January House Progress

When we looked at this house the first time, we were escorted by the Hwangs and it was dark (and the tour was about 15 minutes). When we looked at this house the second time, we were again escorted by the Hwangs and it was another 15 minutes. At least the second time it was in daylight. The third time I wasn’t there; S did the inspection with the inspector. Then we moved in. So there were some things that were a bit of a surprise when we moved in. I told people that I was excited to find out what I bought. It really was true. I could draw a vague layout of the house, but that was about it. I couldn’t tell you if there were 1, 2 or 3 windows in the bedroom. I couldn’t tell you the approximate size of the bathrooms, etc.

Upon moving in, we learned that the Hwangs did absolutely zero during their 8 years of living here. Nada. 8 years of neglect is hard to pick up after. Plus all the crap they left. Plus all the awful painting.

Our to-do list has become:
- Get Hwang crap out of the house.
- Clean stuff so we can at least use it.
- Steam clean all the carpets.

Usually when you buy a house, you don’t have to do those things because the previous owner (cough, cough) does them. We wish we were that lucky.

We’ve been in the house almost a month. And that stuff has taken us an obscene amount of time. They left a lot of crap. There’s still crap in the garage, but most of it is garage crap. The garage still has a foul fishy odor from the fridge and freezer that were out there. In the summer we’re going to have to wipe down the garage floor and walls.

So now that the to-do list up above has mostly been done, we’re proceeding on our to-do list. Our to-do list is crafted by the motto: “maximum impact for the minimal dollar.” Those have been things like paint the master bedroom, closet & bathroom; paint the main bathroom; replace the most offensive but able to change without killing ourselves on a ladder fixtures; take down the awful valances.

By the end of January, we have a few goals:
- Paint the family room/kitchen/nook combo. It was all yellow before. There are good shades of yellow, and then there are horrendous shades of yellow with green undertones that should not be used. So we’re working on changing that.
- Unpack 15 boxes. We probably have about 50 or so boxes left, I’m aiming to be done by the end of March.
- Get S’s car in the garage. We actually cleared out the space, but the garage door doesn’t close. You know those beams at the bottom that act as the safety so you don’t crush a kid/animal? Well, they aren’t working so the garage won’t shut…which makes it kinda difficult to use in practice.
- Trim back plant life from the house. We had ivy growing in the garage. It had not been tended to for so long that it had gotten itself inside. The inspector said we should really do some cutting back of the plant life from the house.
- Screens on the roof air vent holes so that no animal life can get into the attic.

Busy busy busy!