Extreme Makeover - Ongoing project (Picture Heavy)
- Thread starter Josh
- Start date
Look forward to seeing what way it turned out mate. Does indeed look a bit badly cared for. But tbh I've seen much worse in my 20 years as a professional painter and decorator. I've worked in some badly neglected houses were pro tek disposable boiler suits were the uniform of choice. Burn at the end of each day.
I bet you have, I've never decorated before, you sir have my utmost respect, I was knackered every blood day lol
Looking forward to this mate. As promised, I'll be inviting myself over once it's all finished!
Feel free dude
I have no experience of council tenancy, do you have some sort of guarantee of residency there?
I assume you do? It seems a bit much to expect a tenant to renovate out of their own pocket if not
Yeah we pay our bills etc so the risk of us getting kicked out if zero. As we both work the bedroom tax thing will not bother us in later life when the kids move out. Hopefully I will be living here for the next 20+ or so years!
Thanks guys still a long way to go but its very much home now!
Thankd bud, from what I have heard from mutual friends they have already trashed the new place. Indeed they have broken down furniture and 4 mattresses strung out over their front lawn already!
Both lots of neighbours have come round to say hello and tell us their tales of woe from the previous lot. The had at once stage 4 different farm yard animals in the garden and from all accounts the children where feral! Needless to say they are both very happy that a "normal" family has moved in. Both have offered their help when it comes to doing the garden if we need help with ripping it out. Jolly nice
Now time for a brew.
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Wow! Amazing difference in those latest photos Josh!
I'll bring the orange juice
I bring the Vodka then!
Thanks pal, so far this house has taught me how to, strip walls, plaster, paint, wallpaper, hang and cut out new doors, how to plumb in a new sink and replace all the pipework and how much I prefer working in IT
It's not huge but its plenty big enough for the 4 of us!
Yeah I encountered that problem today attempting to fix a shelf, luckily my daddy drill got into them ok but the baby drill just died after it did the plasterboard!
Thanks Duke.
Yeah the council have to send someone out to review the structure to make sure it is fine to live in before an exchange takes place. Think it is just moss.
And sadly no, even though we have save the council time/money on them doing it up themselves when the previous tenants left we get nothing off the rent.
If you get given a council property then either decorate it for you or give you £1000 to buy the stuff yourself. Not if you exchange.
Money well spent for me personally though. I can sit back and ssay "I did that"!
Yeah that is the correct bit! a 3 bed house around here costs around £220k plus! Very expensive.
Spot on bud, although the box room is bigger than most of my bedrooms growing up.
new carpets you say...you chose that colour
With x2 messy kids,a dog and x2 cats blue hides all stains! Its a good hard wearing carpet, colour isnt great but it was a needs must sort of fitting.
Be good for 5-7 years!
I looked into it when I was in the Prison Servce as we got the "Key Worker scheme" stuff, the drama is it would be a single mortgage as my wife was in an IVA 5 years ago, which means according some the last mortgage adviser we spoke too would mean that for at least 10 years she wouldn't get considered.
And on my wage alone I could only afford a shoe box in Surrey.
We do however via the council have the right to buy after 5 years. This is an avenue I will be exploring closer to the time. I have put too much work in to not own this house now!
Opened them up fully and banged the top edge really hard, they had never been opened before I think as they snapped into the correct position and now open properly.
Looked very odd on day 1. I asked the people leaving if that was normal and they said "dunno never open em up before"
Enough said!
Yeah we first used some Nitrmors to remove the worst and then used a power sander to strip it back, then undercoat, sand, undercoat and gloss! Very happy with the finish.
Kudos to my old man, he spent about 18h on that!
All walls and ceilngs were blue with little shells and crap painted on them. Did x2 coats of white but then a load of pink lines showed up through the paint, stripped the paint back to reveal a boat had been drawn in felt tip marker so was coming through the paint. Stripped the wall back to plaster board and undercoated. X2 more coats of white and it is just waiting for the Lucious Lime paint to go on now. Aoart from that the bathroom believe it or not, was the cleanest bit of the house. The power shower is brand new and the bath looks like it has been never used. White tile paint will cover the dodgy coloured tiles.
Thats this weeks job! Pics to follow.
You got me!
Was too busy to do a manly picture fest, managed to get a quick Ice Bucket challenge in but nothing else!
Thanks Cheesy, yeah they people leaving also inherited it and they clearly didn't realise how much of a good thing they had judging by the lack of cleaning ever applied to it!
Comes up very sparkling!
Its not the new carpets but the new wall paper that is
What the flowery stuff? Blame the long haired general.
If however you mean the avengers stuff, blame me, but I wouldn't care!
Ta BB
Yes bud, we have been in around 3 months now and have just had a surveyor come out to inspect what needs doing.
I mentioned the front door not sitting correctly, he is ordering a new one.
Roof tiles, he is going to get his contractor to come out and give it a thorough going over.
Kitchen ceiling hole - they will be replacing the whole kitchen ceiling next year.
Wiring in outhouse - they will be ripping out all the old stuff and dodgy wood, re wiring properly and then we will tile it and make it a proper wet room.
Getting there...
Small update,
Mother nature had a good wind session here on the saturday after Christmas and the bodge job fence that was errected didn't survive.
Before (done by previous tenants not me)
I telephone the council and asked who's responsible for that side of the fence and the lady confirmed that all council tenants are responsible for the left hand portion of the fencing. So a trip to wickes online for some supplies was needed.
Quickest £300 I have ever spent.
But the results are very nice. Sadly someone long ago had erected a very strudy concrete base for 3 fence posts so we had to navigate around those leaving the first 3 panels a little crooked. I spoke to the landlord of next door who lets the hosue to students, explained the drama and he was fine with us taking about a foot of "his" patio, I also told him he could have the tree stump back as I would put my fence in front of it, he was happy as we both gained/lost a little.
How it looks now
Was a nightmare job, the ground this morning was frozen solid, under the top soil is very hard clay and many bits of broken brick, tile and **** type stuff. We started at 8am and were done by 2pm. Hard graft at it's finest, just need a 6ftx3ft end piece for the very end as I was just out on my measurements, that has been ordered and is coming on sat. Also need to find a nice fence paint to darken them a shade.
More work happening on the garden this year! Going to be a huge job.
Mother nature had a good wind session here on the saturday after Christmas and the bodge job fence that was errected didn't survive.
Before (done by previous tenants not me)
I telephone the council and asked who's responsible for that side of the fence and the lady confirmed that all council tenants are responsible for the left hand portion of the fencing. So a trip to wickes online for some supplies was needed.
Quickest £300 I have ever spent.
But the results are very nice. Sadly someone long ago had erected a very strudy concrete base for 3 fence posts so we had to navigate around those leaving the first 3 panels a little crooked. I spoke to the landlord of next door who lets the hosue to students, explained the drama and he was fine with us taking about a foot of "his" patio, I also told him he could have the tree stump back as I would put my fence in front of it, he was happy as we both gained/lost a little.
How it looks now
Was a nightmare job, the ground this morning was frozen solid, under the top soil is very hard clay and many bits of broken brick, tile and **** type stuff. We started at 8am and were done by 2pm. Hard graft at it's finest, just need a 6ftx3ft end piece for the very end as I was just out on my measurements, that has been ordered and is coming on sat. Also need to find a nice fence paint to darken them a shade.
More work happening on the garden this year! Going to be a huge job.
They stopped doing anything the second we said we would be happy to exchange.
We knew it would be bad, it gave my a chance to learn some basic DIY. All in all I am glad we took it as the cost vs reward it huge.
Sadly I am not in a position yet to buy the place.
We knew it would be bad, it gave my a chance to learn some basic DIY. All in all I am glad we took it as the cost vs reward it huge.
Sadly I am not in a position yet to buy the place.
Not a chance £75 per panel. Not going to happen, unless the lotto decides to pay me out then I will stick with £20 per panel units.
If I had the cash I would have it professionally done with decent panels but sadly I don't so these will do.