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Help has Arrived

Today was a giant sigh of relief. Our awesome hired contractor, Keith Cox, arrived this morning for a consultation to discuss the details of tearing down the bay wall. He let us know he might be back tomorrow, but then showed up just a few hours later and began work right away. Knowing he was there to get going on this leg of the process was a huge relief. We no longer have to worry about whether or not he would have time to fit us into his schedule, or whether that wall was going to delay all the forward progress.

So we are moving forward working side by side with another contractor for the first time. It’s so great seeing multiple things happening simultaneously. We are confident at this point that we are going to complete this job ahead of our previously foreseen schedule. Knowing that we will be moving into this place, and the fact that it is ours gives us so much motivation to work every spare second we have.

This past weekend we were able to complete the framing disaster on the first floor and close in the hole. The new joist supports are in and connected to the new concrete pads. All the joists have began leveled and decking has been laid on top.

We also handled another funky lip in the floor where the kitchen meets the hallway, and started the electrical work on the second floor.

Derek was also able to finish the skirt and platform for the dual pack hvac unit so that it will be ready for Bob when he comes to install the unit.

Progress is being made every corner you turn and all of it at a rate we didn’t know we could achieve.

Tomorrow we will have the city inspector out to just take a look at a couple of the things that we are worried about, especially the old chimney next to the bay wall that Keith is tearing down. It seems to be brittle and may need to be rebuilt with a bit off additional supports on the walls even though Derek already supported the bottom.

Even with a little hiccup it looks like we will still be finishing far ahead of schedule!

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The giant, gaping hole

This weekend was an interesting one. We did actual demo. On the first floor of the house we had a lot of issues with the floor heaving. So, with the help of our awesome friend Felicia Davis, we created a giant hole, by cutting out the subfloor. Then we were able to find a solution to the problem.

The cause of the hump was the fact that the entire house settled around the front basement foundation that only runs half way through the front living space. In order to correct this we had to shave down the joists that rested upon the foundation, and also cut back the other joists so that we could drop them down onto a new header that we attached to the front basement foundation.

This was a long painstaking process that also included cutting out all the old radiator pipes, waste line and whatever the other miscellaneous abandoned pipes were under there.

We finished the full process today and are now ready for subfloor. Because of how severe the hump was we will make up the difference by having a threshold in the doorway of the first suite. This will allow us to have an even floor at the front of the stairwells.

Once we opened up the floor we also found the issue with our sagging second floor in the hallway. The wall in the center of the first floor, directly below the hallway, wasn’t placed above any supports. We poured two footings that will support another joist directly under the wall and hoist up the sagging. It is minimal sagging, but it will make a definite difference. This bearing joist will be placed this week after the concrete sets.

Granger and I even found enough time to set almost all of the electrical boxes on the second floor. We had to wait until we were confident Derek wasn’t going to kill himself while we were upstairs. Sometimes the remodeling processes can get really hairy.

With a fist bump, high five, and congratulatory smack on the behind we are feeling super accomplished this week. Even though it looks like we went a bit backwards we have actually made a bunch of improvements. Please enjoy this week’s update video, and while you are here please scroll all the way down to the bottom of the blog and subscribe so that you don’t miss a thing, including our public open house that we will host as soon as the project is completed.

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Moooovin!

In right around a week and a half we have completed the framing of the second floor. We can now move our operation down to the first floor. And on that first floor, other than the firring of the outside walls there’s not a lot to do.

There were a lot of hiccups in the ceiling of the front, South section of the second floor. There were odd splices, and large gaps and lifted boards from the settling of the eaves. These have all been repaired.

We are also ready to begin setting electrical boxes and stringing the wire on the second floor. I think we will meet our goal of 180 days for initial inspection. But that will also hinge on our contractor’s timeline for the demolition and rebuilding of the bay wall. We are very excited about that process.

Other than the framing overview video above we have uploaded a few other shorts to give you all an idea of what we are dealing with and the progress we have made.

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When the “remodel” part of this job comes into play.

Up until this point this job has been a breeze. We were planning on completing the framing for the whole second floor. However in the original section of the house there is a bit of separation where the roof has been putting tons of pressure on the eaves and that has caused the ceiling rafters of Rider’s proposed room to lift. We spent most of the day devising a plan that would amend the lifting as well as secure the eaves. By the time we did this, because we are in Utah and it’s a Sunday, all of the stores were closed and we were no longer able to purchase the boards we needed to complete the job. And we were so close! This is the first hiccup we have had because of the old building’s sagging body. Sometimes the fun of remodeling is the problem solving. Sometimes the headache of remodeling is the problem solving.

You can see in this picture how much the boards lifted above the wall in this room.

We were able to do the last of the interior demo today. In Ryu’s proposed room there was a bit of wall and ceiling left that was lathe and plaster on strange, inadequate framing. Granger pulled all that down (see video) and we cleaned the space up. Granger is really sad that we have to put the wall back up in order for it to be Ryu’s bedroom because it looks great opened up to the stairwell.

(Pay close attention to that window on the right that Keisha busted out with a ladder)

(Oh, and this window pane, the very same window just the upper pane that Derek broke out with a board. What a pair we are…lol.)

We have been in the house now for just over a week and have made really great progress. We purchased this large stack of lumber and look how much of it we used already. And this was after we had used up our huge stack that we reclaimed from the demo.

I’m confident that barring any major burnouts or divorce we should finish on my timeline. We have many update videos available. Follow this video on our YouTube channel and check out all the others while you are there.

One of the main things we are trying to accomplish with this remodel is completing the project with no mortgage whatsoever. We were able to pay cash for the house, we also had much left over from selling our last remodel that we have been able to use toward some of the big purchases such as the dual pack heating/cooling unit and the bundles and bundles of lumber. We will also be selling our current home in Helper and should turn a great profit so that that money can go toward the completion. I think that with good management, hard work and being very careful to stick to our timelines we should come in on budget. Another big plus toward this goal is the fact that we have a few buyers for our Helper home just waiting in the wings and Helper is BOOMING! I’m confident this is our time.

One of the things I love about this home is our wonderful neighbor Faye. He takes such wonderful care of his home and yard and I just love looking out the windows of our proposed master suite and seeing how big beautiful roses and tranquil landscape. I’m very grateful, and I hope after all the racket we are making now is done we will be able to offer him the same.