Planning the renovation we don’t know how to do

Jul 272010

31 days to possession

It’s the nervous laugh that comes when it shouldn’t: in trying times and difficult situations, when your best friend tells you he/she’s been dumped. Your first instinct is to laugh.

Since winning the ugly baby, Paolo and I have been grinning like fools and laughing out loud. Oh holy mother of god. We’re ripping apart – top to bottom – a tiny apartment in which we’ll simultaneously live. We’ve signed up for this.

But I’ve never even used a crowbar!

With 31 days to go, we’ve got a month to wait – or is that a month to plan? Certainly four weeks to pack and move – the boring details to get us from here to there. Oh shit, moving! I need to book movers.

nervous laughter Planning the renovation we dont know how to do

Holy. Hell. Paolo’s decompressing after the most stressful week of our lives and – me? I’m actually swimming in a world of pretty pictures. Years’ worth of daily home blog reading, entire giga-bytes of saved-to-desktop idea photos… and all the possibility in the world.

  • Is the bath tub getting hacked, to make bigger closets? Parents with small kids will run, but singles would love a sleek glass shower.
  • Do we make the storage closet an office? An all-singing, all-dancing laundry room? A pantry?
  • And, most of all, exactly how long will it take to eradicate that popcorn ceiling?

Future apartment buyers of Vancouver, what will you want!

Hey Pandora, got some sticky tape? Your box won’t stay shut.

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Thanks & full photo credit to marlon felippe presotto and Tiagø Ribeiro via Flickr Creative Commons

Why flip a property? Is it worth the effort?

Jul 262010

32 days to possession

Any good story’s meant to start at the beginning, but what of a mad-hatter’s experiment? We’re still in such a giddy state of shock and delight, we don’t really know where to start. Kelly advised that we start in celebration. Noted. A 4-day bender of Vancouver’s best: fish and chips on the dock, fireworks, cherries, sunshine galore… and more fireworks.

vancouver fireworks Why flip a property? Is it worth the effort?

Consider us celebrated.

vancouver fireworks2 Why flip a property? Is it worth the effort?

Consider our yet-to-be-returned damage deposit spent.

vancouver fireworks3 Why flip a property? Is it worth the effort?

And consider us vindicated - we really do live in the best place on earth.

Well now bloody what? This deer’s looking mighty frozen in her headlights. She’d be off sprinting, if she could sit down and decide for one second which way to go. While I fire up Excel and fill full legal pads with too many ideas, I’ll sidetrack slightly.

What are our flip goals, and why?

This is a profit-driven exercise with anything but money at its roots. Want the house? Want the family-filled backyard with the hammock and apple tree? Sign yourself up for this toad’s wild ride. But! When doing anything half-baked with your money, first make damn sure it’ll do better than it would in a generic savings account at your local bank.

ING Direct’s current interest rates: 1.30%.

Can you think of any way to make more than a meagre 1.30% in 12 months’ time? Flip an ugly baby.

What about [name your preferred investment]?

  1. In 12 months’ time you’d maybe make 4, 5, 6, 7 or 8% from a TFSA, mutual fund, RRSP or something similar. Is this accepted logic?
  2. If you bought an ugly baby for, say, $400,000 – could you use your every last creative fibre to flip it in 12 months’ time for $432,000 (8%) or more? (Hopefully more, inclusive of your renovation costs).

Probably, right? You’d need a decent dose of cockiness, a chunk of optimism and maybe some luck – but if you picked the right property, you could probably do it.

That’s how I’m looking at flipping.

What am I doing with my money here, that’s a better idea than tucking it over there?

I far prefer words to numbers – and to speak in percentages and ‘rate of return’ smacks of shiny-suited douchery. But I think it’s fair to lay out some goals.

I want our project to be fun, but it needs to be worth it. If we hand back the keys in 367 days’ time, with more than 8% extra in our pockets – to me, that’s a win. That’s better than I could have done elsewhere, with memories and new skills included for free.

The second goal? Enjoy the chaos. Ready? Down the rabbit hole we go.

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Full photo credit & utmost thanks to 3 amazing Vancouver photographers: kennymatic, il.irenelee and TylerIngram, via Flickr Creative Commons. Love these photos.

Keys please: 100 things to do in closing time.

Jul 232010

35 days until we get the keys. Give them to me. Until then, expect a Bridget-gets-her-ass-in-gear montage of being very, very busy. (We end up with a scary apartment and she gets Mr. Darcy. Fair? Hardly).

apartment closing checklist 2 Keys please: 100 things to do in closing time.apartment closing checklist 1 Keys please: 100 things to do in closing time.

If apartment closing starts now, and keys appear then… what’s to do in the mean time? Oh, just a few trifles. It hadn’t occurred to me that the house hunting was the easy part – and I can’t just sit back and squeal. Pressing items on the list while the apartment closes?

  • Make our entire budget
  • Wonder what we’ve got ourselves into
  • Consider the design, look & feel of the renovations
  • Design a floor plan
  • Decide how we’ll ever get it done – in between our real jobs
  • Research flooring, lighting and everything in between
  • Learn a hell of a lot about DIY
  • Arrange our move
  • Pack, pack, pack
  • Figure out crazy adult stuff like “home insurance” and “mortgage payments”
  • (If you’re rolling your eyes at my ignorance – please fill me in? Am I missing something completely obvious?)

give me the keys Keys please: 100 things to do in closing time.

Whether the length of our closing period is typical, I’m not sure. But that’s an awful lot to do in a month and it puts Closing Time to brand new use:

“You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here…”.

Good. Don’t wanna stay here. A far more applicable theme song: The waiting is the hardest part. Have I ever been more excited about anything in my life? Negative.

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Bridget Jones photos found here & here. Keys – full photo credit to (clockwise from left) woodleywonderworks, GenBug, and jchong via Flickr Creative Commons

Ok. That’s done.

Jul 222010

WE GOT IT.

WE GOT IT GOT IT GOT IT.

WE GOT THE UGLY BABY.

WE GOT THE UGLY BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just a few more administrative chores and pieces of official home-buying nonsense to check off. Inspect. Sign. File with whatever higher powers need these things: mortgage forms, titles, notarized this, that and the other. (What does a notary even do?)

We’re officially waiting to begin flipping our (OUR!) ugly baby. If I said this morning was a rather slow start, would you blame me? Thanks you guys for the good luck, crossed fingers, pinned voodoos of our bidding competitors – now…who’s handy with the crowbar?

Good news? Bad news? We have our answer.

Jul 212010

Thoughts from under the coffee table…

I have never wanted anything so badly. I’m pretty sure I forgot to eat dinner last night.  I only realized this after forgetting to eat lunch today. It is so improbable to me that Agent Awesome hasn’t phoned by now. Ring, god damn you. What if his phone is on silent? What if…he stopped being awesome?

waiting for phone call Good news? Bad news? We have our answer.

Such was my day. I ditched my freelance work early to go fully fetal. Don’t get emotionally involved while house hunting? Ha. Don’t let a bidding war derail your entire life? Uh huh. This one phone call is going to make me very, very happy… or very, very sad.

offer accepted1 Good news? Bad news? We have our answer.

When the phone finally rings, Paolo & I are both at home. I’m actually lying prostrate on the floor, half under the coffee table. I’m so convinced that someone evil kidnapped my ugly baby. Paolo disappears into the other room to take the call. Damn him.

Another string of “OKs” then “Ok, well, thanks. Ok bye.” Eh? I can’t decipher that!

I make scientific analyses:

  1. There was no conciliatory let’s-make-a joke-totally-Canadian way-of-handling-bad-news.
  2. Nor did I hear shrieking and jumping up and down. I guess Paolo’s not a 12-year-old girl. Still.

I swear to god he stayed in that room another 5 minutes for dramatic effect. There’s a grin when the door opens.

We got it.

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(Full photo credit to tylerdurden1 and Ally Aubry via Flickr Creative Commons)

Fighting for our ugly baby: it’s a bidding war

Jul 202010

Bidding war? Didn’t see that coming. Hours and hours and hours later, Paolo’s damn phone rings. He nods a lot and a lot of “OKs”. It’s us versus an unseen them. Load your weapons: our bidding war has begun.

bidding war1 Fighting for our ugly baby: its a bidding war

At least in a live auction you can stare down your bidding opponents. This apartment-buying hoop-jumping means a fair game for all – one that we could very likely lose.

How to win the bidding war? Our options.

  1. Hire a steely-eyed Russian.
  2. Or these guys.

bidding war Fighting for our ugly baby: its a bidding war

  1. Resort to the bribery I considered when first making an offer.

In the real world? Paolo’s staying pragmatic.

It’s business.
We need to make sound business judgments.

Arghh. He’s right. The whole foundation of our project is based in this first transaction. If we pay too much – we’ve blown the game before we even start.

Do we increase our offer?

Yes. We consider what is a likely sale price, following our renovations. As it’s taken over two months to find an apartment on which to bid – we have a fair idea. (Daily MLS dates and dozens of Vancouver open houses paint the picture…). Agent Awesome helped with figures of past sales nearby but as for the actual New Number Decision – that’s ours and ours alone to make. Which is horrible.

There’s lots of potential in that ugly apartment. So. We’ve increased our offer by a small margin. If the bidding war’s next round goes higher still, we’ll walk away (me crying my eyes out).

Shit.

I’ve done what I absolutely wasn’t supposed to – I broke my own house hunting rules. I got attached. Bidding wars are meant to be pure business, and to me this competition is life & death. It’s about more than winning the place. I never want to go to another open house. I’m sick of looking. I just want to get destroying, get painting… get renovating. (Rather than living vicariously through Liz and others’ crash-bang-boom series of gorgeous before/after photos). Every month we pay rent seems a waste.

As for my fingers? If I cross them any further, they’ll turn blue.

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Victory poster found here. Full photo credit to damo1977 via Flickr Creative Commons

Making an offer: nobody told me about this part.

Jul 202010

You know when you were 15 and waited by the phone all day? Making an offer and being told to wait 24 hours is worse. After signing some official papers, we’ve made our offer on the potential ugly baby and, if no news is good news… then we’re in pig heaven.

making an offer Making an offer: nobody told me about this part.

Damn all its glorious potential – how could others have seen it too? We’re all but certain there are multiple offers. The equality of the process is really starting to grate. Why doesn’t home-buying have one of those EBay “Buy Now!” buttons? I could really save everyone a lot of trouble.

“Look, I want it the most. Let’s be adults about this. You’ll get an obscene, embarrassing, flashy and likely illegal bribe (Veuve? Blue Label? What’s your poison?) if you sell me what I want right now. Whatever it takes for you to choose our offer. Let me help you… help me.”

You can’t not choose us – it would be like making this poor doggie sit there with the cookie for 24 hours, then taking it away. And then kicking him.

waiting Making an offer: nobody told me about this part.

Paolo will go postal the next I call him at work for an update.

Are you sure your phone’s not on silent? Could its battery have died?

Even I don’t want to be friends with me today.

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Ginnifer Goodwin photo found here. Full photo credit to trazomfreak via Flickr Creative Commons.

What stress? Buying an apartment is heaven.

Jul 192010

Who knew that buying an apartment was a blood sport? I’ve never known such stress. Nails have been bitten to the quick. There’s not enough yoga in the world to save this situation: buying a house or apartment is horribly, horribly stressful.

stress of buying a house What stress? Buying an apartment is heaven.

We put in our offer on the potential ugly baby, the apartment to renovate, as soon as possible. We know for almost certain we’re not alone in this sick little game – and these unseen opponents are trying their damndest to ruin my life.

stress eating What stress? Buying an apartment is heaven.

Every carb within a 20-km radius is about to get stress-eaten.

The apartment-buying offer
Unlike every other competition on earth – when buying a house (or apartment), you have no way of knowing your enemy. That’s the stressor – an inability to strategize. Will they offer high? Offer low? Why is everyone given a fair shot when I want it the most?

And yet. It’s said and done, signed and sealed.

“Now what?”

“You cross your fingers.”

Agent Awesome picked up the documents and left.

How’s it going to go down?

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Full photo credit to lululemon, and (clockwise from top left) norwichnuts, Kanko*, Geoff Peters 604 (Wa-hey, Vancouver photog!), and more norwichnuts via Flickr Creative Commons.

Help! Someone’s trying to steal my ugly baby.

Jul 182010

Not just someone. Fifty or a hundred someones. I sense major house hunting competition. This entire afternoon, other awful people were looking at my apartment to renovate, my ugly baby, in awe – trying to make it theirs as well. Damn that 2nd open house. Why can’t there be an apocalypse to wipe out other ugly-baby-buyers?

open house competition 2 Help! Someones trying to steal my ugly baby.

I considered returning for a second visit, this time with some sort of horrible consumption, coughing fits or maybe open, oozing sores. Something requiring hazmat.

hazmat at open house Help! Someones trying to steal my ugly baby.

Would that eliminate all this open house competition? It’ll take a miracle.

Apparently the 6th house hunting tip is don’t get attached. Attached? It’s far beyond that. I’ve already planned our whole lives together (he’ll take my name). A second open house visit would put me over the edge. We can put in an offer tomorrow. Tomorrow is a great many hours away. We’ll have no idea, no way of knowing, whether we’re putting in the top bid – no matter how badly we’d like to. What a horrible, stupid system.

Who’s been-there-done-that and won a house-buying competition? How do I distract myself for the next 12 hours? Tips?

Ugly Baby! Hold on! Don’t get in the stranger’s van! They won’t love you like we will!

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Full photo credit to The U.S. Army via Flickr Creative Commons. (The U.S. Army has Flickr?!) & cometstarmoon for the scary blue-face kidnapper photo.

We found it! The One. Our apartment to renovate.

Jul 172010

OMGOMGOMGOMG.

It’s so ugly. We’ve been looking – for months – for an apartment to renovate. We finally saw the potential ugly baby today, the ugly house with no listing photos. It’s so ugly. So ugly I laughed when I saw the bathroom. Actual LOLZ. So frightfully hideous I couldn’t stop smiling. A group of well-heeled Chinese arrived, took one look, and fled. This is it.

This is the one.

It’s a history museum dedicated to the full glory of the 1970s. When ABBA members die, they’ll want to end up here.

abba We found it! The One. Our apartment to renovate.

It’s mirrored, it’s shiny, it’s perfect.

It checks our requirements, it’s well within our budget as Vancouver first-time home buyers, it’s nothing but potential. You could stand there for an hour and improve it without meaning to.

disco ball We found it! The One. Our apartment to renovate.

I went through the apartment – the bathroom, bedroom and kitchen – four times over, settling in my head what needed renovating and how fantastic it’d be once finished. Paolo & I only had to look at each other, then try our best to stop smiling. It already felt ours and I was in pig heaven.

The problem?

All the other people at the ugly apartment’s open house. A dozen or more of them. Trying to ruin my life.

Go away! You’re not invited! This ugly baby is taken.

I thought about just locking the front door. A bold move of ownership: maybe they’d give up and leave?

“When are you taking offers?”

We were ready to pounce.

“After our second open, tomorrow.”

….There’s another open house?! With more evil competition? More ugly baby thieves? I turn now, hysterically, to the sage words of Dr. Elliot Reed.

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Full photo credit to *Vintage Fairytale* via Flickr Creative Commons. ABBA photo found here.

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