Will a contoured toilet rug cover the brown splotches?
This is probably a really stupid idea, but could you do a translucent “wash” using a very diluted pale paint on that one tile to make it match the others, before sealing it? Obviously you’d want to consult a pro and try it on a scrap first. Like I said, probably a really dumb idea. I don’t know anything about travertine.
No contoured toilet rug for this house, given the price point, location and target buyers.
I understand the irritation, but It’s a half bath in the basement… I doubt anyone will be looking that closely.
If it was a main bathroom upstairs I would make him tear out the tile and put in a new one. But, at this point it is the Man Cave basement bathroom where guys are probably not even going to notice it. When buyers come downstairs to look at the garage and workshop, the bathroom is just going to be a bonus. Most women will walk in and think the whole basement area is creepy. Luckily it is not musty or moldy, it is nice and dry down there. I am very comfortable in the space but I think I may have gotten used to it now.
Yeah, my H is all about the functional. Which is why I have the world’s ugliest clothes hook in my laundry room.
@coralbrook, this house is going to be great. As you move up the flip scale, do you think you might get to the point where you decide to move in and sell your own house? 
We had relatives visiting from out of town who came to project July 4th. They said we shpuld move into this house. But I personally don’t want to live with stairs. Have always lived in a single story house and i don’t think retirement age is when I should move into a house with two flights of stairs.
But soon i will be looking for my personal fixer upper because I would like to move to have view of San Diego Harbor
Oh but CB…your property taxes…yikes! They would most definitely go up,if you move…right??
Technically yes, but there is an ‘exemption’. If you move from a home, and you are over a certain age (I think it is 65) then you get to take your current taxable Prop 13 value to the new house, as long as you buy a house of equal or lesser market value.
Example for those that are outside California:
Taxable value of home = $500,000
(you bought it for $400,000 12 years ago and it has only risen by the 2% year index allowed)
Current property taxes are $5,500 / year
Current market value of your home = $800,000 and it sells on the market for $800,000
You can buy a home for $800,000 or less and transfer the $500,000 taxable value to the new home
Your taxes will stay at the $5,500/year instead of $8,800
Actually it is 55 or older. And it is once in a life time, under the normal circumstances.
Here is the details, if any one is interested.
https://www.acgov.org/forms/assessor/Persons_55_Perm_Disabled_Transfer_Brochure.pdf
Unfortunately that was no help for those moving from out of state
Not only move out of state, unless there is special arrangement, moving between counties cannot take advantage of the law. In the Bay Area you can do it between San Mateo and alameda counties but I don’t think it will work in Monterey county. Certainly it won’t work if you move to San Diego.
Sorry, tax base transfer between counties is based on adaptation of Prop 90 by county
Here is the details, actually, you can move from San Mateo to San Diego and transfer the tax base.
http://www.car.org/governmentaffairs/localgovernmentaffairs/prop90/
The receiving County has to have agreed to Proposition 90 to receive base value from another County. Most counties have accepted base transfers (San Diego is one of them), but some Counties did not (I don’t know which ones will not receive).
For example, San Francisco County and Monterey County and Santa Barbara County could lose a lot of tax revenue if a ton of retirees moved into their county and carried base values from a low value area. But good luck finding a home of equal or lesser value as your home in Kern County (Bakersfield) in one of those Counties !
We have finished our kitchen vaulting and I loaded some pictures - hard to tell what is going on with the pictures.
I estimate that the cost to do the vaulting was about:
$1,000 extra for engineering
$1,000 in expensive versalam beams and materials
$2,000 in labor
So, that kitchen vaulting had better be worth at least $4,000 in the sale 
Either way, we would have had to reconfigure the kitchen ceiling because the walls were pushed out and opened up (requiring the expensive versalam drop beams and metal hardware) and the eastern wall was pushed into the staircase / powder room area to make room for a run of cabinets in that wall. So, the existing ceiling joists that were running east and west would not have been long enough and would have to be replaced even if we stayed at an 8’ ceiling.
There was just no way I was going to let all of the beautiful architecture in the roof line above the stove area stay hidden inside a huge tall attic. The roof is at least 7’ above the kitchen area and it would have been just a waste to enclose it and keep 8’ ceilings in the kitchen.
Lots of angst yesterday on exactly how I wanted to finish some of the vaulting blocking around the existing tall beam in the kitchen. Let’s just say that after it was all built and finished I realized that I had made a 2" mistake. I wanted the existing high beam to be exposed as a rustic beam in the kitchen. They set the ceiling joists just a little too low on the eastern side of the beam (at my instruction) and only about 2" of the beam is going to be exposed on the eastern side and I could have had about 4" deep of beam exposed. I decided that I would have to just let it go and hope it all works out in the end. Normally I would make them pull it all apart and start over again, but it was a lot of work and lumber and I didn’t have the heart to make them start all over again due to my mistake in the design analysis.
Honestly, in the photo the “poop tile” looks just like all the others.
Monterey county closed the door to prop 90 several years ago. Too many wealthy retires from the SF Peninsula bought [ second] homes there there and declared they were their primary residence.
BINGO!!! The comparable has Sold…
4505 Newport Ave 92107
5/3 2644 sq ft
Only 3 blocks away, situated at same location on top of hill.
Slightly inferior location because it is on a corner of a slightly busy street, a lot less privacy
Lot is 2/3 size of my property
House does not have ‘character’
pool in back yard
Views are from front of house on street only, patio with BBQ and views is on the street
Good condition - remodeled recently by homeowner
$1,720,000 !!!
PROGRESS UPDATE
We have a lot of guys costing a lot of money working all over the place
Basement bathroom is complete… tile down, tile grouted, tile sealed, rosin paper over tile. All drain lines and water lines complete. Venting complete out to the roof. Exhaust fan complete out to side of the house (very carefully cut a hole in side of house because stucco is already complete in that area). Drywall installed, but we cannot mud and paint because the drywall screw pattern needs to get inspected. Vanity and sink installed.
Porta pottie gone!!! thank goodness, that was a stinky mess in the back yard. Every time the company came to pump it out on Tuesdays it smelled up the entire neighborhood
Dumpster full and being removed. We got through 90% of the trash piled in the back yard plus the full demolition of the back of the house.
Staircase complete and kitchen vaulting complete. Of course we discovered one piece of engineered lumber that is required as a rim joist for the top of the staircase landing. I will have to special order that piece. It took days just to finish all the blocking and all the boards needed to be able to set drywall properly in the kitchen
All flooring torn off the back of the house so that we can set new sub floor that will make the floor even from kitchen towards the back of the house.
Shear walls and straps complete on the back of the existing house.
New water heater installed! This required us to put 5/8" drywall on ceiling above water heater area so that we don’t have to try to squeeze in there and install it later. Electrical ready for water heater. We have been waiting to get water heater installed after all the structural work and demolition was complete in the existing garage. Need hot water in order to test all our lines as we go through the plumbing. We have discovered that we cannot ‘bleed’ new copper lines without the hot water because there is some kind of vacuum being created in the lines that doesn’t provide enough pressure to bleed the shower and bathtub lines installed up in the hall bath. It was challenging to get water heater installed because the ceiling is really low and we needed to do a lot of work to get earthquake straps into the concrete stem wall and set it up to code off floor.
I loaded some photos with a lot of explanation
^^Looks like that house has its own chicken coop.
Several solar panels, too - is that a +?