Don had the excavator here for a couple days, thinking he was just going to "wrap up" the demo on this house. Then, as soon as the money becomes available, he could start in on the reconstruction. Our hope being if we can just keep this project moving, now, we can still have the house "move-in ready" sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
But, the further Don got into it, the more he felt that sinking feeling...
...Once he got through the multiple layers of flooring laid on top of one another over the years, he discovered issues with the foundation. Two of the corners are pretty solid, but the others? Well, Don described them as "crumbly".
Oh, no.
This changes the project significantly...less of a "remodel" and more of a "new construction". Even if he started the stick-framing process today, it would likely be another eight months before we have a house.
What concerns me is that camper-trailers are not really designed to be lived in full-time for months and months, and the ones we purchased are already older and well-used, so what happens when things start wearing out or breaking? And, what happens when it begins to get cold...like in the 20's and low 30's?
So, we are currently considering all options from building a pole barn house or buying a modular/pre-fab house (these options would have us in the house before Christmas) to purchasing a used single-wide, something a bit more substantial..."house-like"... to live in through this winter into next summer, giving us extra time to stick-frame our new house. If we can use the same footprint of the current house, that would help tremendously with cost and time, but can we? Not sure, yet.
At any rate, we've got lots to think about right now...tons of research to do this week.
We found a few more interesting items in the demo this week:
Oye! 2017 has been fraught with tough challenges for our family, quite literally from day 1 when we had to make the heart-wrenching decision to put down Ginger, our dog of 13 years, followed by Mac a week later. Just about every aspect of this move back to PA has presented us with unexpected, "testing"challenges. I know we'll get through it, though, sanity somewhat intact. Haven't lost our faith, yet. We know that our God is for us, not against us.
Like a friend recently shared with me: We could be in his neighbor's shoes - have a big, beautiful house in Lancaster County, but our teenage child diagnosed with an inoperable, fatal brain tumor.
Life is full of difficulties, but that makes the good moments even more precious. Like all the opportunities we've had to spend time with our family and our special friends. I was blessed to worship with our Timberline family and witness the baptism of some special young friends yesterday!
But, we all are feeling a bit weary at the moment. And, a bit on edge.
Your prayers are greatly appreciated.
And, I am holding on to the hope that 2017 is going to end on a high note - maybe, celebrating Christmas in our new house?
In the meantime, I will continue posting updates as I can, so keep an eye out!
So sorry you're having problems with the foundation. I hope it can be repaired rather then having to total the foundation. The photos are of my mom...Joan as a small child. Kevin.
ReplyDeleteHello! If you are interested in having those photos, I set them aside. Don thinks it would be best to redo the whole foundation, but keep it in the same location. We are looking at some modular cape cods today to see if/how we can use the existing footprint of the house. And, whether it would be better to have a crawl space, rather than a full basement.
DeleteSure, you can hold onto the photos. Can't wait to hear where you found them. I always thought it would be easier to do what you're looking at now...wipe the house clean and put a new one on top. Obviously no way of knowing the status of the foundation until you got there.
ReplyDelete