The Good the Bad and the Ugly

The good

Apologies all around for this highly overused title, but it is apt. There really is some good news. The framers are making great progress with three sides of the house covered in new siding and all four of these eave returns rebuilt. Hard to believe these two pictures are from the same view. The dormer work is coming along. And today they hauled away the old dumpster and brought in a new smaller one. Red this time. Somehow that all feels like progress.

The bad

is something you may have seen on Mark’s (my husband) flickr site. As long as there was a dumpster in front of the house, we decided to see what was behind the cheap old wallboard in the basement. Among other things, we found a very cute critter, which we released into the garden.

We also found one very scary vent job for the hot water heater. Never mind that the vent comes out under the deck. We knew about this little code violation. What we didn’t know was that the vent we could see on the outside wasn’t actually attached to anything on the inside! Thank heaven for the idiots who insulated the basement. They didn’t do much to change the temperature in an underground basement, but they may have kept a good bit of carbon monoxide from circulating through the house and killing us as we slept.

Now for the ugly.

It involves the south wall of the house and the fact that a good portion of it appears to be resting on a stack of bricks. That’s right. Sans mortar. As soon as the framers noticed this, they called the contractor to come have a look, and to put in an order for some substantial timber products. The first thing the contractor said was, “well that deck isn’t even attached to the wall is it?” To which I replied, “Well it isn’t exactly a wall.”

The framers are going to pull the deck off the back of the house next week and have a go at shoring things up. Hopefully by the time that is done we will have a permit for the patio work. The original contract called for completion in about five weeks, which would be around the first full week of May. We may still make it, but I’m not going to hold my breath.

Knobs, Tubes, and Holes in the Roof

The holes aren’t exactly in the roof. We had a feeling that something bad was hiding behind the aluminum on the fascia and soffits. The contractor suggested we leave it in place, but the gutters were all askew, we were doubtful. Our perseverance resulted in a $5,800 work order. Read addition to the original “fixed price” contract to replace all the existing fascia boards, and wrap the vented soffits with plywood.

The demo on the porch revealed something else we suspected. The porch roof isn’t connected to the house…at all. Whoever built it, just toe nailed the side roof supports to the house. As the workers were pulling off siding around those connections, they discovered that one side is now hanging by one nail and the other is just floating in space. Help. I need 2 x 4s right now! These are holding it up for now and they are going to build a couple of half columns up against the house to carry the load. Don’t even think about the nightmare if that roof had fallen on the head of anyone using our front door over the last ten years. Can you say lawsuit?

Ever seen knob and tube wiring? If you aren’t familiar with it, let me just say a few words. Ungrounded, aluminum, 15 amp, fire hazard. This stuff has got to go. While directly connecting aluminum knob and tube to modern copper wire is a really bad idea – special insulated wire nuts are used to make the connection safely – we are lucky that there is modern wire running to a junction box right at the front porch wall. All we need to replace is a few feet.

Still think there might be some good news? Well there is. Replacing the porch ceiling with new bead board was already planned. It’s a good thing considering what the old ceiling looked like after the workers removed the vinyl that was installed over it. And, this project is allowing us to take an interesting walk through the many colors of the house’s history. Right now, the house is a conventional gray with white trim. However at one time it was apparently robin’s egg blue with dark brown trim. Was this the result of a conscious choice or a paint sale? Guess we will never know.

Renovation Page 2

I’m sure you aren’t as interested in my home improvements as I am, but it is sucking up most of my time. Since I’m neither working on the book nor thinking up great topics for the other blogs, I thought I would share.

After many weeks of crossing and dotting, the City of Atlanta graciously granted us a permit for the repairs we have planned. Why we even need a permit to replace siding and put up new gutters is beyond me. I thought I was a master wordsmith back in my marketing days, but the linguistic maneuvers required to get basic repairs approved is a real art. Contractors actually hire expediters – people who are experienced at running the maze – to help them get building permits in less than a month.

Today the workers started ripping the old vinyl siding off the house. The good news is that we found R11 insulation behind the foam board. That means we have a credit coming from the contractor. We didn’t think there was any insulation in the walls, and were planning to install R13 before adding a plywood sheath, moister barrier, and Hardie Plank siding.

What’s the bad news? If we thought the squirrels had access to the attic space before, they sure do now. Apparently the only thing between the great outdoors and the inside of our attic space was an inch and a half of foam board and some vinyl siding with about half the nails and none of the caulk that should have been there.

And, we are going to have a chance to spend the credit from the insulation on rebuilding spots like this. The contractor originally planned to demo the old siding and put up the new as he went along focusing on completing one side of the house before moving on to the next. Now he has decided he had better demo all of the siding quickly to see what other surprises are in store.

My next challenge is to get a survey of the property. We already have a survey, done ten years ago when we bought the house. However, our expediter tells us that the Bureau of Buildings won’t issue the permit to rebuild our deck and patio without seeing a survey that includes topographical markings.

So I’m headed back to the phones. Maybe I’ll work on the book tomorrow.