Frankie: Week 15

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. This is your last teaser post before Frankie's big reveal next week!  Are you excited!  I am!  So excited, in fact, that I may overuse the exclamation point in this post.  Don't say I didn't warn you.

Come hell or high water, I WILL have this house done and ready to list by the end of next week.  Especially since as of today we'll own 3 houses... what what??  #1, our house...#2, Frankie...and #3.....

That's right, flip #3!!!  Another ranch!  My specialty apparently.  Hubby's named him Grover (following our naming convention of using part of the street name).  I may just end up calling him Grove.  We shall see.  We won't be starting in on the house right away, so I'll have time to finish Frankie and take a short breather before jumping in with both feet.  Until then, I'm going to start dreaming about ripping out this delightfully modern bathroom.

Woof.  It even matches the exterior... as it should.....  My sledge hammer is going to be my bff.

But anyway, back to the current flip!  Frankie is almost all grown up and ready to leave the nest.

It's honestly hard for me to believe the transformation here- he's really a looker!!  I've got the upstairs at about 95%, just some touch-ups, cleaning, and minor staging needed.

Just look at all those check marks!  That's what flipping dreams are made of.

Thankfully, I was able to fix my botched grout job with another layer of the same unsanded grout, now it's pretty and smooth as it was intended.  Yay! As the kitchen cleaning commenced, I started peeling the protective film off the appliances.  It was like unwrapping presents to reveal a sparkly kitchen.  Almost as gratifying as painting/refinishing furniture.  Almost.

The bedrooms and bathroom all got inexpensive blinds for privacy.  My secret for making them look less cheap and more custom: trim them to fit inside the window frames!  No more messy bunch at the bottom!

After touching up all the window trims and sills and polishing up the floors, I can't help but show you a teaser of the living room.

When I started on this house, my goal was to make it clean, functional and livable- three things it was not before.  This house cleaned up better than even I expected- it just puts a smile on my face, and hopefully the next owner's.

My To Do list pretty much has one thing still left unchecked: the basement.  I have to tackle it with lots and lots and lots of paint, so I anticipate being covered in paint next week... maybe I'll even get a bit on the walls.  It will be so worth it, though, trust me!

The end is near!  I can't wait to show you guys Frankie's full transformation next Friday!!

Frankie: Week 14

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. The last major item on the To Do list got checked off yesterday with about a dozen exclamation points- new windows!!

Despite the annoyance of scheduling the windows, the install guys were complete rock stars.  I'm resisting the temptation to show you a (very boring) series of window pics throughout the house.  Spoiler alert: they pretty much all look like this:

Seriously, though these are some sexy windows.  At least compared to their predecessors, remember?  They were even uglier up close.

In the back 2 bedrooms, I did keep the existing vinyl windows on the right, so the new windows don't match them (sad trombone).  There was a method to my madness, though: I wanted the sides of the house to have all the same windows and I wasn't prepared to spend an extra $1000 to replace the already replaced, but matching windows on the back.  Never fear!  I have a solution!  Installing neutral white miniblinds will help to unify the windows in the bedrooms(which are also different sizes) and add privacy.

With all the major items off the list, I've been working through my list of what feels like a million little things.

After trimming down several doors to allow for the new floor heights (which the contractor had already supposedly trimmed...), I was finally able to get ALL the doors rehung and start putting the newly painted hardware back on.

All the wonky electrical has now been fixed and updated throughout the house (by a pro!), I was finally able to glue & screw down the butcherblock island top,

and while the window install was happening upstairs, I finally got started on the basement.  Basement beginnings included removing about 3 kajillion nails from the ceiling, organizing everything left over from the upstairs work to keep/donate/trash piles, and prepping every single surface on the planet in the basement for paint.

The walls got prepped by scraping flaking paint and using a wire brush to remove all the efflorescence.  I'll follow this with paint designed to seal basement concrete walls.  I used this same process in the last flip and it seemed to do the job, so here's hoping it'll work again!

With the basement cleanup finally started and all the major items with a check next to them on my list, I feel a huge weight lifted off me.  Fingers crossed, but I'm hoping this last leg of the flip will go swimmingly!

Frankie: Week 13

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. It's crunch time here at Frankie!  Windows are getting installed in less than a week, and the goal is to do some touch-ups after, then LIST!  I'm not sure if the basement will be 100% complete at that point, but the main floor of the house is looking mighty pretty.  Especially the kitchen.

The kitchen now has countertops AND a pretty backsplash!!  And working plumbing!!

I'm loving the Moroccan shaped tiles- just the right amount of texture and interest.  My muscles don't appreciate the time bent over the counter and running up and down the stairs to make cuts (with the tile saw in the basement), but the result is worth it!

I still have to wipe them down again to get rid of the haze and make them super shiny...But I also have some fixing to do.  Probably later once EVERTHING else is done.... but I hate making mistakes.  It's no fun.  It's kind of embarrassing to admit that it took me a full day to realize why the grout looked kind of terrible once it dried.  I first tried to blame it on cheap grout, but eventually the reality set it that I just used the wrong product.  I used unsanded grout when I should have used sanded.  Rookie mistake!

I'm hoping that another coat of unsanded grout on top of the already dried grout will have the necessary structure not to sink in the gaps and look silly.  Fingers crossed!!!  I feel kind of foolish that I did this- I just didn't think it through and I really hope I don't have to scrape all the grout out and start over.  That would kinda suck (majorly).

But on a more positive note, I've started polishing up the hardwood floors and they're looking quite spiffy!  Even just a good clean made a huge difference.

I used Rejuvinate Floor Restorer in High Gloss (after remembering that  Young House Love had a good experience with it) and it didn't disappoint.

Hello Shiny!

As I finish up with the floors, I'm also rehanging doors at long last!!  Those buggers aren't the easiest to get realigned when you've completely taken them down.  Maybe today the bathroom'll actually get a door.  Apparently a door is a very important element to a bathroom.  Who knew?

Back down the hall in the kitchen, I was also finally able to cut down the butcherblock for the dresser/island.  I had to wait until I had a second pair of hands at the house to lift it- a 2"+ thick solid wood slab weighs a few pounds.  It's not attached to the island just yet, but I'm already finding it handy to have this additional surface.  I can only imagine how nice it would be to cook in this kitchen!  Ya know.... if I actually cooked....

I took a bit of time yesterday to really look at what's left and make a bajillion and a half lists.  Shopping lists, staging lists, to do lists....  I have a love/hate relationship with my to do lists.  There are few greater joys in life than crossing off item after item on a to do list, but in their beginning stage, they're just intimidating:

None of the items on the lists are huge tasks anymore, so I'm really hoping that I can make quick work of these lists!  Chop, chop, Karen, this house won't sell itself!  Anyone in the market for a nearly move-in-ready home in good ol' Worcester, MA?  The kitchen's going to be kind of amazing!