Here comes Pollyanna Very Happy to add the silver lining:
By seeing what’s available, you’re getting an excellent education on the market where you are, cb.
CB, it is a custom job because it is a weird kitchen, and yes, the guy who does the precision measurements is booked for a while. Then the stupid counters need to be made. Can’t just go to a granite yard and pick out a slab. Counters are usually no big deal… I’ll just have to live without a kitchen for a week.
OMG, stopped by House2 this morning, and the Pella fellas are hard at work! Doing a great job so far. Showed up on time and are very professional. It was not hard to say goodbye to the windows that would not even close properly. The house was apparently quite upscale in its prime; lots of wood and fancy stuff that screams the late eighties, like a whole house sound system. Mr. is getting Sonos for his birthday to curb his urge to resurrect it. 
There will be a lot of painting and sanding and staining in my future!
I so hope you will be able to find your “prince” soon, CB!
Exciting!! New windows make a huge difference
While we are waiting for “prince” #7, here is some time-kill reading. 
http://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/-kitchen-backsplash-ideas-not-tile
Walnut backsplash? Uhmmm… Not for me. But the artsy glass one is awesome.
A friend of mine has stone tiles that look very porous to me to have in a kitchen. They are not directly behind the stove but too close for my comfort.
Has deck been built and tile put around the fireplace?
Deck is 75% there and is quite large. About 330 sq ft of deck. We are putting down trex c9mposite and doing everything possible for low maintenance for the devk. Its going to have a beautiful ceiling for a coveref deck.
Fireplace tile is only half done because my carpenter begged to focus on finishing the deck. Wr meed to get deck done so all the tools can get cleared out of the master bedroom. The young owners have completely moved out of their big master bedroom so that they can paint before new flooring and baseboards next week.
Wow! Low maintenance decks rock! We will be replacing all cedar decking at the new (old) place with trex or something like that next year. We have plenty of projects for this year, I am afraid! 
This means I will have to clean and stain the darn thing… Hate cedar decks.
We just had our contractor paint our deck with something called Nu-Deck. He swears it will mean low/no maintenance going forward – just power washing every year, but no need to restain or reseal. Does anyone know anything about this stuff? (I suppose I should have asked here before we did it.)
I’m all ears, @VeryHappy
It is a polymeric paint that is supposed to bind to wood very strongly, so no peeling or chipping. I personally dislike painted decks. So no, not going to use it on mine.
Listing agent for Tivoli just took it off market. No takers at 995k. Its now up for rent at $3,750/ month. Guess he wasn’t kidding about Seller stuck on price
@BunsenBurner: I’m not crazy about painted decks either, but the color we used is a “deck” color called Sable. You can’t tell when you look at it that it’s got anything special on it. Thanks for the chemistry lesson.
I’ll have to look into that color, VH, thanks! Mr. looked at the coatings and said that they would be good for the stairs. Ipa wood, coated for extra durability and traction.
Just got a tip about where to get good ss backslashes. There is a Seattle-area fabricator that does metal everything, Metal Masters. I love this hood they made!
http://metalmastersnw.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Stainless-Steel-Hood-with-wave-design-2.jpg
Ipa wood? Oh my goodness. We looked into that before we built the deck and it was very costly. But I understand it wears like iron. so I’m not sure you’d need to bother painting it with NuDeck stuff at all.
It is durable, but gets very slippery in our wet winters, as we discovered. That coating has some sort of stuff in it to make it non-slippery. Probably very good for stairs!
Here’s another gutted house with a view, this one tucked into a hillside. They just cut the price $200K! Looks like the only parking is a pad at the top of the stairs used to access the house. Getting supplies to the house would certainly be an interesting challenge! Plus unless I’m misreading the streaks in the last photo - possible water damage? http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-170020847-1161_Akron_St_San_Diego_CA_92106
I do like the round window.
Other than that just a couple of smaller houses in need of an upgrade in non-sexy neighborhoods.
That house could really be something special. As for the parking problem and getting stuff up to the house – maybe a dumbwaiter?!!
What’s the smaller building down hill on this property?