The Basement

The basement is unfinished. It’s built on a floating slab so you can see some soil around the edges. The house has oil heat and a gas-fired hot water heater. This is nice because that means when the heater goes, we can eventually put in a gas heater with having to pay to have the street opened up. It also means Julie can have a gas stove one day. It was disclosed that the oil tank was new in 2005. There is also a utility sink in the basement (unphotoed.) No one knows how old the heater actually is, though the listing states 1990. The home inspector couldn’t date it. The other point of contention is the water pipe located in back corner behind the oil tank. The home inspector seems to think there is crack in this pipe because there was moisture at the base and the paint was chipping off. The problem is that again, the house is built on a floating slab and the soil there will be moist after any rain. Because this is up against the oil tank, only the Atom or Ant-Man could get back there to verify this. Time will tell, but during the contingency period the seller agreed to have this pipe and the plumbing certified.

The Bedrooms

There are three bedrooms upstairs. The master bedroom is so pink that it visually assaults the eyes. We’d really like to re-wallpaper this room before me move in. The current wallpaper is halfway between old lady and bordello. The next largest bedroom has white walls and brown carpet. I know what you’re thinking, “finally a neutral tone”. Eventually this will be a guest bedroom. Until then we’ll use it as a visual shelter to hide from the pink everywhere else. The third and smallest bedroom has white walls and blue carpet. For now, this will be a computer room and a place for our countless books. Three bedrooms, one giant bathroom and a hallway; well that’s about it for the second floor. Time to head to the basement.

The Bathroom

Ok, now on to the second floor and first up, the bathroom. Each of the four corners of the room houses one feature. There’s a make-up table, the bowl, a gigantic triangle-shaped tub and the shower stall. There is no picture of the make-up table as I would have had to stand in the tub to snap it.

The oddball feature is the glass window between the shower stall and the tub. You can see it in the third picture, there is a blue flower pot placed on the window sill. I understand that aesthetically it makes the shower space less claustrophobic, but I’m not sure I want to have a bather watching me shower. It’s all very odd. The giant tub has a whirlpool but no one knows where the access panel is to the motor. I’m hoping that the 80-year-old frame house can support that tub, all it’s water and me without collapsing on itself like the house from Poltergeist.

The Exterior Sides

These three shots are as follows: the left of the house as you face the front, the right of the house as you face the front, and the third is taken from the backyard walking along what is the right of the house if you were facing the house front. In the first shot you can see the oddball air-conditioning unit. The second two photos depict the side door, which leads directly from the driveway to the kitchen via a narrow cellar stairway/foyer.

The Garage

Yup, there is a garage. Now we can go and get an old collector car and insure it with Hagerty Insurance. They have unlimited miles and no attendance clause, which is awesome. The garage does need some work. There has been some termite damage, so the roof needs to be lifted and the sill replaced. We also need to dig out the soil encroachment on the right side of the garage. There is also a hole in the roof that needs to be patched, but that’s no problem. I’ll post pictures of the slight termite damage later in the week. Theoretically the seller is supposed to have the garage remediated.

The Swimming Pool

Ok, there is a pool and it takes up nearly 80% of what little backyard there is. Julie likes the pool. I do not. I can’t swim. Pennsylvania is a landlocked state so I never needed to learn. Now the interesting tidbit is that you can only have a 6’ fence in this town if you have a pool. Otherwise, it’s no more than 4’. So my vote is keep the pool up until we get a privacy fence, and then we remove the pool.

There is a quaint little brick path from the deck to the pool and that’s our garage on the right. The structures in the background are the neighbors behind us and their garage. They seem to have recently put a lot of effort into their property, which is nice.

The Deck

There is a deck on the back that is about 8’x20’. This deck and the above ground pool take up the majority of what little yard space the property has. Structurally, the deck seems to be sound, but apparently needs to be “power washed” and “resealed”. We have no idea what this means as we’re apartment dwellers and neither of us ever lived in a house with a deck.

The Addition

Built on the back of the house is one story addition that has one giant 8’x20’ room and a small half-bath. The half-bath is a radioactive pink color and is just barely big enough to house a sink and toilet. The big 8x20 room is basically useless as it’s oddly long and narrow. Based on the realtor’s website photos, we know the sellers used this as a den. I find it personally too awkward to be useful. Though I have grandiose and expensive ideas to remodel it. My brother Rob immediately referred to it as the bocce ball room.

The Kitchen

The kitchen switches the abhorrent pink out for a violent blue. We can live with the border, though it’s not of Julie or I’s liking. The floor is a laminate as is the countertop. It’s basically a long walk-thru but there are a ton of cabinets. Of course, any cabinets are a quantum leap for us compared to the tiny kitchen in the apartment. There is a door in the kitchen which leads to the cellar stairwell and directly outside. This is one neat feature because it means we can pull the car right up to the kitchen on a rainy day to unload groceries. That’s the home inspector’s laptop in the one photo.

The Carpet

The carpeting in the living room and dining room is some sort of alien color that either looks brown or pink depending on how close you are to it. There has been hours of conversation around what the exact name of this carpet color is. Julie and I have settled on “Cat Barf” as it’s the exact color of regurgitated Fancy Feast. We’re open to any decorating advise on how to play down or mute this abhorrent color short of ripping up the perfectly functional and clean carpeting.

The Dining Room

The dining room is adjacent to the living room and decorated in the same abhorrent pink decor. The seller is including the chandelier and wall sconces. They all operate off the same dimmer switch. This room will be empty for some time as neither Julie nor I own dining room furniture.

The oddball feature of this room is that there is a giant hole cut thru the exterior wall to mount a window AC unit. This is an 80-year-old frame house, so there is no central air. So I guess someone thought it would be great to permanently cut a hole thru a load-bearing exterior wall. The third shot is the dining room AC unit from the outside of the house.

The Fireplace

The fireplace is fake. I’m not too keen on it as it kills the only good TV wall. Julie likes it. The compromise is a flat screen TV hung above the fireplace. Not sure how to rig a DVD player and game consoles up to it then. This is not a problem we’ll tackle for a while though.

The Living Room

This is the living from opposite corners. The front door is across from the bottom of the steps. The living room leads into the dining room and the kitchen. The ceiling is textured and glittery. We don’t know what to think of the glitter effect yet. The whole room screams Pink. The carpet is pink though it looks brown from a distance. It’s fairly new and in great shape. I’ll upload a better picture of the carpeting later.

The pink has to go though. We don’t want to shell out the expense of recarpeting the living and dining rooms when the carpet is so new. But I want to strip that wallpaper as soon as settlement is over. We’re talking about repainting up to the chair rail in a brown or sage green.

The Porch

This is the carpeted front porch. Yes, the front porch is carpeted. It also has two exterior electrical outlets, one on each side.

The Ivy Tree

The newest big debate is whether you keep the ivy on that tree or try to save the tree and remove all that ivy.

Exterior (Part 2)

This is a close up of the front porch steps and the little stone garden wall around the porch.

The Exterior

This the front of the house. That's Julie and the home inspector walking in.