Frankie: Week 6

I hope you enjoy these weekly updates as I learn to navigate through the business of flipping houses.  Check out other posts about Frankie the Fliphouse HERE. I'm not really sure where the time has gone on this flip!  Week 6 already??

Anyway...  The beginning of the week I spent doing more paint prep, scraping and sanding the bathroom ceiling and more of the exciting stuff, all to prepare for the contractors to finally get started!  I have handed over the complete bathroom installation and the kitchen/hall floor installation over to the pros and so far I'm very glad that I did!

After starting on Wednesday, they've made strides in both the kitchen and bath.  In the kitchen/hall, they already 100% desqueaked the creaky floors, installed backer board and cut back the door jams (so the tile can go underneath).  The room already looks so much bigger with the uniform, non-peel-and-stick floor, I can't wait to see the tile down!

Speaking of tile, I picked up 1/3 of my tile order from Lowe's (apparently tile is ridiculously heavy and unless I want my Jeep to tip over, I shouldn't take it all at once... who knew??).  It's 18x18 and it's pretty.  22 more boxes left to pick up!

In the bathroom, the contractors shimmed out the back wall, added new insulation and put down a new sub floor.  Walls in a house of this age were a strange material.  Not plaster and lathe, but 2 layers of plaster board making it an odd thickness.  Since they need the wall to be even with the window trim, they needed to furr it out a bit.

Again, already looking so much cleaner and nicer and we haven't even reached the finish work!

While they were cutting and screwing, I was trying to stay out of their way but still be productive.  I was able to get the trim and doors in 2 of the bedrooms all primed, although the third bedroom is the bathroom staging area with ALL the materials and supplies, so that one will have to wait.  And since it's one of my most asked questions, I'll be planning a post about painting wood trim.  It'll be enthralling, I promise.

I also spent a good amount of time in the basement prepping the heater covers, trim that has been removed, and the bathroom doors for painting in the basement.  As you may have seen on instagram/facebook yesterday, I went crazy with my Critter sprayer again.  Have I mentioned my love for this tool?  Yes? ok.  Moving on.

All of the interior door knobs now match with a fresh coat of oil rubbed bronze spray paint.

After being in demo-land for over a month, it is nice to see finish work starting to happen!  By next week's post, there will be a dramatic difference, and I'm getting giddy about it!

Frankie: Week 5

I hope you enjoy these weekly updates as I learn to navigate through the business of flipping houses.  Check out other posts about Frankie the Fliphouse HERE.

Since I was missing for week 4, I'll skip directly from week 3 to week 5.  This week's alternate post title is "Adventures in Tedium"

I'll warn you now- this week was b.o.r.i.n.g.  Well, not really boring for the work side, since I'm still pooped, but it was uneventful to say the least.  Prep was the key-word this week.

I did a LOT of scraping, patching, and sanding so that this ceiling

eventually looked like this

It was a miracle.... that involved numerous curse words and practically an entire package of sandpaper, but a miracle nonetheless.

If you were a hole in this house that wasn't supposed to be there, this week was not your week either.  I went on a patching frenzy!  I bought this 1 gal. bucket of spackle on Monday...

See what I mean about tedious, though?  Patch, sand, rinse, repeat.  Since I'll be painting every ounce of wood trim (it's in horrific condition), I have a lot of surfaces to prep.  A lot.  Seriously- every surface in the house with the exception of the floor is getting painted and it all needed patching and sanding.  Even the door knobs will be painted!

On top of all the mind numbing surface prep, my lists are back!  It makes me smile every time I get to check a box off!  Only a few boxes are checked, but I'm building momentum.

This week also made our bank account much lighter on account of having to purchase supplies for the next phase of the project- the rebuilding phase!  Purchases included:

-countertops

-bathroom vanity

-bathroom mirrors

-bathroom sconces

-tile- Kitchen/hall floor, bathroom floor, & shower walls

-kitchen pendant

-kitchen sink

I just keep telling myself that this messy, tedious week is leading up to the fun part.  Hopefully the contractor will be able to start on the bathroom next week, and I'll become one with the paint brush.  Once I start painting, I think this whole house will start coming back together pretty fast!

Frankie: Week 3

I hope you enjoy these weekly updates as I learn to navigate through the business of flipping houses.  Check out other posts about Frankie the Fliphouse HERE. An alternate title for this week's post is "Gone Baby Gone"

Although not a drastic difference from last week, I'm certainly relieved to have reached this point!

Kitchen?  Gone

Bathroom? Gone

Basement? Gone (mostly).  Buhbye sailboat wallpaper!

The only thing that got marginally prettier in this house and not messier this week was the outside.  With a few sunny, not freezing days, I decided to tackle some curb appeal before winter arrives in full force.  Since we plan to be selling in the colder months, I want to make it look as nice from the outside now as possible.  I painted the door, started painting the awning & railings, mulched, and trimmed bushes. Not done, but it's a giant step in the right direction.

I've also decided to start a new trend- a kitchen in your living room!  Think it'll catch on?

With my head 100% focused on completing demo this week so we could get the dumpster out of there, I surprisingly don't have my usual list of other accomplishments (unless you count breaking a water pipe- go me).  This week, what you see is what you get, for better or worse.

I made the mistake of looking back at where I was with Clark (the last flip house) at week 3 and the rebuilding had already begun.  There was less demo there, and I made the mistake of not doing all the demo at once, so I can't allow myself feel behind with this flip.  I'm really trying to approach this one more systematically and strategically.  Here's hoping that tactic works...

Next week'll be a bit of a hiatus from flip posts, but I have a fun alternative up my sleeve :) so stay tuned!