Jul
2
So, umm, yeah. I officially waved the white flag yesterday afternoon, as far as trying to finish up the Main St. house before I leave for Vegas on the 5th. In the back of my mind I knew it was a case of tilting at windmills but still wanted to try to power through and defy the odds. I’ll get pretty damn close, but the stone and tile work outside just soaks up too much time, especially working by myself, as I have to stop to mix grout/mortar, stop to cut tile, stop to measure, put down some tile, stop to mix up more mortar/grout, yada yada yada.
I was also going to end up doing a half-assed job on the landscaping, in order to get done, and I don’t really see the point in that, not at this stage. I feel like it’s at the point now where I really need to maximize all of the appeal I can, even if it means delaying things for a bit and making another mortage payment (or two). This is just me guesstimating, but it seems like jobs like this often go two ways: very quickly slapping on some paint, doing fairly minimal work, and listing it quickly, with more than a few bumps and bruises (and basically just extracting the equity I conjured up when buying it at such a discount to market value), or the second route, which is the one I started down by bascially upgrading everything I can get my monkey paws on. Seems kind of dumb to abandon that second approach in the end, just to get it listed a few weeks earlier.
I’m also getting a bit worn out in general and would rather throttle down things a bit and hang out with my wife and take care of assorted stuff before leaving for Vegas, as opposed to pulling all-nighters trying to get the house done. It’s also worth pointing out that this Vegas gig is actually going to be fun, too, and something I enjoy, so while it sucks that it pushes back my house flipping plans yet again, I shouldn’t be too hard on myself, as it’s shaping up be a profitable and fun freelance writing gig.
But yeah, excuses, excuses, excuses… Makes me giggle to page back through old posts here and see my original target date of April 15th for completing all repairs. Umm, yeah, missed that by just a smidge.
But there was some good news from the last few days at the Main St. house, as I got the last of the estimates for new flooring and replacement of the furnace, and it’s looking like they’ll both come in at about $500 less than what I’d budgeted, so that’s welcome news. I ended up cheaping out slightly with the flooring for the kitchen and bath, as I’m going to go with an Armstrong vinyl product that’s basically “faux laminate” as far as the look and feel, but I didn’t thnk it looked bad at all, and the color/style of it matches the existing hardwood floors in the dining room/living room pretty well.
I should finish up the tile on the front porch and the patio stone walkway later today, as far as getting it all in place and mortared, and hopefully get it grouted on Wednesday. Have to say that I’m really happy with how it’s turning out, especially the slate front porch. It’s definitely slow going but it’s jobs like that that I think will make me much money in the long run, as far as eye-catching upgrades that make places stand out, and which really aren’t that expensive in the end, other than the labor invested.
