We’ve gone and done it again – bought a house that has more issues than most anyone could conjure up if they tried. This is a long post with lots of pictures, we hope you enjoy reading all about our lives.....
We first decided that Asheville is a cool town about 4 or 5
days after we got here! And, after about 5 months of being here we
decided we’d make it our home base, and we began to look at real estate. We came very close on two places (another
story or two), and around June we decided on a third place that is part of a “cluster
home,” community which “needed some work”.
We knew we wanted to take down some walls in the house and
redo the bathrooms, floors, etc but didn't know that we had a seriously faulty
foundation wall. Even with a home inspector, an engineer and all of our experience
no one caught it until the previous owners moved out and got their piled up
stuff away from the wall in one of the bedrooms in the “walk-out"
basement - after the closing we discovered a soaking wet carpet and tackless
that was very much disintegrated and black.....then, as it rained some more, a
puddle on the floor appeared and the moisture meters put on the block wall read
from 60-100% wet. The bottom line is that we now have a 40’+ long hole
next to our house that is 11-12’ deep by about 5’ wide in an area that is only
about 10'wide total, so the dirt has been taken out creating a new couple of mountains in
our neighbors yard! Some of it will be
returned and we will change the landscaping considerably. . .
We got 6 formal recommendations and estimates and about a
hundred suggestions about how to alleviate this problem and it has been quite
the learning process…in any event below are some of the photos of “The Coopers
Big Dig 2012.”
Before we knew about his issue we had contracted to have the
3 bathrooms gutted, the stairs replaced, wood floors installed and tile floors
on the lower level…the painted over wallpaper and the popcorn ceilings removed
and skim coated…and, the ceilings painted.
We are doing the rest of the painting ourselves – every square inch of
the place was painted in really awful colors and, except for closets and
bathrooms our “Linen White” is being slathered on everywhere (sometimes it is
taking 3 coats to cover those nasty – to us – colors).
So, along about November 10th, we should be moving in and will have plenty of room if you care to drive to the south east where it really hasn't been very hot this summer…where the fall is glorious both weather wise and with fall color treats….and if this year is anything like last, the winter won't be very cold either - the town doesn't own snow plows so when a tad of the white stuff appears everyone goes back to bed.
As we said, aside from this house mess, we are really busy - the OLLI Senior Learning Center at the Uof NC is much bigger and more sophisticated than in Tucson and the courses are super...did 2 days a week in the spring, but skipped the summer and are only taking 2 courses 1 day a week this semester... the UU congregation is really something too! About 800 people, very active with lots of social stuff (monthly “restaurant tour” dinners with a group and “dinner for eight” groups), as well as social action and good adult RE programs (we will facilitate one on “Living Deeply” beginning in January). Then we are still spending at least one day a week (sometimes 2 or 3) volunteering for the Hospice estate sale/resale store program - we pack, unpack houses and trucks, set up the warehouses for sales then man the cash registers. It is hard physical work and we seem to love it....they raised over 800K for hospice last year and hope to top 1M this year.
Here are some photos of what we bought at 14 Cedarcliff Circle in Asheville - and what we've managed to turn it into so far...
The kitchen/dining room was an amazing turquoise green color - 3 coats to cover it, we took out the wall between the kitchen and the dining room, and took out the fireplace in the 'brown" living room and opened the wall behind it in the kitchen so that the fridge can be counter depth but full size. Note that the floor in the kitchen is a dark stain and the adjoining floor in the living room is very light - go figure...They are being sanded and stained all one color - "Espresso."
.jpg)
Below is the downstairs "purple" bedroom - after we closed on the house, we found that the carpet was dripping wet in this room - there is mold and the water seepage thru the wall was enough to create a really neat puddle in the middle of the floor. We removed the sheetrock and the insulation and the wall is now supported with 2x4s at angles. We are anticipating that "The Big Dig" will allow the wall to dry out so that the rebar that has been put into the 2" wide strips (every 16") on the inside can be secured with epoxy.
The home inspector pointed out these cracks in the unfinished part of the wall and we called an
engineer before we closed on the property - he said in his report that
we could easily fix these little cracks with rebar and epoxy, that it looked as
though there "had been" a water issue but it was fixed - so "no problem"
- we'd have a stronger wall than when it was built...now it is part of
this massive waterproofing/wall stabilizing project and the engineer
returned and changed his report...free of charge! We broke the sewer twice and the AT&T cables 3 times with the earth mover - what a mess!!
All the bathrooms had 25 year old plastic tub/showers - the master had nasty shiny pink walls with nasty cabinets and sink tops. The paper in the second bath was amazing with a ton of paint over it...and a dreary pink. The down stairs bath had a border of wall paper and painted white walls that were really a greyish color.
 | |||||||||||||
The downstairs bedroom was "major blue" and it took 3 coats to cover it up. The rug smelled. It now has a tile floor, white walls and the bathroom has been tiled. We can't wait to hang some pictures - this is to be the guest room and will be a comfortable place for you to visit...we will post some finished pics after we move in.
It's taken so long to get this blog together that "The Big Dig" is moving toward completion. More to follow...
Take care and hugs to you all. We are just off the Blue Ridge Parkway and
it is glorious – come!!
Susan & David
