It 'Aint Dead Yet.....

Now that the wife's core has cooled from her melt-down over the Home Inspection report, we're proceeding.

Our contractor in-law told her 99% of the same thing that I told her over the results of the inspection report, and she calmed down.

Our realtor has three quotes for a complete re-roof (~$9k to $10k), and she should get the estimate on the tree removal today.



We have until 2359 today to proceed or walk away, and we'll have all the estimates from both our realtors contractors, and our in-laws subcontractors in a couple of hours from now, 1145.

Th sellers have until 2359 on Tuesday to respond with a "yea" or "nay" to our demands, or offer some form of compromise, usually a price reduction.

So the ball is still in play, and this is probably the last "time-out" of the process.

Scratch One House Offer......

Inspection report came in, and other than the roof and tree, it has a bunch of little piddly shit that's freaking my wife out.

Things like typical "Home Owner Grade" repairs to the plumbing (flex-type drain hoses in the bathroom sinks, etc), and other "advisories" in the report that are intended to cajole the new owner to bring the property up to the 2017 building code when it was built to code in 1977.

I told her to call the realtor in the morning and kill the deal.

I'm absolutely NOT going to put up with her bitching, moaning, fretting and whining about $2k worth of minor repairs.

Aint worth it AT ALL.

Good night, all....gotta take the dog for her 2230 walk.

Home Inspection

We don't have the final report yet, but as expected, the roof has hail damage, and evidence of poor repairs.

I thought that so many items checked as "Do Not Know" on the seller's disclosure looked pretty shady, but let it slide until the home inspection happened.

The seller claiming they didn't know the age of the roof was especially galling, as it would have been on the disclosure statement THEY received. And seeing as we were told they are realtors, they really should have known better. One of the insurance agents we talked to about homeowner's insurance pulled the permit history of the house, and told us it was last (legally) re-roofed in 2001. For the seller to say they "didn't know" is 100% pure BS.

So, at this point, we need one run of fence replaced (we knew that already), and the cottonwood tree cut waaaay back (we also knew that), and now we have confirmation that the roof needs replacing.

Since there was a major hailstorm here in September, and there are a dozen or more houses in the neighborhood getting new roofs, it's pretty obvious that a damage claim could be filed by the current owners to cover at least some of the cost.

Anywhoo.....our contractor in-law just called his roofing guy, tree guy, and fence guy, and they'll go look at the house either this afternoon or tomorrow, and get back to us with estimates. And he said he'd be pretty surprised if the two agents let this deal fall apart over these items.

Dotted a Few More i's Today.....

Delivered some required loan docs today, and drove by "our" house this morning. We also drove around the neighborhood for a while today.

There seems to be a significant number of houses in a 1/2 mile radius (several blocks every direction) either undergoing serious renovation, or for sale.

At least one or two every other block we drove by had a low-key for sale sign on the yard, or had a roofing crew doing a complete re-roof, or a dumpster out front and a company truck from either a kitchen/bathroom remodel place, or a general contractor parked at the curb.

Now this might be typical for Fort Collins, but I didn't see this much activity in any of the neighborhoods where the 20 or so other houses we looked at or drove by were located. It's fairly specific to this particular area.

My contractor in-law tells me that for the last year or so, certain areas are getting quietly bought up by "Big Money Real Estate Companies", but he didn't go much further than that, only indicate that the area was "ANYTHING North of Prospect Rd", which is the next major street to the North of us.

Maybe it's spilled South a little, or maybe the not-so-big real estate companies are coming down our way.

Geez.....I can't believe how fast I've assimilated into this area! I mean, I feel "At Home" here, something I never really felt when I merely "lived" in SoCal. It's almost like I was on a long-term Field Service assignment for a large part of my life "back there", and now that job is finished, and it really was time to move on.

I think it's fitting that I consider my "last job" in SoCal to be on the Iowa, as it was really the only place other than on the Sea Launch Commander where I ever really felt "At Home". Kinda like I was going back to the "Home Office" to clean up a bunch of loose ends, train up a few good guys, and square things away before going on to a new "assignment". It's just something about having a deck under your feet; you're "Home".

This place reminds of "home" back in Illinois, but with mountains!

Anyway......the Official Home Inspection is Wednesday, and we'll most likely find out that it needs a new roof. When we were shopping companies for homeowner's insurance, one of the agents took the address, crossed it to the city building site, and pulled a permit history for the house in about 45 seconds! Turns out the house was last roofed in 2001, and as a result of that hailstorm a while back that trashed the kid's place, along with how many others in 16 years, the roof is most likely "End-Of-Life".

Which means we'll most likely have a new roof this winter. Either the current owners can submit a claim for hail damage based on the inspection reports, or they can buy us a new roof, or make a cost reduction. The outcome has direct impact on our homeowner's insurance in that if we have a new roof, out cost is about half what it would be if we went with a repair or used the roof "AS-IS".

Wednesday should be pretty "interesting"!

"Survived" First Storm!

Mostly because it wasn't much of a storm.

We got roughly 3"~4" here in Bellvue, and it's melting. The dog absolutely LOVED it, running around and trying to catch the snowflakes.

Can't find my camera, or I would have taken some pix. And my cellphone will not cooperate with this laptop, so I can't get the pix off of it and on to here.

Big sheets of snow are sliding off the roof of the shop/apartment, and going "PLOP!" on the ground, causing the dog to run to the side door/window and look at them.

Tuesday we sign the final loan documents, and Wednesday is the official home inspection, which I'm going to tag along on....

First Winter Storm Coming....

I'll take some pix here today, and then some tomorrow for the "before and after".

NWS says anywhere from 4" to 10" depending on what the storm track winds up being.

In the mean time, I'm helping our extended family members get the garage/shop area cleaned out so they can store a couple of boats in it, and also clearing room for the Supra whenever that gets here......

Counteroffer Accepted, And The Clock Is Running!

Now we're sceduling the appraisal and inspection, and looking into high-speed Internet providers.

Should be in the house the 1st or 2nd week of November.

Holy Smokes.......I Think We Just Bought A House!

WoW........The realtor just called, and the sellers countered with $385k!

I had expected them to come back at $395k, but I guess they really do want to get rid of this property and avoid the financial drain of holding on to it until spring.

Now my wife is (finally) beginning to fret over the electric baseboard heat, where she's going to put the furniture (can't block or cover the baseboard units), where the big TV and entertainment center is going to be ("we simply can't put the couch there!"), blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.....

I mentioned these things the second or third time we looked at the house, and I might as well have been talking to a tree......blank stares from her. Nothing registered......

I suggested tonight that we go look at the house again so she could get all these "woman" things out of the way and she was "Oh, NO!!! That will look so dorky to ask to see the house again before we accept their counter offer!!!!".

DUH!

We have until 1700 on Thursday the 5th to accept or walk away.

I talked to the in-laws "Tree Guy" today and he told me that depending on if he could get his bucket lift to the tree, or if it would be a "climbing job", the cost to get rid of all the dead limbs could be anywhere from $1k to $2.5k, including clean up. He said you can burn Laceleaf Cotton wood in your fireplace once it's dried, but that it has "an odor", and is better suited to burning in a heater or stove in your shop or garage. Most people burn pine here because it's cheap, and when I asked him about pine's reputation for clogging up your fireplace flue, he said you "just burn a hot fire", and it isn't much of a problem.

A cord of hardwood goes for about $350 here, so I'm thinking the fireplace will not be used as a source of heat.

Written Offer Submitted

Just finished going over the official offer to buy, making sure the i's were crossed, and the t's were dotted.

The sellers have until 1700 tomorrow (Thursday) to accept, reject, or counter.

I'm expecting they'll counter, as we offered about $20k less than the listing price.

The interesting thing is that the owners are real estate agents and lived here in Fort Collins for many years. They should have (and probably did) know that the city would never allow them to turn a house in a residentially-zoned, "single family house" area into a mini-apartment building.

The price we offered is what they paid for the house when they bought it back in March, which is why they'll probably counter-offer.

As our DIL's Dad says, "Don't pay for THEIR mistake." He thinks we made them a very fair offer, and he knows the market here very well.

But, it's been on the market for over 60 days, and we're they only offer they've had. I really doubt they'll want to sit on it until Spring because they'll have the mortgage, utilities, taxes, and other things to keep paying for.

Just have to wait and see what their response is......

Made An Offer On A House.....

The owners are absentee landlords (East SF Bay area) who bought the house this March for $380k, repainted it inside and out, installed new carpet and appliances, fixed a bunch of things, and advertised it as a rental unit for CSU students.

Until the city stepped in and told them that use was forbidden in a residential area.

Frustrated in their attempt to be landlords, they put the property on the market at $420k and waited.

They dropped the price to $419,900 to get it under $420k so it would show up in more searches on real estate websites, and waited.

After a while, they dropped the price to $399,900 and waited.

They had two open houses, lots of lookie-loos, and no offers.

The only thing that bothered me about the house is that it's "All Electric", with electric heat, electric stove, and most likely an electric water heater.

I'm not even sure if it has a gas line running in to it, but I'll look for a meter next time I go by.

Anyway....it's been on the market for 61 days, and NO offers, but a fair amount of interest.

So, after getting all the billing info on gas and electric usage, and talking to both the City of Fort Collins and the Larimer County building and zoning people confirming that YES, I can put up the 40' tower and antenna, we decided to go with the "All Electric" house. It will cost several hundred dollars per year more to heat it than the other house we were looking at, but this one is closer to town, has a bigger garage with an extended back wall to fit a work bench, and is a bigger house with a really cool layout.

Front of house:

Back of house:

And one of the downstairs rooms (it has a fully finished basement with another full bath!) that will most like become my "Colorado Radio Ranch" room:

The house has five bedrooms, 3 full baths and a half-bath, is 3389sqft, and is on a 10,477sqft lot in a very nice section of Fort Collins.

My wife flipped out when she saw the front door was painted red, one of her favorite things, and I like the neighborhood because it has street names like "Constitution Ave", "Valley Forge Dr", "Yorktown Ave", "Essex Dr", and "Independence Rd".

Good omens for both of us.

I would expect them to counter our offer, but our agent, their agent, and our contractor in-law have all said that if we aren't the ones to buy it, it will probably sit until Spring, as the real estate market is winding down for the season here.

There was snow here yesterday above 7,000', and frost everywhere this morning.

Winter is coming!

Better Fuel Economy at 5300' elevation??

Just a side note to all that's going on here.

My fuel economy has improved by approximately 1.8MPG.

The only thing I can think of is the quality and type of gasoline going into the tank.

Most of the pumps here, and all of the pumps we refueled at during the trip, have the disclaimer "May Contain Up To 10% Ethanol" on them, so it's not like I'm getting 100% gasoline all of a sudden.

I've read in reputable publications for 20 years or more that gasoline in Kalifornia is very strictly regulated, and blended quite differently than that sold in other states.

Either Kalifornia uses some zombie-blend that kills fuel economy, or the 1100 mile trip pulling a dual-axle trailer really loosened up my engine!