Demo is underway!

Mom and I started right away on the demo work. We went to the house on Thursday and Friday evening to start the process. Mom jumped right in by removing all the baseboards and switch covers. She then pulled up the laminate flooring that was in the master bedroom. Next we all tackled the wall between the living room and dining room.

Here is the living room before and after we started demo. We have taken down the wall between the rooms to open up the space.

Here are some pictures of the kitchen during the demo work this weekend. The light will also come down and be replaced with recessed lighting in the ceiling.

The bedroom floors have all been removed along with the doors and the closet shelves. Thanks to my mom and my aunt! This is a full family affair.

We finished the weekend with the jack hammer. Luckily a friend of mine is a DIYer and has purchased their own jack hammer as they work to remove all of the tile in their house and put down wood floor. So we borrowed the monstrous tool and set to work destroying the floor. It was slow going at first but we started to finally make some real progress. I will most likely stop by the house again tomorrow evening to continue to pull up all of the wood-looking tile in the dining, living, and hallway areas.

You can see in the picture below that my husband is also a huge help in all of this. Funny enough he is really enjoying the demo work. He says it is satisfying. He is a sweetheart for helping me with my wild hair project!

Oh my dad also stopped by to mow the yard and clean out some of the junk left behind in the backyard. He also helped remove all of the appliances from the kitchen and the sink. We have all of the appliances in the garage while we remodel the kitchen. We also carefully removed some of the cabinets in order to donate them to habitat for humanity resale store. We will try to donate anything we can from the house. The seller left behind extra tile and laminate flooring that we will donate as well.

Before pix! Demo starts this weekend!

We closed on the house and the loan is funded! Alleluia! I was not sure this day would come. I am relieved and overanxious all at the same time. I picked up the keys this afternoon and mom and I met there to plan and measure. Here is a current picture of the kitchen.

My plan for the kitchen is to remove the fur downs from above the cabinets, remove all cabinets and countertops, and add recessed lighting. We also plan to move the door to the adjacent wall and relocate the frig to where the garage door is currently. Then we will extend the counter to the back wall as well as extend it out 4 feet into the dinning space to make a peninsula for seating and extra storage.

The little nook under the window is awkward space I am trying to figure out what to do with. Right now my best option is to remove the overhead light, add recessed lighting and stage it like a small office area.

Great thing about this kitchen is that the appliances are all relatively new and in good condition so that will save us a ton of cash. Thank you sellers!

For the redesign, I have started to plan vintage marries modern design. It seems many designers are going this route so hopefully it will bring lots of buyers and a great price point at resale. I am thinking shaker style cabinets, keeping the straight door pulls, adding subway tile backsplash with dark grout behind the stove. For the floor we plan to do some type of wood-like flooring with a light grey tint. I will keep the farmhouse sink and do shiplap with open shelves on the side with the sink.

Let me know your thoughts by leaving comment. I will add more before photos next time as well as share demo pictures when we start slinging sledge hammers!

Closing today (we hope)

So after the drama of Rocket Mortgage dropping us like a lead balloon we scrambled to find a new lender and continue on with the purchase of the house. We went with a local lender our realtor suggested and now we are all set to close today (hopefully!). I am keeping my fingers and toes crossed because so many things have already fallen in on us regarding this investment that I just can’t assume anything will fall right into place.

However, I am getting excited and already have purchased a few items to go in the house. I am looking to marry vintage feel with modern design as many designers are doing these days. I would like to make the house look very appealing to many people but at the same time add charm and character. As a buyer, that is what I would want.

I am also needing to keep a very close eye on the budget and try to save money every where I can on this project. Our contractor’s bid come back much higher than I was hoping and it did not even include all the “fixes” I had in mind for the house. I plan to do some more shopping around for some of the work to help cut some of the costs. For example, my general contractor has included paint and windows in his bid but maybe I could find someone to do it for less. I also plan to get started on the demo work ourselves to help save money. We may end up painting the interior ourselves to save on the budget.

We had the final walk-through the house two days ago and all looks to be in order. I will take pictures of the interior next time I visit the house, hopefully today, so I can share some before shots.

Denied

Yep, that is right, our loan has been denied. Four days before we close, early on a Saturday morning, Rocket Mortgage (Quicken Loans) decided to screw us. They have denied our loan because they have decided they don’t do short term mortgages. In other words, they decided not to loan to someone who is going to flip a house.
I was honest and up front with them the entire loan application process that this was our intention. I did not hide the fact that we were looking to flip a house. They knew this was an investment property for us and I told them we would not be renting it out but instead turning around and selling it again.

So why did they wait till four days before we closed to inform us that they did not do this type of loan? No one will truly never know. What I do know is that I will never apply for another loan with them ever again and I will be telling anyone who will listen to never apply for a loan through them either.

What is next for us you ask? Well, this is not the end of the line for us. I am not ready to give up on this crazy endeavor. I have reached out to another lender who is local and my realtor suggested. Of course, it is a Saturday so no one is jumping to return my call but as I see it the fat lady has not sung yet, we still could some how pull this off.

I do feel very bad for the seller, I know they will be very frustrated and disappointed with us, which I completely understand. They actually asked us to not use Rocket Mortgage (Quicken Loans) and I did not listen. I need to make sure I listen to all advice that comes my way, even the unsolicited advice.

We will not be closing on Tuesday. Hopefully, I will soon have a new closing date and a path for moving forward with our first flipping project. Until then, I will continue to watch HGTV and look up design ideas on Pinterest.