biggerboat's building boondoggle blog
I started this in H&F but this seems a better place for it. These are my H&F posts. A bit long-winded but hopefully entertaining. I'm sure more hilarity will ensue.
I've been debating about doing this, and I sort of thought it might qualify as health and/or fitness so I'm gonna do it.
A little background. I have a very old house that I started to remodel about 10 years ago, then ran out of money and WIM to finish it. I gutted it completely and moved walls and did a lot of interior work. But I never did anything with the exterior.
It is sort of falling apart now. The roof leaks and a lot of the wood siding is so rotten I can stick my finger through it. It needs to be completely replaced.
I just paid the house off so I can sort of afford to completely re-side and re-roof it..............if I do it myself. Another factor is I just got out of a serious relationship and now I have way too much time on my hands. I'm going a little stir crazy.
Now to the health tie-in. The last few years I just haven't been able to do things like this. I used to be able to work sunrise to sundown. But lately I'd be good for about 2 or 3 hours and my back would just tell me to stop. However, due to this forum, my back is really feeling strong again. I think I'm up for the challenge. The other health aspect is mental. I don't feel good unless I have some sort of challenge like this. It gives me something to look forward to. I'm really needing something like this about now.
So, I think I'll sort of log this activity as well as lifting. I'll have to cut back on lifting/running some. Mostly due to time considerations. I'll be working on the house on Saturday/Sunday so no lifting/running on those days.
I haven't committed to this quite yet, but I think I'm close.
On the house front. I went to the city website to see what permits I'll need. It was so confusing that I called, got an answering machine, and never got a call back. So, I went down to city hall to ask some very basic questions. Apparently the appropriate question answerers are only there MWF but a substitute question answerer was available. So, after waiting 1/2 hour the substitute question answerer informed me that he couldn't really answer my question so he told me to come back when the real question answerer was there.
I suspect this will not be healthy in any way.
I tweaked my back Wednesday doing deadlifts.
The back pain has nothing on the pain the city is inflicting on me, though.
Went back to talk to someone again. I at least got the right day. The girl was really friendly and helpful. However, she seemed to not really know what all I was supposed to do. Which, as you will see, nobody could.
The first thing she did was pull up my address.
Apparently, there were 3 expired permits associated with my house. About 10 (or more) years ago, I did a big remodel. I did it mostly myself. The first permit was for an interior remodel. I had to get electrical, plumbing, framing and probably more permits. I remember having each one signed off on. However, apparently there was a final inspection that I never got. This is just conjecture based on what she said and my hazy memory. The second was for a garage. I hired a contractor to pour the slab and I framed and finished it. Apparently the slab inspection failed but the framing inspection passed. I'm not sure how this happens. I really don't recall any of this. The third one was for a bedroom addition. I never did this. I do not recall even applying for this. But, it is there. More on this later.
So I asked a lot of questions and the girl was very polite when she had to repeatedly excuse herself to ask someone else that knew the answers. From what I gathered I can do most of the work on something they call an express permit. However, if I want add a small porch roof I will need site drawings, impervious cover documents, elevation drawings, detailed framing plans and flood plain people approval. At minimum.
Back to the old permits. The girl indicated that I could fill out a form to remove the permit for the addition since I never did it. She then sent me to someone named Tony on another floor to figure out what to do with the other ones. Tony, it seems, did not have his coffee this morning. Either that or he was just an *******. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. He told me they couldn't do anything about any of them since he had no idea if I even did any work or not. Which is problematic since I can't get any new permits with these on their computer. After much discussion he agreed to go back downstairs and talk to the friendly girl. Tony then came up and informed me that I needed a Life Safety for Expired Permit permit. He informed me that I needed to go back where I started (the line that I waited over an hour in) to start this process.
So, I go back to the window and explain to them what Tony said. They seemed a bit confused on exactly what a Life Safety for Expired Permit permit was. So, they suggested that what I really need to do is re-submit all three permits and get inspections on the work I did over 10 years ago. Even if I didn't do the work. They then put my name in the computer to talk to someone. However, the number of people waiting had swelled considerably and I had already been there 2 1/2 hours so I think I'll tackle this another day.
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Well, that was a decision we made 2 years ago. The cost of insurance is astronomical here. We figure it's cost us about three years of what we would have spent on premiums and there's no guarantee we would get much of anything for a claim. There are so many stories of people not getting anything or very little.
Our biggest loss was the cars and we both got paid some for those through our car insurance.
Closet finished. I'm really happy on how they turned out.
bb, do you think it's likely you'll just have to redo all this stuff again in 3 years?
You got some FEMA money didn't you?
That closet looks awesome. Great job.
Thats the question my wife and I keep asking ourselves. Our plan right now is to try and seal up the house if it looks like a storm surge is imminent. We figure we can do it in a day. We bought a bunch of window flashing tape and tarps and caulk. We'll just try to make it as watertight as possible. We dont have to stop the water, just slow it down. I figured we were getting about 50 gallons a minute in the last storm. If we can cut that to 5 we'll be ok.
Also, we got over 8 feet of storm surge and it was high tide. We know what that means now. That's quite a bit. We'll just monitor storms and take action if we need to.
Oh, yeah. Well take our cars to her dad's. He has an elevated parking garage at his condo.
We have a plan. Not sure if it's a good one but we'll see.
We just can't justify raising the house right now.
Closet looks great. Next time you want to escape Florida, c'mon up; I can put your skills to use. 😉
Closet looks great. Next time you want to escape Florida, c'mon up; I can put your skills to use. 😉
Hehe thanks.
It's been a LOT of work, but the house is in pretty good shape now. The only major things left are to put the bar cabinets in, finish up the kitchen facing, and put closet bifold doors in. We are waiting on all the materials to be completed/shipped. We have a lot of little touch-up stuff and some painting but the house is close to being finished.
We figure almost half of the houses in our neighborhood are still uninhabited. Our next door neighbors to the left were the first to get back in after us. They've been in for a couple months now, but just now have a working kitchen. Our next door neighbors to the right just moved back in last week. I'm not sure what the state of their house is, but they have 2 very small children and a newborn so I'm guessing they at least have a kitchen and bathrooms. They had been living in a camper. Yikes.
The neighbors across the street are still not in. One of them owns a rental property that also got flooded and they have been concentrating on getting that back so they can get income. They are living with relatives. Directly across from us, no clue. They don't live there full time so I assume they have another house. People are working on it. The people next to them were moving along until they got their cabinets. They sent the wrong cabinets so they have to re-order. It's been taking about 2 months to get cabinets around here. They are living in a crappy apartment, the fourth place they've had to live because they have a dog and people complain. Makes no sense because it's the most chill dog you could ever meet. Never barks, sweet as can be. But it is big and people complain. The people in the apartment above them are apparently very noisy at all hours so they are miserable. Plus, they had a murder in the complex parking lot recently. Not a great situation. The people next to them are going to bulldoze their house I think.
Anyway, the neighborhood is on one hand a bit of a ghost town at night, but on the other hand there's a flurry of activity during the day from contractors.
We hope we've put the big repair purchases behind us now. We still don't have much furniture. I guess that's our next step.
Oh, yeah, plumbing......
During the holidays when, of course, people were staying with us, the plumbing backed up. This is the third time it has happened. Fortunately, I was able to plunge the blockage out.
A lot of folks in the neighborhood have had to replace their sewage pipes. They are old iron pipes and have already exceeded their normal life span. The plumber that re-did our incoming water pipes said he would run a camera through ours free of charge, so I took him up on it.
A somewhat sigh of relief. He said there were no roots in any pipes, and none had failed. He said there is some build-up from the iron pipes corroding but it wasn't too bad. He didn't think we needed to replace them any time soon, but he also didn't think they would be good for a long time. He offered to run some sort of cleaning machine through them for four grand. Replacing them will be a LOT more expensive. I think I'll leave them be for a while.
We are still considering raising the house so if we make that decision, the sewage pipes will be a lot cheaper to replace. Our homeowner association is hosting a company that raises houses for a presentation and Q&A in a few weeks. Also, my neighbor is having another company come give them an assessment. I'm probably going to do that as well.
1) "Define long time. Maybe it's longer than I have left, and I won't care."
2) Misread the first paragraph initially as "razing". WTF, just put in that new kitchen....
If you raise the house, the parking is underneath like in the Keys, I assume. Is there any way to build in something like the boat lift, to keep cars (more) out of water if there's flooding again?
1) "Define long time. Maybe it's longer than I have left, and I won't care."
2) Misread the first paragraph initially as "razing". WTF, just put in that new kitchen....
If you raise the house, the parking is underneath like in the Keys, I assume. Is there any way to build in something like the boat lift, to keep cars (more) out of water if there's flooding again?
1) 10 years.......may...beee....
So, a lot of people raise the house enough to park underneath like in the keys. However, people are also choosing to raise it even higher, put a bunch of dirt down and raise the bottom level as well so you can drive up into the garage. The house two streets over is doing this (I think). I'll take pictures next time I'm over there.
Another day, another teardown...
I had a thought about all of this. We've gone through a lot of stuff with this. And, as long as we live here we'll be worried about hurricanes several months of the year.
But I'd still rather deal with this than live next to an airbnb.
Started back on my book again. It's probably good that I set it aside for a bit. Coming back refreshed.
The LA fires got a little personal.
My sister lives south of Malibu. She's out of danger but she can see the palisades fire from her house and the area is full of smoke.
Her best friend had to evacuate from the Eaton fire and is staying with her, along with her husband and his 94 year old mother. They watched the mother's home burn down on TV. The husband went back last night to try to protect their home. I don't know the outcome yet.
My niece lives on Hollywood Blvd and she had to evacuate as well. She went to my sister's but it was slow getting out of the area. She's safe and the apartment she lives in seems OK for now. It is so close that we watched one of the reporters reporting from the roof of her building.
I told my sister we all need to find a disasterless part of the country to live in.
My wife and I have decided to try to get only good wood furniture from here on out. Her old hoosier survived the flood without any evidence of water damage. On the other hand we tossed anything that wasn't solid wood. That compressed wood stuff just disintegrated.
We went antiquing last weekend. We found a great little bookshelf thing for her cookbooks. It matched the hoosier and it fit a space we had open. The store said it was late 1800s. No clue if that is true but it is solid as a rock and was cheaper than buying anything similar new.
Then we bought a couple of bare wood bedside tables that she plans on staining. Again, cheaper than any rooms to go tables.
I like that shelf. Very nice.
Thanks.
Here's the house by us getting raised.
jfc that looks like egypt
I got an email from a recruiter today for a part time, 100% remote position at the state agency in Texas I worked at for many years. They are looking for someone with experience in the language and their systems.
I sent the guy my resume and he immediately responded. Turns out the manager making the decision is one of the people there I got along with quite well.
Not sure I'll like going back to work, but it will be nice to get some of this storm related debt paid off.
Um, congratulations?
Hopefully part-time really means part-time, and it doesn't become, "we're going to send a never-ending stream of issues to boat because he's reliable."
Um, congratulations?
Hopefully part-time really means part-time, and it doesn't become, "we're going to send a never-ending stream of issues to boat because he's reliable."
Yeah, right?
I honestly don't know. It's the state and in the past they were really laid back. "It'll wait until tomorrow" was the motto. Who knows.
If it happens I'll just work until I don't want to anymore.
