Hey all,
I hope everyone reading this is doing well.
We have been busy doing renovations on the Mud Creek farmhouse since we bought it a couple weeks ago. The process to purchase this land was incredibly arduous. New York is a different animal when it comes to buying and selling homes.
When we decided to sell in Idaho, we literally had it on the market for three days and began negotiations the fourth day. We closed in 10 days. This is quite the contrast to our experience in New York. We began talking with the land owners here during the end of July and didn't close until mid October. I think this has to do with licensing of New York's real estate professionals. Regardless, we achieved it and I am so very grateful to have this new wholesome opportunity.
In the past two weeks we have removed old carpet and drywall and we've painted the majority of the house. I built a bench for our dining room and have begun planing our wood planks. When exploring the inner bones of the house, we found a few things that needed immediate attention. One of which is the lack of water shedding from the house. It rains here A LOT and how this house is still standing is beyond me. The deed shows original ownership dating back to the 1870's. To help with the humidity, we purchased a high powered dehumidifier for the basement and we have a smaller one to use in the house, given to us by Laura's grandmother, Grammie. I am still surprised how much water each removes from the environment every day. We are talking several gallons of water daily. Dat house has old wet bones.
No gutters exist on the house, except above the mud room. This has caused some major damage to the fire place in the living room and in the old chimney that was built in the 1800's, I believe. Over the years, water found its way into the floor beams and rotted the drywall and a few 2x4's. Exposing the damage was a little nerve wracking, to say the least. The whole house needs new siding too.
We hired Rick's (Laura's father) friend Rob to fix the damage done to the structure of the house. He did a great job and knocked it out in a day.
Rob's work allowed us to finally begin putting our plywood floors down. Finally is a word that seems like we've been working for decades. We haven't been obviously but we've been dreaming of having this home for a long time, so it seems like decades.
The support we have been given by Lisa and Rick (Laura's parents) during this transition, has been incredible. Moral and physical support. They have opened their home to us as if it is our own and they have guided us on challenging decisions. Not to mention the help they have provided for Henry during all our doings. Lisa has picked up Henry after work to spend time with him so we can have time to work on the house. Not to mention the meals she's made us. I don't know how she fits it all in. Rick has loaned us use of his dump trailer and many tools, as well as, helped us plan for a new propane heating system. We are very grateful to have such support here.
To find a solution to the water shedding crisis, we started looking for gutter professionals to help us get the water away from the house. I called a company locally and was given a mid-December timeframe to get gutters up. That won't work because we literally have a constant trickle of water in our basement. Rick found an Amish fella that does seamless gutters and we hired him. In the spring, we will begin figuring out ways to divert the water shed away from the farmhouse from the higher land. Gutters for now.
I found the Amish fella to be such an honest man. He penciled it all out (literally) and treated me like one of his own. I really liked how genuine the guy was in how he lives his life and how fair he was with his price. We inquired about having him remove the old chimney and he gave an honest estimate of time and cost. He was a pure dude and I feel like having a tie to the Amish community is good. Rick drove him back to his horse and carriage caravan to take his 8 mile trip home. So very cool.
There is a sense of purity here. Fertile land and hard work.
We've yet to venture into the acreage for our master plan but I feel wholeheartedly that whatever we want to do will be accomplished with the help from a strong community. I love it.
Thanks for reading and we will be getting our YouTube channel up soon. I will continue posting pictures on Instagram and Facebook unit then.
Nate
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