Most of the homes we’re looking at as possible downsizing options are foreclosures, short sales and/or estate sales and many of them are empty. Meaning no one is living in them at the moment. In fact, we’ve walked through at least a dozen by now and I think only 2 of them had the utilities on. We’ve been relying heavily on flashlights and batteries. I figured it’d be okay to take pics along the way and share our house hunting adventure with you since it’s not like we’re impeding on anyone’s privacy. Here’s one of the first bank-owned foreclosures we went to see just a few weeks ago. From the online photos, Handy Hubby and I knew we’d be smitten with this nearly 100-year-old home. We also knew there were probably quite a few costly repairs that would be required just to live in it. Still, if even just for fun, we wanted to walk through it. Forgive the photo quality…electricity was shut off and it was evening time, so lighting was poor. Plus, I had my old point-and-shoot camera with me that doesn’t take quite as good pictures but, hopefully, you’ll get the idea.
As I said, this home was old, built in 1912. Here’s the front door from the inside…
…and the adjoining entryway that leads to the rest of the first floor and a set of stairs to the second floor…
Notice the original wood floors still in great condition. The ceilings were really high too. Probably 9′-10′ tall. To the left of the entry and beyond a set of lovely french doors was the massive fireplace in the living room…
Opposite the fireplace was a large wall of windows with a window seat below…
At the end of the living room were 2 sets of french doors leading to a tiled sunroom with newer windows. Possibly an addition?
Back to the entry…to the right of the entry was the formal dining room which boasted original windows and a window seat as well. It also had 2 built-in corner cabinets.
Beyond the dining room was the kitchen. To us, it looked original – especially the farm sink – and I even liked the linoleum floors. It had tons of cabinet space and storage along with a little eat-in breakfast nook.
Upstairs there were 4 ginormous bedrooms all with the same hardwood flooring. I could have stared at those floors all day long.
The 2 full bathrooms {one on the first floor and one on the second floor} were both large but missing fixtures. We couldn’t tell for sure if the tile and flooring were original or not but they sure matched the style of the home beautifully.
I don’t have any exterior shots of the house but it was stucco with a detached 2-car garage and almost no yard. You can imagine all the decor ideas that were racing through my head during and after our tour. The place was amazing. So much potential. Such a great neighborhood. Awesome public schools. A short 25-minute drive to Handy Hubby’s work. Original details and loads of character. The drawbacks? For one, it was listed at the top of our price range even though it was a foreclosure. We probably could have gotten it for less than the listing price but there were several major and costly factors to consider. It needed a new roof, gutters and soffit for starters. There were also quite a few cracks in the walls and ceilings, so we were scared of structural problems. The full unfinished basement smelled musty and most likely leaked. Even with all of that to ponder, that’s not what broke the deal for us. We would have been happy to fix all those things and live in that gorgeous house. BUT. The big but. BUT…the heating system still included the gas boiler/radiator system along with a very old furnace. I loved the look of the old radiators and would’ve kept them just for decor’s sake. BUT…radiators aren’t exactly known for heating efficiently {even though they can be great for allergy sufferers} which is probably why a furnace was eventually added to the heating system of the house. We were very scared just thinking about what it would cost to heat and cool that old home. Did I mention it was 3200 square feet? Not exactly small. And definitely not downsizing material. {We would have actually been gaining square footage.} Sure, we could have afforded to buy the home and make some repairs but I don’t think we could have afforded to live in it. At least not comfortably. So, we had to say no to that big ol’ house even though we really wanted to say yes. Handy Hubby and I could totally see ourselves working on that house until the day we died. We even talked about putting a metal roof on it and installing an energy efficient geothermal heating/cooling system. If we’d had the funds. In the end, we decided this home would have been TOO MUCH. Too much money, too much work, too much space, too much utilities, too much stress.
Who knows? Maybe we’ll hunt down that house again some day after we’ve saved up a bunch of cash from downsizing and paying off our mortgage! Lord knows, I’m keeping all these photos on file just to look at and dream about every once in a while. Whoever does get that house is one lucky homeowner. I’m sorry it won’t be me.
images: all Dana Miller for House*Tweaking
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