I realize that I’ve never posted before and after pictures of our “new house” and it’s almost been a year that we’ve been here. I promise I will do that soon, but time is at a premium at the moment. I’m working full time and graduating with my masters in December. We have a LOT more people living here than we originally planned, and so that means all of our main house projects are on hold while we renovate what we call the “little house” out back. (It really needs a better name…….)

 

Renovation is always fun at the beginning. This is no different, even though it was going to be a quick project, mostly a spruce up. (Stop laughing) so of course we started by gutting the space. We didn’t really intend to, but once you get started it’s hard to stop, especially with what we were working with.

Before

 

 

 

 

 

Here we have our 20’ x 14’ guesthouse with a bathroom, walled off space for a bedroom and living room about 14’ x 12’. Our two main problems were that the ceilings were just under 6’, and the floors were really soft. We figured water had gotten to the sub floor since there was considerable water damage to the paneled walls. So our original plan was to remove the ceiling and the subfloor. Maybe replacing a few floor joists as needed. Which translates to……….. we gutted the place. You know how that works? In order to take the ceiling down, the center wall had to come down. And once we looked at the water-damaged paneling, it wasn’t worth salvaging since there was more to replace than save.

 

 

 

So this is where we ended up yesterday. I haven’t even taken pictures of what was done today. Picture this with no floor and with termites.

Its going to be fantastic I swear. The potential is absolutely there and with the sweat equity we bring, the added value is significant for the investment. My problem is that I can see it done and there are many steps to get through in the meantime. And there are a lot of people living in this house…….

 

I will keep you updated, both about my sanity and the renovation.