<p>Yes, there are reasons that you wouldn’t want to live in Detroit. But these areas are beautiful - take a look at Boston Blvd on google earth.</p>
<p>I’ d pass on Detroit even if I could have those homes for free and a 100k job was thrown in…It is a city who’s time has come and gone…</p>
<p>Maybe you could put one of those Detroit houses on a flatbed truck and move it somewhere ?? :p</p>
<p>I am just a couple of years ahead of all of you, since I already sold my house and then bought the much smaller, supposed-to-be-less-expensive, house – for the price of a car!!! However, since it had been abandoned 50 plus years I also have a multi-page spread sheet with hourly costs of every available workman within commuting distance.</p>
<p>Now if anyone wants to start a discussion about putting houses on flatbed trucks and moving them, I am so there. My husband and I evidently can’t die happy till we accomplish this feat, too.</p>
<p>[Detroit’s</a> Beautiful, Horrible Decline - Photo Essays - TIME](<a href=“TIME | Current & Breaking News | National & World Updates”>http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1882089,00.html)</p>
<p>BC, saw that a dew days ago…the pictures are beautiful and sad at the same time</p>
<p>I’ve bought several nice old (1800-1865) houses for $45K or less and they needed a significant amount of work, though the bones were good. Not for the faint of heart or for those who can’t/won’t learn how to do most of the work themselves. But, for an old house lover, the rewards are plentiful and many parts of restoration make great family projects. Not many young people know how to mix plaster, hang wallpaper, restore old windows, rebuild stone walls, and paint like pros these days but we had a lot of fun learning and practicing together!</p>
<p>sk8rmom…a person buys one of these homes for $45,000…after the homes are fixed up…how much can these homes sell for? I know I am asking a general question and asking for specifics…:)</p>
<p>Since you have done this multiple times…I take it this is a profitable enterprise…</p>
<p>Or is this a hobby?</p>
<p>I saw this article yesterday. We’re headed to South Bend this Friday for parents weekend. I thought we might take a look at this house and scoop it up while we’re there. Based on the response in this thread alone, i’m guessing we’re gonna be too late. Ha!</p>
<p>sk8rmom: what date/style is your current house? your kids enjoyed this process?? for a brief time my enjoyed demolition :)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I am very very interested in the answer, too, having restored several old homes mid 18th to mid 19th century. And having sold one about a year ago. When prices were going up and you did the majority of the work yourself, and you lived in a “hot” area, I think it was possible to make a profit. If the house needs hvac, electrical, plumbing, a roof, and you have to hire it out, I doubt it. If you have to do a well and septic, I really doubt it. So much depends on finding the right buyer. And you may be looking at properties that aren’t mortgageable and you may not even be able to get any kind of builders loan after you buy it. Also, I think it is probably always more expensive to do a restoration with a bank involved. In my opinion it makes financial sense for old house lovers to buy someone else’s restoration. Last year I looked more than a dozen beautiful restorations, done fairly recently, that are still on the market. However, those of us who are ridiculous purists will never be satisfied until we find a completely untouched property and do it up right from scratch. So we refused to take the sensible route.</p>
<p>a search function in the following sites should locate the “cheap as a car” houses:</p>
<p>[Historic</a> Properties and Old Houses For Sale](<a href=“http://www.historicproperties.com/index.asp]Historic”>http://www.historicproperties.com/index.asp)</p>
<p>[OldHouses.com</a> - Find Historic Homes For Sale](<a href=“http://www.oldhouses.com/cf/search.cfm]OldHouses.com”>Old Houses For Sale, Rent or Auction - OldHouses.com)</p>
<p>Many state preservation societies have properties available – for free! – if you are willing to move them. We haven’t yet had the opportunity to spend more-money-than-makes-any-sense-at-all on that type of project - But we are definitely looking into it.</p>
<p>Dstark, we don’t live in the houses as we’re doing any major restoring but, for me, it’s a labor of love and not a money-making thing. I’ve managed not to lose money so far, but I try not to think of all the hours we put into it as work…so I guess it’s a hobby with some investment potential. I enjoy having a clean, comfortable house to come home to and there are certain advantages to not having to make an old house livable first, such as first saving the exterior from further weather damage and being able to take time to understand the house and restore things or source appropriate replacements. There are tax credits available so, if one’s taxable income is high, that is a benefit and some states have very limited grant funding. I can apply for a grant to restore a barn, but not a house, and only if the barn will have some business purpose…of course, mine doesn’t but I may be raising a few goats and chickens and selling eggs before it’s over if that’s what it takes! Housing isn’t terribly expensive in my area and many people prefer new homes, so I agree that it’s a matter of finding the right buyer - my old house-seller friends have been successful, but they’ve also lived there for many years and of couse there was an overall appreciation in home values and one of them ran a successful B&B for many years, which was sold as a going concern.</p>
<p>Now that my kids are grown, they’re busier with their own lives and participation certainly isn’t mandatory. The younger neices and nephews like to go help (doesn’t every kid like to work, but just not at home) and we sometimes spend the weekend. My D has the patience to sit and strip old metal, shutters, balusters so I bring what can be removed home to her. The boys like to do the “bull” work…demolition, scraping/painting, dismantling old chimneys and furnaces, landscaping, roofing, carpentry, etc. and I do the designs, schedules, research, materials, supervise, feed, and most of the artistic or truly tedious jobs that no one else wants to do! </p>
<p>My first house was an 1804 center hall colonial which used to be a huge, u-shaped hotel/stage coach stop back in the day and still had lovely 16’ domed ceilings upstairs in the bedrooms/former ballroom (lovely until it was time to take down the old wallpaper and repair the plaster, that is). It had been partially modernized by the previous owners (so little plumbing and wiring was needed) and the roof was slate, which was pricey to fix/slate but rarely needed maintenance. I bought that house when I was single and lived there for a number of years before the state wanted the lot for yet another road expansion project, but they did pay a fair price. It was going to be demolished, which broke my heart, so I tried for many months to find anyone who would want the building (for free) to dismantle or move. I had a professional willing to take it down and label it for around $18K, but there were no takers and I didn’t have a place to store such a huge amount of lumber, so eventually we salvaged whatever we could and the rest is in a landfill somewhere.</p>
<p>Our current project is an 1860’s octagon house and this time I made sure it’s on the Nat’l Register and away from major highways! Restoration is still in progess and I’m hoping to sell my current home and move there eventually. It’s a local landmark and people are always stopping to inquire about the history or ask for a tour so it may make a nice small inn someday. It’s required more work as it hadn’t been lived in for 20 years or so and also has an old post and beam barn which was leaning (jacked and replaced sill plate) and a stone foundation under the kitchen extension that also had to be jacked and relaid (like alh, I’m a bit of a purist, so replaced it with stone although concrete would have been infinitely easier). We only work on it during the good weather as it’s a bit of a drive to get there and I’ve found it doesn’t pay to heat it for the few times we get up there in the winter (and the area is beautiful so the boys would only want to go snowmobiling once they got there anyway!). It’s 2-storied, plus cupola, and took two years of weekends to restore the outside, which the kids helped with tremendously…the paint was heavily alligatored and it involved taking every bit of it off the entire structure by hand. This season will bring a new roof (though not the original standing seam, which is outside my budget), more wiring, replastering, an adventure in chimney restoration, and hopefully a floor to ceiling refinishing of the verandahs. As I said, it’s a labor of love and not something we could afford to hire everything out for…even if we could, where’s the fun in that?!</p>
<p>^^my one huge regret on the current project was not making room in the budget for a “true” standing seam roof. The roofer assured me he could make it look the same. It does not. I am so embarrassed. I should have made it a budget priority.</p>
<p>Do you mix up your own lime mortar for re-pointing, rebuilding the chimneys? </p>
<p>Your project sounds amazing and wonderful!</p>
<p>House Hunters had Detroit area homes features a few times recently and even in the nicer areas like Grosse Point and Indian Village you can get a still in good shape great old home at very good prices–not car prices but these are elegant move-in 3000-4000 SF 20’s and 30’s built brick homes for under $400K. Stuff that sells for over $1million+ anywhere decent. BUt it might not go up in value–ever while that $1 million house will go to $2 Million in 20 years…</p>
<p>sk8rmom: a thought if you still have the original roof. Someone locally took off an old metal roof, put down a regular “new” shingle roof, and reinstalled the old metal - keeping the patina and saving some $$ too, I am guessing. That’s what I am planning for the next project…</p>
<p>House Hunters had Detroit area homes features a few times recently and even in the nicer areas like Grosse Point and Indian Village you can get a still in good shape great old home at very good prices–not car prices but these are elegant move-in 3000-4000 SF 20’s and 30’s built brick homes for under $400K. Stuff that sells for over $1million+ anywhere decent. BUt it might not go up in value–ever while that $1 million house will go to $2 Million in 20 years…</p>
<p>I saw that Detroit HH episode too, barrons – I was blown away by the humongous historic mansion beautifully restored and in a nice neighborhood - for $400K. Wondered about the resale issue as well. But man, what a house that was…</p>
<p>alh, the standing seam is still there, but the seams are pounded flat and there are 2 layers of shingles laid over it. Idk what the condition of the metal is as I can only see it from below though, looking at the sad old shingles, I’m pretty sure that’s the only thing keeping the house dry! I have been looking for a tinsmith (another lost art) for a possible reuse/refab but none of the metal people that I’ve found like to fool with anything. Like all the contractors, they want to work with shiny, new, easy materials. My “splurge” in roofing is going to be copper for the 3 entry porches, which have what I can only describe as “pagoda-style” roofs, but only because an architect friend offered to get me a sizable discount!</p>
<p>There is an older retired mason in the area that will mix the traditional lime mortar (most of the other guys are lazy and don’t understand the danger modern mortars pose to old brick) and he is going to be helping S with the chimney project. First the old chimney, which runs up the center of a spiral staircase, has to be cleaned out though as it’s full of soot from a coal burning furnace and apparently some form of stoves in the bedrooms (house never had fireplaces at all). My alternate plan is to rip the whole thing out and use the cavity for some other purpose, like new plumbing for the second floor, hiding the necessary but ugly modern cable/phone lines, and a laundry chute:) The house has stacked walls, which makes hiding things and accessibility a real challenge!</p>