here in minneapolis! you cant pass up some of the charm these houses have!
ReplyDeleteMy hubby has an Electrical and HVAC Co.
ReplyDeletehas done many re wires on homes in that area
info@dependableelectricinc.com
Tell him I said to give you a good deal
Tracey
My hubby has an Electrical and HVAC Co.
ReplyDeletehas done many re wires on homes in that area
info@dependableelectricinc.com
Tell him I said to give you a good deal
Tracey