Bought a house

[Dartman]

Well I've posted about this a a few small forums I use and figured you guys would want to hear it as well, I BOUGHT A HOUSE My property manager sent us a 60 day get out notice back about early June and it took till end of August to find a affordable and acceptable house to buy. Property manager said she'd work with us if we needed more time, I said I'd buy the crappy house we were in IF the price was reasonable, and also found a buyers agent and started the search.
Turns out the owner wanted 50k more then my old house would ever be worth, then the property manager wouldn't give us any more time when I told her we were having trouble finding another affordable house to move to with about a month to go on our no fault get out notice, I offered to continue paying rent and mowing the yard till we found something even.
We did find the place we are in now finally but it was a accidental find when my Realtor was out of town so her backup guy, who we had used to look at one house before and really liked also, showed us a house then said let me show you another house close by I think you'll like.
It was a Manufactured home, on it's own small plot in a nice area, no garage or on site storage like I needed, but all the important stuff was new or replaced and it had been installed properly on a foundation and never moved since new in 96.
We decided to go for it as compared to all the other fixer uppers we looked at everything was nice, the inside was mostly brand new, and it has 4 bedrooms and 1400 sf. Our old place was 864sf two bedroom with a small car port made into a garage.
I rented a big pod, and eventually a 17 foot U Haul box truck once we had everything pretty much secured, the property manager took us to court because we didn't get out on the assigned day, even after we called and told her we had a house now but were just waiting for it to close and we'd gladly pay the rent till we had the new house at the end of August.
We made a deal with her lawyer at the hearing and eventually got till the 26th of august to get out, and we did pay the rent till that date
The house ended up closing late, we had to RENT 3 days early so we could move in before our new get out date and the whole family came out and helped us move to our new place, then we had the pod brought over and started unpacking our stuff as much as we could.
The property manager wasn't too happy of course as we ran out of garbage can space and had to just make piles of leftovers which we were going to pack up or have someone take later but she never bothered to show up on the assigned day and hour to get the keys or ask about what we were going to do with the extra stuff, or the next day either, and we stayed late to make sure the inside of the house was empty and get my extra cars moved over to the neighbors who was nice enough to let me park them beside his house for a few days till I could get insurance on them for a temporary move.
SO anyways we are now all moved over, the cars are here, I'm having a small storage shed built on October 10th that should hold all our extra crap, the house is huge inside compared to our old one, has new double pane windows, siding, sub floor, carpet, stainless steel appliances, roof, kitchen cabinets, etc.
They fixed most of the minor problems it still had before we moved in and the rest is small things I can deal with cheap all this for under 120k and 60 bucks less a month then we were paying to RENT our old place I sleep like a baby, it's very quite inside with the windows closed, it has extra insulation everywhere, and is just plain nice inside and out with a few things we'll eventually redo or replace but everything works fine as is.
I would have liked to be farther away from town with a bit more land but I think with the shed and some RV parking space graveled beside the house this will work great and the neighbors seem nice so far.
It's a FHA loan so all the taxes and insurance are paid when we send in our payment each month, the interest rate was very low, and it's fully assumable if we ever decide to sell out for another place, they get the same locked rate and deal we got.
Here's one of the listings for it, and we paid less then stated http://www.redfin.com/OR/Portland/12642 ... e/26322789 one with inside pics http://www.estately.com/sold/12642-se-boise-st

[Ian]

Congrats Dartman. Welcome to the (usually) wonderful world of house ownership. It looks like your lot is huge and you've got a park and what looks like a school nearby.

btw.. your old property manager sounds like a real bitch.

[Dartman]

Yeah, it's great, my cars barely fit and I have just enough room to put up the small shop/shed thing, which is a 12x16 with a 8 foot roll up door, one 2x2 window, a normal man door and a loft as it's a mini barn style. I think the property manager thought she was going to redo the house once they realized we weren't stupid enough to let the owner sell a 113k on a good day house for 150. Last I heard the door has been kicked in and all the work they started to do has stopped, it supposedly was getting repoed and sold at auction the 13th of this month for missed mortgage payments but last I checked online it's still listed in the owners name. He also owed 3 years of back property taxes and all the promised repairs before we moved never happened so I think they gave up and just pocketed all the extra money they made when she took over and jacked up our rent 300 bucks a month.
BUT I'M not bitter...
We must have checked online 30 or 40 houses and probably looked at close to 20, most were total Sh*&t holes that needed a lot of work just to be livable and safe, but our budget was low so that's what we were shown. My realtor finally said we don't have enough time left to find AND close on a house so lets look at short sales with only 1 bank involved and places closer in or farther out then you want and try to make a deal with the property manger or move in with family till we find the right place, which we were getting ready to do, then this place came up.
Because it was a trailer most banks wouldn't touch it, nice or not. The first bidders had to bow out because the VA wouldn't do a loan on it and we were next, my gal had a in house loan guy who was sharp and he COULD do it as long as it had never been moved and passed a normal and foundation inspection which it did on both just fine.
We used our IRA's to cover the down payment and improvements, which is allowed up to 10k per first time buyer, so luckily we had enough money available to have a decent down, but FHA only requires 3 percent so after talking to the loan guy I decided not to put 10k down as it would only lower our payments 30 bucks a month and the extra cash could be also be used for major improvements, like the storage shed and parking.
Looking forward to getting my shop up and the pod unloaded and gone and hoping the utilities bills don't kill us though this house is way tighter then our old one was so should be much more efficient to heat and run.
The other guy who showed us the place on a whim got a cut of her commission as she wouldn't have shown me this place and I wouldn't have asked to see it seeing how we both knew I needed a garage and parking.
When my mom came with us to see it she said you HAVE to buy this house, all I could say back was no garage, no parking, where will I put all our stuff? BUT eventually the place won me over as I finally realized I could build a small shop and gravel the area behind the car port for extra parking and the rest of the place is so nice compared to what we would have ended up in. I would have been fine with a cheap dumpy house that didn't leak as long as it had good parking and a nice shop but my sister lives here with me and has for years and she'd like something a bit more civilized
I was busy today re-caulking the tub and shower stall seams on my bathroom, I put up the big curtains in the front room yesterday, and we usually try to break open a box or figure out where things work best and need to go but it's hard when we both work full time. still have lots of mystery boxes out in the pod and still haven't found all the things I normally need yet. I couldn't even find my electric shaver for a week but nobody at work gave me any grief as my neck got shaggier and shaggier.
The coolest thing is when I'm doing forms and surveys I now get to check the box saying I OWN rather then rent

[Ian]

Just don't be like me and start a project and then finish it up 6 years later.

[Dartman]

Well I do have to figure out how I'm going to run the networing wires and things. At least the place has a easy access hatch on the outside to get under the house. The cable guy certainly was OK with it and I went under with him to help by tossing him tools and going up top to Make noise so he could reuse some leftover cable wiring rather then totally redo all the outlets. It was nice to be able to say he could punch holes if he needed to rather then worry about what the owner might do later.
I put some of my heavy but small car parts under there too as for now it's dry and safe, just not very tall so your crawling around in the dark with a light. I also need to chase down one of the cable wires that didn't get hooked up, he probably got the one for the other room that had a wire run against the wall.
I do have to call a gravel place or two and see what it will cost to get the parking area I want to make in front of the car port, and maybe have them make another leveled and graveled spot for the shed, then a fence one all that is done.
By the way, my lot isn't as big as it looks in the pics as they bought the whole area, mobile and all for 55k then remodeled this- place so they could afford to fix up and sell off the other parts of the original lot this place had. It's 51×110 and my old place had .23 aceres which was nice but a lot of work to mow.

[SithTracy]

Welcome to the homeowners club... glad to hear folks are starting to get loans again!

[Dartman]

Well I'm glad as well as now I have almost twice the house for less then my rent on a tiny dump was. It's still hard to get into a house as anything cheap has the damned flippers and other bargain huntets tryin to outbid each other.
We saw a few houses that we liked but most needed some work and already had 5 or more bidders lined up.
Even this had a bidder right after we toured it and our guy had been watching it sit for months because nobody wanted a manufactured home or they didn't like the fact that the yard is small and dirt with no landscaping.
Manufactured homes are harder to get a loan on plus they jack up your interest rate a quarter point
Lucky for us they also couldn't get approved. I was pretty frustrated as I finally found a house that I could live with and it looked like we were out of luck. My lil sister and her hubby kept saying not to worry as they were sure we'd get the house

[Dartman]

Latest update I got some gravel down Friday to make the RV parking strip beside the house, 12 yards in a huge dump truck and luckily the back yard is open all the way to the next street over so he just bounced over the curb and backed right up to the end of the car port and did a couple of dumps.
Was crushed asphalt and cost 211 bucks delivered and dumped. Best part was I stopped at their yard, the guy needed a general idea of the size of the area so he could not overdo the amount I needed. I went home and measured it approximately out and he agreed a full truck load was good and I was trying to decide which day the next week would work when he says you there now? I say yep and he says a drivers just got back so I'll have him pick up your load and bring it out now I had to move some crap around and get my van out of the spot and just as I'm getting out after moving it here comes the truck... couldn't have been 15 minutes after talking to him.
Tomorrow the shed guys show up to build my 12x16 mini barn and I have the day off so I can supervise/get in the way Hopefully having the gravel down will help them get a better pad and get things level. Next I need a fence and some paint for the shed. There is some left over paint from the redo of this place so depending on what it is I might be able to use it or I'll get something that works.
Guess I might have to post some pics of the shed and things but of course still don't have the inside of the house dialed in but at least we mostly have the living room figured out WHEEEEE!!!

[Dartman]

My mini barn is built!!! Took from 10am till about 9:30pm or so and I hung out and helped drag materials and BS'd with the two young builders. Great guys, fun to talk to and work with and I think they did a nice job. We fed them and gave them both tips seeing how this was one of their biggest standard builds and we all knew it was going to take a while.
They came from Salem out to my place in Portland so it was a hour drive in a flat bed work truck loaded just to get here.

[Dartman]

Well a few days ago I was under the house trying to find which outlet the cable guy forgot to hook up and heard a slow drip Turns out somewhere by the main feed shut off valve coming into the house there is a slow leak that was filling the plastic and insulation in that small area.
I poked a hole and a quart or so of water spilled out and the insulation close to the plastic is wet. Luckily one of the things included in our closing was a year of home repair insurance so a plumber is coming out this weds for 60 copay.
I also found out the heating flex line going over to the other side of the heating vents under the house has a huge hole in it so bought a new flex line and all the supplies and tools to fix it for about 150 and I'll do that one myself, wondered why only half the heat vents actually blew hot air when I tested it out after installing a nice programmable thermostat.
AAAH, home ownership... glad that insurance was included now and may have to reup when it expires next year if they treat me right on this one.

[Ian]

It's good that you caught that leak now and not after it caused a lot of damage.

Yeah, home ownership.. stuff like that never ends..

[Dartman]

Yeah, was under the house off and on till 12:30am last night as once I got the old flex pipe off the 90 degree adapters for both ends were rotted through and the outlet pipes on both ends were loose and falling off so got new 90 degree adapters, stopped at work and got my metal bending tools and a bunch of zip in screws and went nuts. It's hard to drive in self tapping screws when your laying on your back with a drop light, then I taped up all the joints with metalized vent tape, sealed up the inside edges of both vent pipes as best I could and put the 90's on. Today I'll do some more taping and probably also seal the joints with mastic sealer made for this kind of thing and get the flex pipe hooked up. I guess I'm HVAC guy now too I'm not even going to try the plumbing what with all the insulation under that heavy plastic, and it's PVC pipe anyways so I'll let the plumber figure it out and then probably repair all the insulation and plastic myself unless he will do that too. I should have bought two 90's as I figured the other end wasn't close to any water source so it should have been fine, WRONG, it was just not near as bad but I was under there anyways so might as well do it right even though I could have cheated and sealed up the small holes with some of that metal tape stuff, didn't trust the inlet pipe anyways after seeing how loose the other half was.
We install liners at work and they use similar but smaller parts so I have some experience with this kind of thing. Home Depot now sells almost all sizes and types of heat venting pipes and adapters too if anyone here is a major do it yourselfer and doesn't want to pay a furnace guy.
The one good thing is the heat should have way more air flow and actual hot air now that all the piping is back to new. I might take some pics later of the carnage, if I do I'll post a few.

[Wesociety]

Congrats on the new abode and mini-barn!

[Dartman]

Thanks Wes, good to see you pop in again Yep life is good now, house problems not withstanding, at least it's all MINE now. At least my economy is getting better and it seems most all of the local cheap houses here have been snapped up I've been watching so other folks must be doing somewhat better too

[Dartman]

OK, took some pics for your amusement

[Dartman]

A few more

[Ian]

Nice work. When you buy a house, you become the HVAC guy, plumber, carpenter and electrician all in one. Thank god for the internet though. I don't know what I'd do without it.

[Dartman]

Yeah, was pretty much the same when I rented anyways, anything I could do myself cheaply I did so as to not have to deal with the owner, if it was expensive I sent a receipt and he took it off the rent.
That's partly why I did this repair, it was cheap enough in parts and even taking me a few days it would be faster then getting a guy out here in the middle of busy season, even if the insurance paid for it, plus now I know exactly what was done.
All the vents now blow air fine, a few are a bit weaker but they all blow enough to do the job fine and it is a pretty big house and run.

[Dartman]

Well we ordered a fence yesterday They'll come the week after T day and set the post then come back later and do all the wood work. Spendy but quality cedar material with lifetime warranties on all of it.
6 foot high, 3/4 inch thick no 2 planks with 4x4 posts, two gates, one 10 foot wide for the cars in the back to drive through and a small one by the walk to the front door, and of course fence in the whole back yard.
I spose we could have done it ourselves but would have taken a while and a few trips in the van or pay to have everything delivered so just decided to step up and pay Should be real nice when done and no more easy access to everything in our yard for anyone walking by, though so far no problems.
Also found a small bit of dry rot/mouse hole in the inner door frame in the kitchen outside door that they tried to hide Might look at doing a quick fill with expanding foam and patch for now and either redo the area myself later or let the home insurance take care of it seeing how it's not going to make the door fall off or anything.
I'll post yet more pics when the fence is done.

[Ian]

That fence will come in handy when the zombie apocalypse begins.

[Dartman]

Yeah, but it will probably start from within through that mouse hole in the door... Little tiny ones then ramp up from there...

[Dartman]

Never posted the pics of my new fence

[Ian]

Nice fence. Is that a Dodge Dart I see back there?

[Dartman]

Well yes it is, a 69 Western Sport Special pretty much just like my avatar. Wes made it for me back when he was more active in all the forums. It's my forum handle and I've had it since 79. The red nose is a 78 3/4 ton Dodge van and there's a 71 Plymouth Scamp you can't see beside the Dart. Just found out I owe about 1k in taxes thanks to pulling out 10k to pay the down from my regular IRA
If I had bought earlier in the year the interest deduction probably would have taken care of it. Well next year I should get a good refund anyways...

[Dartman]

Well here's a few updates, been slowly filling up the shed and put most of the boxes and things we want to keep but never use up in the loft which cleared out almost all of the floor Got my weedwacker and lawn mower going and did the first mow job on the weeds/field grass in the back yard and whacked down the dandelions in the side by the car port out front. Been slowly unpacking and rearranging boxes to clear up areas and rooms.
The water bills here are stupid high because they combine the sewer and water together, tack on other things, then bill every 3 months we sold the 71 Scamp to a nice guy who appreciated what it was and all the spare parts to pay the taxes, then he bought some other rare parts I had stashed too so got 1500 for the car and 750 for the extra parts so taxes got paid and I have a few buck extra to coast on for a while. Really nice having all my important stuff locked away behind the fences and the mini barn is working out nicely and I haven't filled the loft up completely yet and still haven't put up the shelves on the walls though I have MOST of what I need to do them now.
My monthly mortgage payment went down 20 bucks a month because the property taxes were lower then estimated and escrow more then covered them so we got a refund check and a break on the payments going forward I might grab some more of the un needed crap in here and haul it out to the shed today and free up more space, I hit it when I have the energy and time so going slowly and trying to figure where things should be or what setups we want to use.
Still get along fine with both neighbors too, nice people and we still haven't explored our park though it mainly is a grass feild with a baseball diamond and some small trees.