Black cushioned neck pads on the tub - weird!
Two Steps Backward
Wow, there are a lot of embarrassing little mistakes going on and one Really Big Mistake.
After installing the vanity in the downstairs bath, the wiring box for the light is not centered over the vanity. I cannot figure out how this always happens. I don’t want to move the vanity to where the light wiring is because that is too close to the toilet. And, for some reason the outlet box is way over by the toilet. OK, open the drywall, pull out the boxes and open up some more drywall and put in new boxes. All lined up now. This is after the drywall is done, primed and we have painted the entire bathroom with final coat of semi gloss.
The stairway light issue is not with the 3rd one from bottom of stairs. After laying straight edge along I discovered that the first one at top of stairs is too short (about one inch lower) off the tread. It’s throwing everything off. Open up the drywall, have to pull out a wood fire block and move the wiring up higher.
And then, the carpenter goes to install the downstairs bedroom entry door and it just doesn’t seem right. I ordered these doors awhile ago. I did not really look at the room correctly. I wanted the door to swing to the right upon entry because I didn’t want it to bang into the pocket door going into the bathroom. But, there is only one place to put a switch for the ceiling light as you enter the room… on the little right closet wall. No way to get a switch over to the left because of the pocket door. Ooops, door jamb, hinges and everything are cut into the wood for right swing. Carpenter had to cut out new hinges and door lock and reverse the door to swing left. Then laborer had to follow around and start putting up all the old routed wood areas. What a waste of time because of my ordering boo boo. (see photo with yellow putty on door)
But, here’s the worst thing that could happen. When we started the project I had my regular floor guy come in and do an analysis of the floors and give me a bid. He wanted $8,000 just to add new flooring upstairs and refinish existing floors. He gave me measurements and said it was ‘White Oak’. Second guy comes in and the floors are now covered with paper, but he looks at them under the paper. I went with second guy because his estimate was lower. I gave him amount of square feet needed and said White Oak. Over two months ago we had White Oak delivered and it sat in a room getting ‘acclimated’
Then he installed all of the new White Oak in living area, kitchen and master bedroom. Still says nothing.
Yesterday he started sanding down the old varnish off original floors. THEY ARE RED OAK!!! Are you kidding me.??? we have 900 square feet of new White Oak laid down right next to this Red Oak. This does not look good at all. He’s blaming me because I told him White Oak. I have no knowledge of oak species, I just went with what original guy told me and second guy supposedly verified it. Granted, it was very hard to tell what exactly was under the very old yellowed varnish.
So, luckily he is a master with stain. He is going to have to do a heavy whitish grey stain over the red oak to try to get it to match the bare White Oak. Then another coat of stain and sealant across it all to try to get everything to match. I have a feeling that this is going to come back and cost me more money 
The good news is that $350 dollars later, we have all our window and door trim purchased and carpenter was able to install most of it today.
Tuesday the Anderson door arrives to Home Depot and we should get it any day now so we can finish the installation of that door.
We might actually make October 13th!!! If only I can get my butt in gear and go down to the Barrio and fish through the bone yard of remnant leftover granite and quartz at my Granite guy’s shop. I need to pick out countertops for master vanity and downstairs vanity. This is becoming critical path because we cannot install sinks, faucets or plumbing until the countertops get installed. Actually, the sinks will be under mount but they get installed with the countertop
cb, the floors will wind up looking fine. I have similar minor differences in the floors in my house and only I notice it.
I like your price of $994,000, because remember I suggested you go with $999,999? Although it was a tongue in cheek suggestion at the time, I’d say I was pretty close! :))
Cb, oh goodness! What a glorious job you have. A skilled flooring specialist should be able to match the stain pretty well. Hope today goes smoothly.
One more step backward
Total power outage all day on whole street. Evidently we were notified by mail, but I dont even have a mail box. Flooring guys very pissed. He’s paying 2 guys and they cannot get any work done and they will lose 1 day in schedule.
Never a dull moment!!
Can you rent a generator for the day?
The cord they run for the big sanders is hard wired straight into main panel. I think it takes some major juice. Id have to go get a commercial construction size generator that would have to be delivered. Not worth it
Hang in there - you’re nearly finished and it’s really looking wonderful. Before very long the house will be sold and you’ll be happily adding up your (well earned) profit.
Coralbrook, did you give up on the under-stair closet / storage space for the Family Room? I fully realize you have larger fish to fry, but this might be a cool enough feature that I wanted to remind you we had discussed this a couple of moons ago.
Yes, there’s a closet under there. Doorway is across from bathroom door . its all drywalled with special fire code 5/8", has a light and switch right inside the door.
I’m getting talked into $1,039,000 asking price by my agent. Two more sales nearby of 3/2 homes in outdated condition in the $900s that are making her hopeful.
Yippee!!! This is so exciting!
I say go for it. It sounds like your area of CA is different from the Bay Area…where a sort of low price is set, and everyone bids above it.
It sounds like in your area folks will expect to make an offer that is lower than your asking price,…with some counter offer back and forth until you agree. That being the case…your agent suggested price would likely get you a sale price of about $1,000,000 or just under. Someone could feel like they got a bargain!!
The floors will be fine with the proper stain.
Great about the stairway closet!
About the price: you have a 4/3 house that has been taken down to studs and completely reno’ed with great attention to detail and quality. Go for it!
Yay!! Thrilled you’re going for the just-over-one-million-dollar price!!
I agree on the price: everywhere I’ve lived, except during extraordinary markets, people expect to bid and buy under the asking price. There may be a rare bidding war, but the battle does not normally result in a price above asking! So when people see a price just barely over $1million, they figure what the seller actually wants is a little under. Most of the time.
It really depends on the market. The market here hasn’t seen wild price swings over the last 20 years, but unless your house is really under-priced it is going to take a long time to sell. Like months.
We just sold our house in Central California… where I think the market is somewhat like San Diego. In pricing ours, we figured out what we thought was a fair price (e.g. where we wanted to end up) and then added $50K. Ended up with two offers right on our fair price. Buyers thought they got a deal by talking us down 50K and we got what we wanted… Applying this to your place, after looking through Zillow, I’d actually go even higher - 1,074,000. Then be ready to go down to 1,025,000 which is what seems like what you should be aiming for…
Wow, you guys are the optimists! My agent is the optimist also. I am Debbie Downer and am always worried about selling as fast as possible.
Agent came over today with two more staging company appointments. She still hasn’t even received a proposal or pricing from the first company that came through last week. I think the market is heating up and there is actual tract home development going on - these staging companies want those jobs.
My next major decision is paint color for downstairs. I put up some swatches today (forgot to take a picture). I’m leaning towards a light taupe wall and a dark mushroomy grey on the staircase wall as an accent wall. I need to go get a couple more paint samples - I am the proud owner of at least 50 little cans of paint samples. Then I’ll take a photo.
Didn’t make it down to Barrio to pick out remnant countertops today. My glamorous ‘ride’ took off for the dump for most of the day. Trips to the dump are never ending.
We had to get inventive on tasks today - anything that did not require a power tool. A lot of plumbing fixtures installed and all of our toilets got installed. I usually like to wait until the last week so that the gorillas don’t start using the brand new toilets, but it was something that could be done without power.
Also, doing a lot of patching, sanding and touchup. As soon as we cannot get into the house anymore because they are working on the floors, I will finally see some progress on the curb appeal.