Buying A Home
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
First home needs tlc
We looked at a house today that needs some tlc like new flooring, new tiles and vanity in bathrooms and kitchen upgrades. But overall it's perfect for us and we can both see the vision of how it will look. We also both think it will be nice to make it our own.
How much work did you have to do on your first home and did you regret it one way of another?
~Erin~
proud pagan
proud pagan
Re: First home needs tlc
How long are you anticipating living there? People say that bathrooms and kitchens are what sell a house, so renovating those will pay off in resale value as long as the home is priced low enough for you to make up at least most of what you'll have to invest. If you know any contractors it might be good to have them take a look so you can get an idea of what it will cost in your area. I've been shocked by quotes I've heard for kitchen renovations.
Flooring doesn't scare me as much because I'm willing to DIY and the fact of other people's carpet grosses me out, so I want to rip it all out anyway. My mother is the least handy person on the planet and I've watched her retile bathrooms and kitchens and put down laminate wood. While I know that I'll probably spend $10K reflooring whatever home we end up in, I know that it's something I'm willing to work on over our first six months of living there.
How are the non-cosmetic features of the house? Age and quality of roofs, windows, siding and HVAC have been HUGE factors for us. If you have to invest in any of those you definitely want to know about it going in. My current "dream house" has a roof that is 20 years old, so we know that we'll probably have to spend between $8k and $15k to fix it in the next five years.
If you're realistic and informed about what you're getting and you still love it, then I don't think you'll have regrets.
We plan for this to be our forever house so we have plenty of time to get stuff done such as redoing the hardwoods. They are original but so scratched, stained and knicked. The only major changes we have made so far was replace a chimney that was falling apart due to it being waterlogged ($900 to replace from roof level up) and paint really.
On our to do list - redo the bathroom in hopefully 2 years or so (has no shower so we shower in the stall in the basement), perhaps seeing what we can do about a window that is new but has moisture between the 2 panes of glass (huge window so its probably going to be a fortune to replace), repaint the exterior foundation this spring/summer, repaint the house eventually
The roof was just replaced last year so we have a good 20 years before we wold need to do anything else. The structure of the house is amazing no water damage not even a crack in a wall could be found. Exterior is beautiful and furnace and hot water heater are newer.
My parents and brother are very handy and we already know they will help so that is a big plus. It is definitely priced low enough that is comparable to purchasing one already done.
Thanks for the reply!
proud pagan
It's hard to tell the real scope of your project from your post, but we did all of those items you listed and more in our first home. Honestly, it was a real PITA. The house is a million times nicer now that we've put time and money into it but I'll never buy a non-move-in-ready home again. The only reason we did it is because we couldn't afford to live in this neighborhood on our budget unless we bought a home that needed work.
Make sure you know how much everything will cost before you make an offer, and be honest with yourself as to 1) how patient you'll be able to be living in the house before the changes are made and 2) how much of your spare time you'll be willing to devote to house projects. There are enough chores to do like mowing the grass, cleaning the house, etc. that it really gets to be a pain to spend even more time on top of that doing remodeling.
We redid the floors throughout the house and de-wallpapered and repainted most of the rooms. We will likely replace the kitchen counter tops at some point in the next 3 years, but it's not a huge priority. The counter tops (and the floors and wallpaper, for that matter) are fine -- just NMS. I wouldn't say this house was a "fixer-upper." We just wanted a lot of cosmetic changes.
We didn't want to do the work ourselves (we're not handy at all) so we hired someone to do all the renovations before we moved in. (It took about 9 days total for them to finish everything).
I'm thrilled with what we did and wouldn't change anything -- except perhaps to have kept our contractors/handymen on the job longer to do ALL the little things that needed to be done. Two months into living here, and we haven't done any of the things we left to do ourselves. Like a PP said, the everyday stuff takes up all of our energy.
Are you willing to pour all your spare cash and time into your home for the next year or two to make that happen? Or will you have several thousand available immediately after closing to do it all at once before you settle in? It will always cost more than you think and take longer than you think.
My Pinterest
The Googlesites Paint Bio
Thinking of doing cosmetic updates to a dated home? These were our costs.
My FI purchased a house a few years ago and he redid the entire kitchen, replaced the stairs going to the basement, and had to paint everything.
With what you say the house needs, I would say if you have money to do the upgrades now, or you can deal with what the house has until you can fix it up, go for it.
proud pagan