Grover: Week 14

I hope you enjoy these weekly updates as I learn to navigate through the business of flipping houses.  Check out more about this flip, Grover, or check out posts about our last flip HERE. It's crunch time!  I want to have this house listed in less than a month.  Hustle, Karen!!  Thankfully, with the floors now mostly complete with 2 coats and all of the remaining walls primed, it's finally starting to look like something.

After everything else is done, the floor will get a 3rd coat so they are flawless and gleaming for when we list.  I seriously couldn't be happier with the floors- I'm crossing my fingers that it'll be a HUGE selling feature.

Also on the list of big ticket items that I didn't do myself but that got done this week.  A roof!

Rather unsexy, but completely necessary to sell the house.

Meanwhile inside, I kept myself busy as always.

In addition to my usual patching, sanding, and priming (and banishing all of the old dark colors), the living room ceiling got painted, the back door got new trim around it (like this tutorial from flip #1), I repaired all the other door frames where the previous owner had arbitrarily cut chunks out of the bottom (?), I finally primed over an obscene drawing that was on the exterior of the back door,

drooled over the hard wood floors some more,

and I added trim to both the interior and exterior of the front door (which I decided to keep because $) to make it seem a bit more cool retro instead of old and dated.

I also spent the good majority of my day yesterday tackling the kitchen vent and the gaping hole in the ceiling.  It went from this:

to this:

I still have to sand and do a second layer of plaster over it.  With a stand alone vent hood going there, I need to make it look GOOD!

Thankfully, this house has finally turned a corner from being a disastrous construction zone, to being near completion (at least the upstairs.... we won't talk about the basement right now).  Even with my drop cloths strewn about, the view as you walk in the front door puts a smile on my face.  Light bright walls, open concept, gleaming original hard wood floors.

Next steps- paint and get the kitchen installed!

Crash! Seed to Stem

I'm so excited to be announcing this new series!  Every month I'll be 'crashing' a home, shop, or studio and sharing the awesomeness with you. This first Crash! I happened upon by accident.  Hubby and I were pooped from trying to move a couch into Frankie (and movers we are NOT) and were ravenous for a late lunch.  After parking and making a beeline for a Diner, we passed a shop that made my head turn.  Food?  Who needs food, I see pretty things.

Seed to Stem is hard to describe (even by the owners Virginia and Candace).  Here's my assessment- if a posh botanical shop fell in love with a quirky antique shop, had an affair with a taxidermist and then a love child was born out of this little love triangle, you'd get Seed to Stem.  Confused yet?  It'll all make sense when you check this place out!

It was so nice of these lovely ladies to let my camera and me invade their shop and ask them a few questions!

When did you first open the shop?

"We started Seed to Stem about 3 years ago, and were just setting up booths at craft shows, selling terrariums or other nature-inspired art we had put together. Soon after, we decided we wanted to have some type of a brick and mortar store, and rented a small room in an antique mall, The cider mill, in Sterling Mass. We stayed there about 6 months, quickly outgrew the space, and found our new home on Shrewsbury Street in Worcester."

What inspired you to start your own business?

"We were inspired to start our own business because we truly love nature, design, art, creativity, style..... and we really like working for ourselves. We wanted to open a unique shop that can be an inspiration to people, and connect them with nature. We also love visual merchandising, and have a blast re-arranging the shop to present our products in a unique way."

How would you describe your shop's style?

"We sometimes have trouble describing our shop's style. We often call it a gift, curiosity, and botanical shop. Our clients have called the shop "like walking into Narnia", "a perfect juxtaposition between life and death", a "natural wonder shop" etc. etc.  Our shops style is a mix of old and new, of times gone past...antiques, skulls etc., mixed with living plants, modern hand blown glass, and more stylish home accents, with a nod to the Victorian era.  We also do fresh floral design and staging for weddings and events. Most couples that choose us love our style and want it reflected in the design."

What has been your biggest challenge in regards to the business? "Our biggest challenge in regards to the business is keeping up with non-creative tasks.... bookkeeping, banking, e-mails, cleaning etc. ....all while creating the botanical pieces in the shop, re-doing displays, and doing large scale weddings and events. We feel like for most creative people, the more structured parts of running a business can be quite challenging."

On behalf of other creatives- I agree!  It's so tough to focus on boring numbers when you have shiny and pretty things to distract!

His name is Rufus and he is not for sale.  Came you blame them- look at that face!  Bear hug anyone?

And speaking of adorable faces- meet their shop puppy, Poe.  The little sweetheart has the most piercing blue eyes and almost converted this crazy cat lady into a dog person.

Even if you look away from the curated vignettes and look down to the floor, you won't be lacking for eye candy- those rugs!

Thanks Seed to Stem and Virginia and Candace for letting me share your shop's story!

2 Weeks and $1000

It's been a good few days on the flip front.  Friday, after 2 weeks of scrambling, I got Frankie all staged and ready to show off for his Saturday showing.  The Saturday showing lead to a second showing Sunday and an accepted offer!  And Hubby and I sighed a collective sigh of relief.  We've learned several expensive lessons with this house: 1- purchase price has to be right for the neighborhood.  2- the best offer is the one you have in front of you.  We would have made more profit if we took the first offer... ce la vie. and 3- staging is totally worth the time and money (plus it's fun). When faced with a non-selling house, we didn't want to sink any more money into renovations, so reluctantly we agreed that staging was the way to go.  We had resisted previously because we weren't convinced that the time and cost were worth it (spoiler alert: they are).  I may be able to envision furniture in the space, but sometimes I forget that not everyone sees a space that way.  So I gave myself the challenge- 2 weeks and $1000.

Admittedly, it was trying to rein myself in- I wanted to design the whole space with the absolute perfect pieces!  I had to force myself to do just enough to make it feel cozy and to work with the pieces that I could get from craigslist for next to nothing.

I hung IKEA curtains in all the bedrooms using Sarah M. Dorsey's hook method and they totally helped the entire house feel finished.

If you didn't see on face book, I'm kind of madly in love with the mid century modern twin bedroom sets (yes, setS) that I found.  Eventually they'll get refinished, but the lines are dreamy and they're SOLID.  Sadly, the nightstand was missing it's original knob.  I may have to find a suitable replacement in the near future.

This dresser may end up being a future project too- polish up the knobs, repaint it (the finish is the victim of a poor refinish attempt) and add legs which apparently were there originally.

I shopped my own house for the majority of the accessories including lamps and trays.

My absolute favorite view is the view you get when walking down the hall:

It certainly doesn't look like a house that's lived-in, however just adding the furniture and a few strategic accessories, help to make it feel like it could be a home.

Aside from the kitchen/dining witch I had staged when we listed, I totally met my own challenge and was able to furnish and style a living room and 3 bedrooms for under $1000

Here's the cost breakdown:

Living room:

Sofa, craigslist-$50

Side chair, craigslist-$50

Rug, craigslist-$40

Lamp, already owned-$0

Side tables-$30 + spray paint

Living Room TOTAL: $170

Bedrooms:

2 twin beds, 2 dressers, 1 nightstand, craigslist-$100

Queen headboard & metal frame, craigslist-$50

2 Twin mattresses, craigslist-$50

Queen mattress, craigslist-$25

Queen split box spring, craigslist-$FREE

Nightstand, tag sale-$5 + spraypaint & new knobs

Dresser, craigslit-$30

Bedding, pillows, & accessories-$328.33

Bedrooms TOTAL: $588.33

TOTAL STAGING COST: 758.33