![\"Kitchen-03Before_050213\"](\"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/ClaireWolfe\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Kitchen-03Before_050213-450x337.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nIt smelled worse. Mold covered walls in every room; some rooms were absolutely black with it. The real estate agent who showed me the place walked in the door — then turned around and walked right back out, refusing even to breathe the air. <\/p>\n
The roof leaked in three places. The enclosed porch sagged seven inches on one end. I could go on, but you get the picture.<\/p>\n
The house wasn’t even cute or well-built. It didn’t even have heat. There wasn’t a single closet. The only things it had going for it were: enormous, nearly new vinyl windows; plumbing and electric that actually worked (more or less); and the glorious bit of land it sat on.<\/p>\n
The bank (because of course this was a foreclosure) was asking $35,000 at the time. No freakin’ way. The house was closer to a tearer-downer than a fixer-upper. Still, it was … interesting. Especially because of its location.<\/p>\n
Over the next two months, the price dropped. To $25,000. Then to $17,000. Still no takers. Few people were even looking. Then it dropped to $9,900 — and on that day a bunch of vultures who’d been watching the place jumped in. <\/p>\n
I bid $10,000 — and lost.<\/p>\n
I forgot about it and moved on. I looked at some bare land and at a metal pole building that had the prospect of being an interesting conversion. But nothing was affordable, not when all the other costs were considered.<\/p>\n
Then two months later, my sharp-eyed real estate agent called. “Get over here right now. That house is back on the market.”<\/p>\n
It turned out that the winning bidder had spent nearly two months jerking the bank around. Somehow he managed to get extension after extension out of them and never even sent them his earnest money. He’d even gotten them to pay for a septic test (which, remarkably, it passed), all while giving them zero. The bank’s asset manager was now livid — and desperate to get rid of the place.<\/p>\n
They accepted my $10,000 offer — on the condition that I close in one week<\/i>. Which, thanks to desperate scrambling and a rapid loan from one of my clients, I did.<\/p>\n
Not long after, I was able to sell the other place. I paid back my wonderful client and came away with a little cash to spend on the most urgent repairs (including, most immediately, the three active roof leaks; I wasn’t surprised — though I was dismayed and not prepared — when more roof problems showed up this year).<\/p>\n
The first months I spent almost entirely on cleanup. My buddy L. gave me the world’s most appropriate housewarming gift — three giant bottles of bleach from Costco. Furrydoc contributed surgical masks. I scrubbed. And I tore down. It required two months and much opening of windows and positioning of fans, just to get rid of the mold reek.<\/p>\n
I moved in shortly after concluding that the air wouldn’t rot my lungs. Slept on a cot in the living room because I wasn’t trusting that (one and only) bedroom.<\/p>\n
Since then I’ve drywalled and insulated and painted and trimmed and shingled and planned — and yes, hired experts to do the heavy lifting and do the “keep the floors from collapsing” parts. And if anybody wants to dis me for not DIYing enough, go ahead and dis. I’ve been too busy and I’m too old for biting those 2x4s into shape.<\/p>\n
—–<\/p>\n
Now parts of the house look like this:<\/p>\n
![\"Kitchen-DiningRoom_After-InProgress_092114\"](\"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/ClaireWolfe\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Kitchen-DiningRoom_After-InProgress_092114-450x337.jpeg\")
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