The Joys of Renovation

• July 14, 2016
• Mari Bickmore
• no comments

We have flipped several houses in a few cities during our continual moving sojourn and I have never written about them.  Some things are just to painful to do whilst in the midst of chaos.  While living in Kansas we did a house in Overland Park and one in Independence and had two contractors directly from #*()#).  Well you get the idea.  One is being sued by the State of Missouri and the other should be being sued by several states and a multitude of people.  As far as I can tell he must be related to the Clintons.  It would take months and books to recreate what happened during that time…the lost sleep and anguish.  Now I know why people sue for things like that.  Really horrible people.   The best one we did was in Salt Lake City.  Loved the end product and the people we worked with.  Those are the two extremes of the spectrum.  Missouri contractors versus Salt Lake contractors.   At least the houses turned out well in the end.

Our most recent move was last summer, and this time we renovated the home we bought for ourselves.   We closed on the house while on a Scandinavian/Russian cruise, which was really weird, and at the same time went into contract on the home we were selling from the last place we lived.  Great stops by the way and Celebrity was a really great operator, but who am I to judge.  That was my first ocean cruise.  Cruises aren’t really my thing.  I like to rent a car and have tons of time to explore versus getting off the boat at 9 or 10 and then having to be back on by 4 or 5.  But I digress.

After we returned we moved out of our nice, midtown apartment to the burbs…to live in two bedrooms and a bathroom over the garage whilst our renovation commenced.  Did I say we were nuts.  Maybe not.  But you know the answer to that.  My darling daughter came to stay the first two weeks because not only was I starting demolition, I was having minor surgery.  Again, what was I thinking.

One of the first things we had done was removing all the hardwood and most of the tile in the house…kitchen, living room, great room, dining room, bathrooms, etc. and the carpet in the bedrooms (except for our “sanctuary”).  So first tip for any of you DIYer’s or those contemplating being in charge of your own renovation:  When someone quotes you on floor removal never sign anything other than a guaranteed price.  He ended up adding on charges that were over $2000 more than the original quoted price (Clean Site – don’t use them).  Not only that, they didn’t get close to the cabinets so I ended up having to pay extra to the floor installers to get that removed.  Not pleasant to deal with and not forthcoming, until later of course.   Then, of course, I had someone in for something else who said he could have done it for half the price…that really hurt.

One thing is weird, I would make appointments with three or four contractors for different parts of the project:  electric, plumbing, painting, etc. etc. and half the time they wouldn’t show.  Or if they did show they never got back with me to give me a bid.  Don’t these people need work?  Maybe they don’t.  In any event, that is a lot of time wasted and very frustrating.   Well, enough of this today.  I’ll continue with the saga in another few days.  But just to know it’s going to turn out okay in the end, here is a picture of before and after of my living room.  I think it’s great…but some of you may like the before better than the after.  Just let me know.  No, I won’t change it back if you do.  Needless to say,  it is not completely decorated yet, so I’ll repost later.