Monday 16th, February 2004
There're rules about that...08:28:07 AMWritten By : Scott Good
Man was meant to stretch himself, to push his own personal limits, to find the edge and go beyond it. With discipline, hard work and perseverance 
he...ok...yeah...whatever. What I'm talking about is home renovation.
Have you been through this? Then you know what I'm talking about. Childbirth? Piece of cake. Home renovation, now there is pain.
I suppose if you did your home renovation the fancy schmantzy way where you just write checks and let people who actually know what they're doing do the work then, sure, yeah, maybe you don't feel my pain.
That's like comparing getting the car washed to doing a complete nut-and-bolt ground-up restoration on a rusted carcass. You end up in more or less the same place but, man oh man, they are different roads.
Not, mind you, that I wouldn't prefer to be writing the checks and whining about contractors, but I'm some combination of too picky and too cheap for that to be a particularly likely possibility.
Alas. Mostly too cheap.
But along the way I've learned a few things
We're living in a (now) 7-year restoration project. That's not to say it was restored seven years ago and we've been basking in the bliss of a new old house for all that time. Oh no. Wouldn't that be nice? No, we're going on seven years of doing the restoration, one little bit at a time.
A bit like shovelling snow one flake at a time.
In all fairness, I must admit we are not always, constantly, in Project Mode. We seem to average one or two biggish and a couple smallish projects a year. This way we can drag it out more or less forever. Or at least it seems that way.
Having had (a lot of) time to contemplate this state of affairs, I've compiled a list of Things I've Learned About Old Home Renovation. You may find them instructional or, at very least, be able to use them to fend off the temptation to do this yourself.
1. However long it takes, it takes longer than that
There is a time-honored computation for determining the actual time involved in any home renovation project. First use your experience and best conservative planning to estimate a reasonable, achievable timeframe for project completion. Then double it. And go up one time increment.
Therefore, something you expect to be able to knock off in about an hour will take two days. An over-the-weekend project (2 days) will take about 4 weeks to complete.
Sure. Laugh. Whoever conjured up this calculation has the brilliance of Pythagoras, because it's right.
2. No project exists in a vacuum
The bane of old home owners, this. New home people may not know about this. It's really a different world they live in, where walls are straight and you don't have to undo everything before you redo it. A shallow, sorry existence.
I pine for it.
No, with old homes there is no such thing as a quick, easy project. An example? You want an example? Gladly.
When we bought our house, one of the walls in the den was literally covered with jigsaw puzzles, mostly Norman Rockwell. The others were "papered" in orange, yes orange, burlap (don't ask me, I'm just reporting the facts). Against the advice of a few family members (another worrisome thought) we wanted to remove the puzzles, take down the burlap, and paint the room something tolerable.
Piece of cake. That's the Alpha Project. Projecto numero uno.
Of course, once the glued-on jigsaw puzzle pieces were removed, the plaster on that wall was a mess; bad enough the appropriate course of action seemed to be to simply cover that wall in a layer of drywall. No problem, drywall's easy to do (project 2).
But, since there was 5-inch crown molding around the room we would need to remove the piece of molding on the formerly-jigsawed wall, do the drywall, then replace the crown on top of the drywall (project 3).
The 90-year-old crown molding shattered like a balloon dipped in liquid nitrogen. With a pattern not produced since, probably, the 19-teens, we'd need to replace all the crown in the room, not just the one piece. But that could be worse as we'd really wanted to do a fancier 3-piece crown eventually, so this would just move that up a bit (project 4).
I tore off the rest of the molding and did the drywall without event. Then I went and got all the crown molding for the room. Hey, guess what? Nice crown molding is expensive. Just for this one room, it was $600 or so. The frugal Scot in me clicked in.
We'd planned to eventually cover the jigsaw wall with built-in cabinets and shelves. Hadn't intended to do it right then, mind you, but, well, since they were to cover the whole wall, it really wouldn't be right if the crown molding around the top of the room didn't go across the front of the built-ins.
Which didn't exist.
Yet. (Project 5.)
Just about the time this was all happening, I found a photo of a spectacular set of built-ins in Architectural Digest. They'd look great in our room, we agreed. Mind you, my woodworking experience was mostly limited to watching The New Yankee Workshop but, hey, I'm a smart guy. I can figure it out.
OK, technically that was true. I figured it out. Mind, it took three or four months to figure out...
But the result was beautiful built-ins, with lighting in all the shelves. This, of course, required finding and running electricity into the wall (project 6). As long as we were doing electricity, I added a ceiling fan (no, not the simple attach-wires-to-the-existing-fixture crap, oh NO, this was the I'll-have-to-wire-it-from-scratch-and-figure-how-to-get-the-power-up-there kind of deal) (project 7).
And, while I'm there, might as well add some recessed lighting in the ceiling (project 8).
And, do fancy paint techniques on the walls (9).
Refinish the floor (10).
Replace the baseboard (11).
And, as Bubba said, that's about it. Well, OK, window treatments (12).
And, strip and refinish the French doors (13).
So let's review:
(jigsaw puzzles + burlap) = (6 months of work + untold thousands of dollars)
Rinse and repeat.
3. You don't have The Right Tool(s)
No matter what you're trying to do, you don't have the right tools. Get over it.
So there are two approaches you can follow.
One is the jazz approach to home renovation. I'm talking improvisation here. Miles Davis's got nuthin' on me, let me just tell you. Yeah, yeah, he's good on the trumpet but, hell, he's using it for what it was designed to do. Where's the challenge in that?
I like New Yankee Workshop just fine. Excellent television. He's got all the tools and a big airy shop. Of course he can build stuff. What I want to see is him having to do it in my shop with my tools. Uh huh. Nice big board you got there, Norm. How you gonna turn around with it? And, dust removal? That's for wimps.
That would be a show worth watching. Laser-guided chop saw my butt.
The other approach is to just buy the damned tools. The logic is so compelling you can almost have it make sense to your wife. I recommend explaining additional uses you'll have for the same tool in the future. Sale prices are important selling points, as well.
Almost any price is justifiable to a woman if it's On Sale.
4. It doesn't count as a project without bloodshed
You're not bleeding from at least a couple of knuckles? Get back to work.
5. Choosing a home to renovate is all about Location, Location, Location
Be sure you're near a hardware store. You're going to be there three times a project day, all your careful planning notwithstanding.
6. Never EVER pay contractors up front lest they give it to you out back (if you know what I mean)
Contractors (eventually, you'll need some help) are friendly. But they're not your friends. And they have no sense of responsibility. None. Really.
If you want something completed by a contractor there's only one way: Dangle money. The day you pay the rest of their bill is the day they're done. Regardless of the state of the project.
Don't pay 'em.
Really.
If all of this sounds a bit much then maybe you're really not the home restoration type. But, it's not all snot and chiggers, because out of this comes the satisfaction of doing things with your hands, the confidence that comes with tackling a complicated...
Hmm. Maybe it is all snot and chiggers. Go buy a new house and leave this idiocy to others.
he...ok...yeah...whatever. What I'm talking about is home renovation. Have you been through this? Then you know what I'm talking about. Childbirth? Piece of cake. Home renovation, now there is pain.
I suppose if you did your home renovation the fancy schmantzy way where you just write checks and let people who actually know what they're doing do the work then, sure, yeah, maybe you don't feel my pain.
That's like comparing getting the car washed to doing a complete nut-and-bolt ground-up restoration on a rusted carcass. You end up in more or less the same place but, man oh man, they are different roads.
Not, mind you, that I wouldn't prefer to be writing the checks and whining about contractors, but I'm some combination of too picky and too cheap for that to be a particularly likely possibility.
Alas. Mostly too cheap.
But along the way I've learned a few things
We're living in a (now) 7-year restoration project. That's not to say it was restored seven years ago and we've been basking in the bliss of a new old house for all that time. Oh no. Wouldn't that be nice? No, we're going on seven years of doing the restoration, one little bit at a time.
A bit like shovelling snow one flake at a time.
In all fairness, I must admit we are not always, constantly, in Project Mode. We seem to average one or two biggish and a couple smallish projects a year. This way we can drag it out more or less forever. Or at least it seems that way.
Having had (a lot of) time to contemplate this state of affairs, I've compiled a list of Things I've Learned About Old Home Renovation. You may find them instructional or, at very least, be able to use them to fend off the temptation to do this yourself.
1. However long it takes, it takes longer than that
There is a time-honored computation for determining the actual time involved in any home renovation project. First use your experience and best conservative planning to estimate a reasonable, achievable timeframe for project completion. Then double it. And go up one time increment.
Therefore, something you expect to be able to knock off in about an hour will take two days. An over-the-weekend project (2 days) will take about 4 weeks to complete.
Sure. Laugh. Whoever conjured up this calculation has the brilliance of Pythagoras, because it's right.
2. No project exists in a vacuum
The bane of old home owners, this. New home people may not know about this. It's really a different world they live in, where walls are straight and you don't have to undo everything before you redo it. A shallow, sorry existence.
I pine for it.
No, with old homes there is no such thing as a quick, easy project. An example? You want an example? Gladly.
When we bought our house, one of the walls in the den was literally covered with jigsaw puzzles, mostly Norman Rockwell. The others were "papered" in orange, yes orange, burlap (don't ask me, I'm just reporting the facts). Against the advice of a few family members (another worrisome thought) we wanted to remove the puzzles, take down the burlap, and paint the room something tolerable.
Piece of cake. That's the Alpha Project. Projecto numero uno.
Of course, once the glued-on jigsaw puzzle pieces were removed, the plaster on that wall was a mess; bad enough the appropriate course of action seemed to be to simply cover that wall in a layer of drywall. No problem, drywall's easy to do (project 2).
But, since there was 5-inch crown molding around the room we would need to remove the piece of molding on the formerly-jigsawed wall, do the drywall, then replace the crown on top of the drywall (project 3).
The 90-year-old crown molding shattered like a balloon dipped in liquid nitrogen. With a pattern not produced since, probably, the 19-teens, we'd need to replace all the crown in the room, not just the one piece. But that could be worse as we'd really wanted to do a fancier 3-piece crown eventually, so this would just move that up a bit (project 4).
I tore off the rest of the molding and did the drywall without event. Then I went and got all the crown molding for the room. Hey, guess what? Nice crown molding is expensive. Just for this one room, it was $600 or so. The frugal Scot in me clicked in.
We'd planned to eventually cover the jigsaw wall with built-in cabinets and shelves. Hadn't intended to do it right then, mind you, but, well, since they were to cover the whole wall, it really wouldn't be right if the crown molding around the top of the room didn't go across the front of the built-ins.
Which didn't exist.
Yet. (Project 5.)
Just about the time this was all happening, I found a photo of a spectacular set of built-ins in Architectural Digest. They'd look great in our room, we agreed. Mind you, my woodworking experience was mostly limited to watching The New Yankee Workshop but, hey, I'm a smart guy. I can figure it out.
OK, technically that was true. I figured it out. Mind, it took three or four months to figure out...
But the result was beautiful built-ins, with lighting in all the shelves. This, of course, required finding and running electricity into the wall (project 6). As long as we were doing electricity, I added a ceiling fan (no, not the simple attach-wires-to-the-existing-fixture crap, oh NO, this was the I'll-have-to-wire-it-from-scratch-and-figure-how-to-get-the-power-up-there kind of deal) (project 7).
And, while I'm there, might as well add some recessed lighting in the ceiling (project 8).
And, do fancy paint techniques on the walls (9).
Refinish the floor (10).
Replace the baseboard (11).
And, as Bubba said, that's about it. Well, OK, window treatments (12).
And, strip and refinish the French doors (13).
So let's review:
Rinse and repeat.
3. You don't have The Right Tool(s)
No matter what you're trying to do, you don't have the right tools. Get over it.
So there are two approaches you can follow.
One is the jazz approach to home renovation. I'm talking improvisation here. Miles Davis's got nuthin' on me, let me just tell you. Yeah, yeah, he's good on the trumpet but, hell, he's using it for what it was designed to do. Where's the challenge in that?
I like New Yankee Workshop just fine. Excellent television. He's got all the tools and a big airy shop. Of course he can build stuff. What I want to see is him having to do it in my shop with my tools. Uh huh. Nice big board you got there, Norm. How you gonna turn around with it? And, dust removal? That's for wimps.
That would be a show worth watching. Laser-guided chop saw my butt.
The other approach is to just buy the damned tools. The logic is so compelling you can almost have it make sense to your wife. I recommend explaining additional uses you'll have for the same tool in the future. Sale prices are important selling points, as well.
Almost any price is justifiable to a woman if it's On Sale.
4. It doesn't count as a project without bloodshed
You're not bleeding from at least a couple of knuckles? Get back to work.
5. Choosing a home to renovate is all about Location, Location, Location
Be sure you're near a hardware store. You're going to be there three times a project day, all your careful planning notwithstanding.
6. Never EVER pay contractors up front lest they give it to you out back (if you know what I mean)
Contractors (eventually, you'll need some help) are friendly. But they're not your friends. And they have no sense of responsibility. None. Really.
If you want something completed by a contractor there's only one way: Dangle money. The day you pay the rest of their bill is the day they're done. Regardless of the state of the project.
Don't pay 'em.
Really.
If all of this sounds a bit much then maybe you're really not the home restoration type. But, it's not all snot and chiggers, because out of this comes the satisfaction of doing things with your hands, the confidence that comes with tackling a complicated...
Hmm. Maybe it is all snot and chiggers. Go buy a new house and leave this idiocy to others.
Comments :
1. Jerry Carter12/06/2010 09:48:24 AM
And here I thought I'd been around the block with 5 6 years into our basement build out which still has no ceiling. I've been fortunate with roof contractors... they seem to know that they get paid when the job is done. I haven't had to use any general contractors yet (YET). 
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