Me: You packed your goddamned cell phone, Bobby?
Bobby: I didn't know I was packing it.
Husband: He is eligible for an upgrade.
Bobby: Cool, what upgrade can I get?
Me: You can get the kind of upgrade one gets when one packs their goddamn cell phone.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Color (Colors) Colors ... and Layout
Architect Josh is working on the site plan review, which is how the city determines that the usage of the property will conform to zoning standards. For example, since we have three units (two apartments and the main house) the site plan needs to reflect there is enough off-street parking. The site plan review is supposed to be ready by next Wednesday, and it may take a few weeks to get approval. While this is going on, though, we can submit plans for the basement apartment.
And that's good, because the bank that rhymes with Chase has finally, after 18 months of agony and runaround and all-around nastiness for our friends, accepted the short-sale offer on their place. Assuming it appraises at the offer level, it should close by mid-March. That's when we'll be homeless, so we need to move fast on the basement apartment. We could all stay with Chuck's mom until the apartment is done, but there's a little problem in that she has cats and I have the worst cat allergy imaginable.
Our contractor was going to show up on Feb. 22 to start exterior painting, but it's supposed to rain every day next week. He's going to wait until there's a three day window of clear weather and start then, which should be March 3. In the meantime, click on the picture and roll over to the notes on the pic to see what the colors will be and where the colors are going. We're going with Glidden, and Glidden's website doesn't make it easy to share stuff on a blog, but the three exterior colors are Dove White, Toasted White and Onyx Black for the trim highlights.
Below is the layout of the first floor. Architect Josh has some of the rooms mislabeled, but that's more a matter of our personal choice for where we want the rooms to be. What he has labeled as the dining room, for example, makes sense as the dining room, but it's where we're planning on having the family room. It's larger, has a fireplace and there's room for the hellaciously cheap (I mean seriously inexpensive) projection system we picked up off of Craigslist. (College kid won it in a golf tournament auction, college kid needed the cash for tuition more than he needed a projector and screen. And thus he sold it to us for a fraction of the original cost.) Lost looks awesome projected on a wall.
The area labeled Master Bedroom 2 is actually one of the apartments. The other apartment is a basement unit below that, with a separate entrance.
The room labeled as the living room on the plans will be a library/sitting room, and the family room will be the dining room. Next to the stairs, that weird little sink area is a pantry, with space for dry storage under the stairs. It leads into the laundry room.
Upstairs floor plan. The boys will take the two front bedrooms and share the middle bathroom. Oldest wants the turret room, of course; youngest will take the other room that doesn't have a turret but does have a gas fireplace. And we're in the back two rooms.
Oldest just commented: I really want to be living in our house. I know how he feels. It's been a long, strange trip to get even this far, and it's weird to own a house you can't actually live in. Yet, anyway.
And that's good, because the bank that rhymes with Chase has finally, after 18 months of agony and runaround and all-around nastiness for our friends, accepted the short-sale offer on their place. Assuming it appraises at the offer level, it should close by mid-March. That's when we'll be homeless, so we need to move fast on the basement apartment. We could all stay with Chuck's mom until the apartment is done, but there's a little problem in that she has cats and I have the worst cat allergy imaginable.
Our contractor was going to show up on Feb. 22 to start exterior painting, but it's supposed to rain every day next week. He's going to wait until there's a three day window of clear weather and start then, which should be March 3. In the meantime, click on the picture and roll over to the notes on the pic to see what the colors will be and where the colors are going. We're going with Glidden, and Glidden's website doesn't make it easy to share stuff on a blog, but the three exterior colors are Dove White, Toasted White and Onyx Black for the trim highlights.
Below is the layout of the first floor. Architect Josh has some of the rooms mislabeled, but that's more a matter of our personal choice for where we want the rooms to be. What he has labeled as the dining room, for example, makes sense as the dining room, but it's where we're planning on having the family room. It's larger, has a fireplace and there's room for the hellaciously cheap (I mean seriously inexpensive) projection system we picked up off of Craigslist. (College kid won it in a golf tournament auction, college kid needed the cash for tuition more than he needed a projector and screen. And thus he sold it to us for a fraction of the original cost.) Lost looks awesome projected on a wall.
The area labeled Master Bedroom 2 is actually one of the apartments. The other apartment is a basement unit below that, with a separate entrance.
The room labeled as the living room on the plans will be a library/sitting room, and the family room will be the dining room. Next to the stairs, that weird little sink area is a pantry, with space for dry storage under the stairs. It leads into the laundry room.
Upstairs floor plan. The boys will take the two front bedrooms and share the middle bathroom. Oldest wants the turret room, of course; youngest will take the other room that doesn't have a turret but does have a gas fireplace. And we're in the back two rooms.
Oldest just commented: I really want to be living in our house. I know how he feels. It's been a long, strange trip to get even this far, and it's weird to own a house you can't actually live in. Yet, anyway.
Friday, February 5, 2010
Et Fin
So the email came today, wire transfer complete and title recorded. The house is 100 percent officially ours.
And even though it's pretty much screwed up the industry by which I make my living, can I just say, "Thank God for Craigslist?" Because thanks to Craig and his list, we are buying about $15k worth of appliances for about $2k -- 36-inch Thermador five-burner cooktop for $275; Thermador double ovens, only used twice and in pristine condition, victim of a kitchen remodel, $475; new in box range hood, victim of a client that changed her mind, $500; brand new JennAir refrigerator, from a new homeowner who changed his mind, $750. The frige alone goes for $2200 new, so considering our appliance budget is $3k, I think we're in good shape.
We need to buy a stackable washer and dryer set for the upstairs apartment, but I think we can find those used and in good condition as well. The upstairs apartment will get our current stove, refrigerator and dishwasher, and then we need to find appliances for the basement apartment.
Decorator Grady and the architect are meeting tomorrow to go over the kitchen design and talk about a few other things, including adding closets and a doorway in the master bedroom. Every room is overlit--since it was going to be an office building, they went nuts adding can lighting fixtures in every room, so they're going to talk about dialing that back a notch or two as well.
On Sunday, we choose exterior paint colors. I thought the contractor only included a single color in his budget, but it turns out he planned for three, which is great news because Chuck is afraid of heights, and I don't want to overtax the one friend who offered to break out his mountain climbing gear and scale the building. Grady is thinking cream, bright white trim and black accents, but I'm not sure. It's a big crazy house, and I want to make sure the colors are right.
So we're happy. There were so many times when I thought this thing was going to fall apart, and we finally made it to the finish line. The financial finish line, anyway--now comes the fun part.
My friend Jay keeps referring to the place as "the compound" and he's not too far off. It's big, but there are reasons for it. We want to be able to grow a lot of our own food, and there's room for that here. I have a sister 20 years older than me who for reasons I won't go into here is going to need to be taken care of after our mother dies. There's room for that here too. With the state of California's economy and the higher education system, I envision kids who are going to be living with me for awhile even after college. (Or maybe that's just wishful thinking. I left home when I was 17 to go to college, and except for vacations, I never moved back. I will miss my frustrating little hoseheads when they go.)
And if the zombie apocalypse ever happens, we're going to put our friend Kyle the Marine on the widow's walk with a .50-cal, and our friend Sean the Ex-marine on the perimeter.
And even though it's pretty much screwed up the industry by which I make my living, can I just say, "Thank God for Craigslist?" Because thanks to Craig and his list, we are buying about $15k worth of appliances for about $2k -- 36-inch Thermador five-burner cooktop for $275; Thermador double ovens, only used twice and in pristine condition, victim of a kitchen remodel, $475; new in box range hood, victim of a client that changed her mind, $500; brand new JennAir refrigerator, from a new homeowner who changed his mind, $750. The frige alone goes for $2200 new, so considering our appliance budget is $3k, I think we're in good shape.
We need to buy a stackable washer and dryer set for the upstairs apartment, but I think we can find those used and in good condition as well. The upstairs apartment will get our current stove, refrigerator and dishwasher, and then we need to find appliances for the basement apartment.
Decorator Grady and the architect are meeting tomorrow to go over the kitchen design and talk about a few other things, including adding closets and a doorway in the master bedroom. Every room is overlit--since it was going to be an office building, they went nuts adding can lighting fixtures in every room, so they're going to talk about dialing that back a notch or two as well.
On Sunday, we choose exterior paint colors. I thought the contractor only included a single color in his budget, but it turns out he planned for three, which is great news because Chuck is afraid of heights, and I don't want to overtax the one friend who offered to break out his mountain climbing gear and scale the building. Grady is thinking cream, bright white trim and black accents, but I'm not sure. It's a big crazy house, and I want to make sure the colors are right.
So we're happy. There were so many times when I thought this thing was going to fall apart, and we finally made it to the finish line. The financial finish line, anyway--now comes the fun part.
My friend Jay keeps referring to the place as "the compound" and he's not too far off. It's big, but there are reasons for it. We want to be able to grow a lot of our own food, and there's room for that here. I have a sister 20 years older than me who for reasons I won't go into here is going to need to be taken care of after our mother dies. There's room for that here too. With the state of California's economy and the higher education system, I envision kids who are going to be living with me for awhile even after college. (Or maybe that's just wishful thinking. I left home when I was 17 to go to college, and except for vacations, I never moved back. I will miss my frustrating little hoseheads when they go.)
And if the zombie apocalypse ever happens, we're going to put our friend Kyle the Marine on the widow's walk with a .50-cal, and our friend Sean the Ex-marine on the perimeter.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Closer We Are to Fine ...
It looked like we were going to have to pull the plug on this earlier this week. The seller--Pacific Valley Bank--was running out of patience. There was a potential back-up buyer down at the planning department asking questions, wanting to know if he could turn the house into offices downstairs and living space upstairs. The underwriters for Prospect Mortgage found out the insurance amount we needed at close had been miscalculated and they weren't sure we had enough in the account.
Then Perfect Friend Terry put a wish in her Tibetan Wish Box, muttered some sort of half-Irish, half-Japanese incantation over it and told me to calm the hell down. (I made up that last part. She really handed me a valium, patted my hand and said, "there there.") And yesterday, after one more freak out with the insurance company, came the phone call from Prospect we'd been waiting for. You're CTC--clear to close.
Documents have been ordered, we sign on Tuesday and close on Friday.
We're in San Francisco for the night, the annual birthday trip to one of my favorite cities. Usually the boy children get left behind, but they got righteously indignant at the idea this year, for whatever reason, that I didn't want to celebrate my birthday with them. So after a lecture from their father ("We're doing everything that mommy wants and nothing that you want, so no complaining, no fighting and just deal with it,") off we went. Lunch at Delfina Pizzeria (good, but expensive), a walk to 826 Valencia and the famed Pirate Supply Store (San Francisco's only independent pirate supply store, of course) and dessert to go from Tartine's.
The skies opened up between the Pirate Store and Tartine's. Hopefully tomorrow will be clear, because I'd like to hit the farmer's market at the Ferry Building before we leave. I dragged everyone to see "Legion" at the Metreon-I'm a sucker for religious Apocalypse flicks. Everyone kvetched about how bad it was, but how can you go wrong with Paul Bettany in body armor?
So. Next Friday. We close and then the fun begins. It's an FHA 203K rehab loan, which means the clock is ticking on the contractor--he has six months to get everything on the list done, and he can't take any draws from the loan until he's hit certain benchmarks. We picked the kitchen, pantry and laundry room tile -- very simple, relatively inexpensive, easy to install and, as Grady says, it goes with everything.
I'll start posting more pictures as we progress. But for now, we're happy the light at the end of the tunnel isn't attached to a freight train anymore.
Then Perfect Friend Terry put a wish in her Tibetan Wish Box, muttered some sort of half-Irish, half-Japanese incantation over it and told me to calm the hell down. (I made up that last part. She really handed me a valium, patted my hand and said, "there there.") And yesterday, after one more freak out with the insurance company, came the phone call from Prospect we'd been waiting for. You're CTC--clear to close.
Documents have been ordered, we sign on Tuesday and close on Friday.
We're in San Francisco for the night, the annual birthday trip to one of my favorite cities. Usually the boy children get left behind, but they got righteously indignant at the idea this year, for whatever reason, that I didn't want to celebrate my birthday with them. So after a lecture from their father ("We're doing everything that mommy wants and nothing that you want, so no complaining, no fighting and just deal with it,") off we went. Lunch at Delfina Pizzeria (good, but expensive), a walk to 826 Valencia and the famed Pirate Supply Store (San Francisco's only independent pirate supply store, of course) and dessert to go from Tartine's.
The skies opened up between the Pirate Store and Tartine's. Hopefully tomorrow will be clear, because I'd like to hit the farmer's market at the Ferry Building before we leave. I dragged everyone to see "Legion" at the Metreon-I'm a sucker for religious Apocalypse flicks. Everyone kvetched about how bad it was, but how can you go wrong with Paul Bettany in body armor?
So. Next Friday. We close and then the fun begins. It's an FHA 203K rehab loan, which means the clock is ticking on the contractor--he has six months to get everything on the list done, and he can't take any draws from the loan until he's hit certain benchmarks. We picked the kitchen, pantry and laundry room tile -- very simple, relatively inexpensive, easy to install and, as Grady says, it goes with everything.
I'll start posting more pictures as we progress. But for now, we're happy the light at the end of the tunnel isn't attached to a freight train anymore.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Welp. Hmmm.
Just when we though we'd given everything to the lender, got the reappraisal completed satisfactorily and were waiting for the closing documents to be ordered, the mortgage company emails to say it needs documents that we already provided to them a few months ago because, get this, "the fax was fuzzy."
We're on the clock with the bank. And I'm so tired of having the twice-weekly conversation with my mother about why we haven't closed yet. Today's conversation mostly entailed me saying, "I don't want to talk about it. No, I don't want to talk about it." I haven't explained the intricacies of what we're trying to do because it's more trouble than it's worth. But at least she's stopped asking me to explain the Internet to her.
If we lose the deal, we get our escrow money back. My birthday is on Jan. 31. If we lose the deal, I'm getting on a plane next Friday with my husband and we're going to Vegas for two nights so I can drink fruity drinks from the gigantic wall of alcohol-based slurpee machines at the MGM Grand, eat cheese, pay homage to Bouchon and lay in the whirlpool tub and cry.
And then we're coming back here and getting busy finding a new place.
We're on the clock with the bank. And I'm so tired of having the twice-weekly conversation with my mother about why we haven't closed yet. Today's conversation mostly entailed me saying, "I don't want to talk about it. No, I don't want to talk about it." I haven't explained the intricacies of what we're trying to do because it's more trouble than it's worth. But at least she's stopped asking me to explain the Internet to her.
If we lose the deal, we get our escrow money back. My birthday is on Jan. 31. If we lose the deal, I'm getting on a plane next Friday with my husband and we're going to Vegas for two nights so I can drink fruity drinks from the gigantic wall of alcohol-based slurpee machines at the MGM Grand, eat cheese, pay homage to Bouchon and lay in the whirlpool tub and cry.
And then we're coming back here and getting busy finding a new place.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Budget Items
I haven't actually sat down and gone over the contractor's proposed budget for the project item by item yet, because the project is still in a state of flux. We haven't even been clear on whether or not we need an entirely new set of plans-the bank didn't get the plans assigned when it foreclosed, and the previous owner is holding the rights hostage for an insane amount of money.
I hope they look nice decorating his walls. That's about all they'll be good for in another week or so.
Designer Friend Grady asked an architect friend to meet with the city to find out what it wants before we can proceed. According to him, the city wants a site plan review and all the mechanical drawings, but given that nothing in the exterior is going to change, we don't need to do all the elevations. The architect also said the city is "giddy" that we're doing three units instead of two. I've met some of the city folks--giddy is not a word that comes to mind.
Under the FHA rehab loan we're finally approved for (a few more i's to be dotted, then we're through) we can take half of the total of the house price for redoing the house. Here are some of the contractor's budget items. (This is by no means a comprehensive list.)
Gutters (repair damage and install downspouts): $1,265
Priming and painting exterior: $17,100
Dry wall installation, tape and texture:$19,480
Interior paint: $10,850
Tile (side entry, bathrooms and laundry room): $5,030
Bathroom vanities with marble tops: $4,265
Kitchen cabinets: $11,900
Pest fumigation (tenting the whole house before the work starts): $4,753
Permits, plans and fees: $11,427
A lot of this is going to change. We're going to do the interior painting ourselves, so the labor portion of that item will go down. I thought the bathroom vanity item seemed high until I started looking at vanities online. Grady suggested we hit the salvage yards around San Francisco, and another friend of ours knows a guy who knows a guy who knows another guy who does marble. What seems low is the kitchen appliances-$2,900, and that doesn't include a frige. I think we're going with IKEA cabinets in the two rental units. We had them in the kitchen of the guest house at our old place, and they looked good and functioned well.
Any suggestions on good salvage places around the Bay area?
I hope they look nice decorating his walls. That's about all they'll be good for in another week or so.
Designer Friend Grady asked an architect friend to meet with the city to find out what it wants before we can proceed. According to him, the city wants a site plan review and all the mechanical drawings, but given that nothing in the exterior is going to change, we don't need to do all the elevations. The architect also said the city is "giddy" that we're doing three units instead of two. I've met some of the city folks--giddy is not a word that comes to mind.
Under the FHA rehab loan we're finally approved for (a few more i's to be dotted, then we're through) we can take half of the total of the house price for redoing the house. Here are some of the contractor's budget items. (This is by no means a comprehensive list.)
Gutters (repair damage and install downspouts): $1,265
Priming and painting exterior: $17,100
Dry wall installation, tape and texture:$19,480
Interior paint: $10,850
Tile (side entry, bathrooms and laundry room): $5,030
Bathroom vanities with marble tops: $4,265
Kitchen cabinets: $11,900
Pest fumigation (tenting the whole house before the work starts): $4,753
Permits, plans and fees: $11,427
A lot of this is going to change. We're going to do the interior painting ourselves, so the labor portion of that item will go down. I thought the bathroom vanity item seemed high until I started looking at vanities online. Grady suggested we hit the salvage yards around San Francisco, and another friend of ours knows a guy who knows a guy who knows another guy who does marble. What seems low is the kitchen appliances-$2,900, and that doesn't include a frige. I think we're going with IKEA cabinets in the two rental units. We had them in the kitchen of the guest house at our old place, and they looked good and functioned well.
Any suggestions on good salvage places around the Bay area?
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Tales to Tell (No New)
Waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting. The loan is in underwriting, although it's supposed to be finished this coming week, and we're supposed to close on Jan. 8. Although we were supposed to close last Wednesday, but the loan was still in underwriting. And it's entirely possible they will have new questions or documents needed on Monday and thus won't really be out of underwriting at all.
In short, no new tale to tell. The bank that holds the deed has extended us to Jan. 15.
We made a decision on Saturday that seemed a hard one at the time, but now makes sense. We've decided, at least until the chimps are gone, to not go the B&B route and instead rent out both the two-bedroom basement apartment and the rear unit of the first floor, or what was to have been the master suite. It's about 700 square feet, and had the original owner finished the project, it was to include a kitchen. Now it will function as an expanded studio or small one-bedroom for someone, with a good sized bathroom, a kitchenette, bedroom and living room with fireplace. Our downstairs space will include the main kitchen, family room, dining room, laundry room and library. Upstairs are four bedrooms and two baths--we'll take one of the front rooms and the bath, and each chimp will have a rear bedroom and share a bath. The other upstairs bedroom will be a guest room or office.
Assuming we can rent out both spaces--the basement for $1,100 and the back suite for $800, a large portion of the mortgage will be covered.
So given that we don't own the place yet, there wasn't much to do over the holidays except dream. Our friend Grady Harp, who has better taste than all the rest of us combined (including you, dear reader), came over and made some suggestions--for example, the bizarrely placed powder room on the landing of the staircase will become a very large storage closet. The garage that Chuck badly wanted to knock down? Grady has convinced him to keep it, because it will cost less to jack it up, pour a new foundation and put a new roof on it than knocking it down, carting it away and building something new. (I don't think the garage was built with the house in 1890, but it does have a cold-storage room for canned goods. Given that Chuck's canner is usually in use, it's a good room to have.)
And we spent a lot of time walking the yard, planning this and that. Rather than fencing in the front, I'm going with box hedges. The potager will go in the front yard on the left side because it gets the most sun. The urban chickens will go in the back yard along side the alley, and the croquet course will go along the yard opposite the potager. I've been told that goats aren't allowed in the city limits; we'll just have to see about that.
More pictures are posted here.
In short, no new tale to tell. The bank that holds the deed has extended us to Jan. 15.
We made a decision on Saturday that seemed a hard one at the time, but now makes sense. We've decided, at least until the chimps are gone, to not go the B&B route and instead rent out both the two-bedroom basement apartment and the rear unit of the first floor, or what was to have been the master suite. It's about 700 square feet, and had the original owner finished the project, it was to include a kitchen. Now it will function as an expanded studio or small one-bedroom for someone, with a good sized bathroom, a kitchenette, bedroom and living room with fireplace. Our downstairs space will include the main kitchen, family room, dining room, laundry room and library. Upstairs are four bedrooms and two baths--we'll take one of the front rooms and the bath, and each chimp will have a rear bedroom and share a bath. The other upstairs bedroom will be a guest room or office.
Assuming we can rent out both spaces--the basement for $1,100 and the back suite for $800, a large portion of the mortgage will be covered.
So given that we don't own the place yet, there wasn't much to do over the holidays except dream. Our friend Grady Harp, who has better taste than all the rest of us combined (including you, dear reader), came over and made some suggestions--for example, the bizarrely placed powder room on the landing of the staircase will become a very large storage closet. The garage that Chuck badly wanted to knock down? Grady has convinced him to keep it, because it will cost less to jack it up, pour a new foundation and put a new roof on it than knocking it down, carting it away and building something new. (I don't think the garage was built with the house in 1890, but it does have a cold-storage room for canned goods. Given that Chuck's canner is usually in use, it's a good room to have.)
And we spent a lot of time walking the yard, planning this and that. Rather than fencing in the front, I'm going with box hedges. The potager will go in the front yard on the left side because it gets the most sun. The urban chickens will go in the back yard along side the alley, and the croquet course will go along the yard opposite the potager. I've been told that goats aren't allowed in the city limits; we'll just have to see about that.
More pictures are posted here.
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