The river city is gorgeous right now. It’s definitely a pleasure to show properties when the trees and flowers are in bloom. One of the nicest communities in the Edmonton area would have to be Belgravia – for its distance to the university, downtown and the river valley. But even gorgeous neighborhoods have their "Money pits."
Recently I showed a young couple a property they were quite eager to see. Right from the get go things with this property just seemed off to me. For starters the wooden sidewalk and the overgrown landscaping made it feel like you were deep in the rain forest.
Aside from that this property scared the beejeebers (yes I know that is not a word, but the real words I used to describe the property are not appropriate here and will remain between my clients and I). It is safe to say the movie money pit leaped into my mind. The 1986 version to be exact, starring Tom Hanks and Shelly Long from Cheers. The tagline for the movie made it seem so romantic. “For everyone who’s ever been deeply in Love or deeply in debt”. Personally I saw it as more horrifying than the 1986 "April Fool’s Day" horror movie.
It’s not often that the calculator of my mind blows a fuse trying to calculate rough fix up costs. The kicker is that the property is priced well, even with the $100,000 in needed renovations, but what makes me afraid of this particular property is the potential hidden costs. Unless you are a seasoned estimator or renovator and know what typical hidden nightmares may arise you just have to stay away.
Undoubtedly it will sell – one person’s trash (in this case us) is another’s gold (possibly a seasoned renovator).
Thanks for the blog. Would you please beable to do a post on the “rent to own” fad? I still don’t understand it completely and it seems like there would be alot of risks involved. Thanks!
I just viewed this “gem”: huge walkout bungalow on a ravine, most expensive house on MLS, in its neighborhood.
Front steps are pulling away from the wall and are no longer level. This is causing the columns that support the roof overhang to slide….
Main-floor deck above the walk-out patio supported only by the plywood of the decorative columns, which don’t seem to have pilons to suport them….
Interesting drywall job in one of the basement bedrooms screams foundation problems.
Basement walls are crooked. No GFCI breakers in the bathroom…… not surprising, since the City does not have basement development on file, for this house….
Those are things experienced buyers spot, but there are dead give-aways even for novice buyers in that house:
All the window cranks except two are missing ! Broken electric plate still on the floor. Dirty countertops and dirty everything else (house is empty). Stucco coming off the outside walls in large patches, around the edges of the house.
In short, a house with exceptionally beautiful architectural features and a LOT of hidden costs to bring it up to code!
We were seriously tempted to make an offer at a reasonable price, (not the pipe-dream asking price) and tackle the required renovation work, but the proverbial
“beejeebers” prevented us from possibly making the mistake of a lifetime.
Cosmetic problems can be easily fixed, but when you talk about structural problems, it’s a whole different story.
If an uneducated buyer purchases this relatively new house without consulting a qualified home inspector, we can see the following happen:
At the house warming party, 20 people step on the deck to admire the ravine, and they all find themselves 9 feet down, on the concrete patio, below.
In the near future, the front columns will buckle and bury the mail person under the roof overhang that will cave in.
And maybe more foundation problems will rear their ugly heads.
Yes, and then there is the little matter of missing permits for the plumbing, the electrical, and the gasline in the basement kitchen…. It will be fun to reopen all the drywall for the inspection to get those permits!
My 2 cents.. buy newer (less than 15 years old) and save the headache! Trust me from my own stupid decision. You will never get the full cost of your renovation back and once you upgrade one room, it makes the rest of the house look dated. If you’re thinking of buying a 60′s bungalow that needs TLC, think twice. It will take 100K+ to bring it up to date, not to mention the inconvenience of living in a construction site. Never buy an older home with a basement developed in the 60′s thinking it just needs paint, etc. Back then, it was cheap to heat the house, so there likely is no insulation. I will never buy a fixer upper again. I learned my lesson. Problem after problem.. my head hurts just thinking about it..
My 2 cents.. buy newer (less than 15 years old) and save the headache! Trust me from my own stupid decision. You will never get the full cost of your renovation back and once you upgrade one room, it makes the rest of the house look dated. If you’re thinking of buying a 60′s bungalow that needs TLC, think twice. It will take 100K+ to bring it up to date, not to mention the inconvenience of living in a construction site. Never buy an older home with a basement developed in the 60′s thinking it just needs paint, etc. Back then, it was cheap to heat the house, so there likely is no insulation. I will never buy a fixer upper again. I learned my lesson. Problem after problem.. my head hurts just thinking about it..
Ken, I hear ya. You either ‘do it right’ or don’t do it at all! All you sellers out there — there is no point plunking a modern sink in an otherwise outdated bathroom — it just looks silly! Same with flooring, or paint, or anything else that needs consistency to make a good impression.
However, the point of buying only newer homes — I dunno, homes built during boom times usually come with some fault. My plumber told me, he bought a brand new home, and the basement concrete floor was not built to code. It was so thin, his knee broke through! Had to have the entire floor x-rayed, and it cost a fortune to fix it. He sold the house and moved back into a 50′s bungalow, which he trusted. So there are cautions no matter what the age of the house. It all depends on the quality of the builder.
Dont’ forget to have an independent home inspector look over your brand new home before you take possession. You may be surprised what they find!
A young couple in our family had a house built in Beaumont, in 2006. They were baffled by astronomical heating bills. Since this was their first home, they had nothing to compare the bills to, but started asking family and friends.
It turns out that there was ZERO attic insulation in the house and the heat went straight out the roof.
They finally got the builder to provide the insulation, but never got reimbursed for the heating bills…..