One busy year.

I just realized this blog turned one today. I was cruzin’ through it to recap some of the events that took place because this eventually turned out to be one of the best years ever (despite a rough start and Dubya being re-elected):

This is a whole lot considering just two years ago Amy and I were living in an apartment on a college campus and I was playing the drums in a steadily performing band until 3am several nights a week. Now if we don’t get to bed by 11 the whole next day is shot to hell.

Look who’s two!

imageOn Friday the deed was done, or at least transferred. Amy and I now own 1404 Raybon Drive in Wendell, NC. but we didn’t get to spend much time out there this weekend because our little man Connor turned two the very next day! And his party was better than any I ever had when growing up. All his little friends were there – Andrew, Maeve, Charlie, Megan, Skylar, Hannah, Jacob and plenty of adults. All of the food was eaten – every last thing.

imageConnor was wiped out by this afternoon. He had his party on Saturday and explored his new backyard all morning on Sunday. And now comes the fun part. As soon as he gets up from his nap we’re heading to Home Depot for paint and about four million other things. Tomorrow I’ll spend the whole day painting and then I’ll be off to buy a new refrigerator and microwave to install over the stove.

By Friday we have to be moved out of the house in Raleigh. Buying new furniture will have to wait until next weekend. Today it dawned on me that this is the first time I have taken off work in over four years that hasn’t been medically related.

David Joyner??? – Work Under Way To Promote Toll Roads Statewide

WRAL.com – News – Work Under Way To Promote Toll Roads Statewide

This article says “To help sell the idea, the state has hired public relations veteran David Joyner to lead the North Carolina Turnpike Authority.”

Is this the same David Joyner who leased my old band our rehearsal room off capital Blvd. I certainly hope not. That would be quite strange because he owns a downtown real estate company. Not a public relations company. Just read about one of his properties: Fox Ridge.

It must be someone different. Gotta be. I might email WRAL to find out.

UPDATE: It’s not the same Joyner (thank God). This David Joyner is the founder of State Capital Strategies in Raleigh.

What the ????

imageLast night I went to Taco Bell to get our dinner. I go two combos and a soft taco for Connor. I must have won the grand prize on that visit: A lifetime supply of Taco sauce. I thought the bag felt heavy but 38 packs of mild sauce?

Not funny ha, ha. Funny queer.

The Seller’s Response

It appears the seller has agreed to have everything fixed that was disclosed in the Inspection Summary and a Structural Engineer is scheduled to go out later this week to look at the questionable foundation columns. The seller states that he had the house inspected at the time he purchased it and the county had to inspect it the first time the house was sold and the columns and girders presented no problems either time.

As long as I can get a statement from an Engineer proclaiming the foundation safe then we’ve bought a house. The underwriting mortgage company called me today and the rate’s been set so all that’s left is the repairs and the closing. Looks like we’re moving in a month.

Inspection Day

imageNow I know why thorough inspections are required when buying a house. One of the first things I found looking around the yard were three of these black and yellow Argiope spiders (an orb web spider). They were huge but didn’t even scare my niece’s, Hannah and Skylar, because they looked so peaceful hanging out in their cool webs. They may have been the best thing I saw yesterday. From there it kinda went down hill and got discouraging.

imageWe found several little things like this broken toilet tank, excessively hot water (140 degrees) and leaky outside water spickets. None of these things are really big or expensive problems for the seller to take care of. In fact, under the terms of the purchase contract they don’t have to repair such small things unless all repairs exceed $1500. But unfortunately not everything was a small problem.

imageThey also had a few mid-range, somewhat expensive problems to address with the air conditioners. The downstairs air condenser had a rusted drip pan – no biggie. But the upstairs condenser had a broken PVC drain pipe thanks to someone throwing luggage on it when they used the condenser access area as storage. Yikes. The big problem is the water leaking from the broken pipe overflowed the drip pan which saturated the sub-flooring. Luckily it hadn’t soaked through to the ceiling below. We brought this to seller’s attention immediately so he could get it fixed quick.

imageBut the real problem, and possible show-stopper, is the foundation. The first time we looked at the house my dad noticed the floor seemed to sink towards the center of the house. I couldn’t tell very much but did notice it felt like I was waking down hill in the entrance foyer. But according to Don, my inspector, this was just “the tip of the iceburg.” As he was describing the problem I quickly recalled from my experience framing houses during college that a floor girder must be located in the center 1/3 of a foundation support column.

As you can tell by this photo one girder of this house is clearly located on the right 1/3 of the support column and is even hanging off a little bit. Why is this a big issue? Because as the house settles the support column will settle to one side creating dips in the floor system as the floor joists bow. And it’s already starting.

So now we have to get a structural engineer to look at it. If he recommends fixing it then the seller will need to hire Ram Jack or some other foundation specialists to make the repair by setting another column. That won’t be cheap and it will be interesting to see if they’ll actually pay for it or back out of the sale. They might as well fix it because any future inspector is going to find the same problem.

More pics of the house.

Here are a few more pictures of the place we’ll call home at the end of next month. There’s a lot of painting and wallpaper removal to take care of. I might even take off the last week of September to get it all done if I can squeeze in the time between projects at work. Right now I’m slammed on all fronts. But there is more good news this week… Amy got a job! She starts Monday in the claims department of an insurance company I can’t think of the name of right now.

Kitchen, Living Room:
imageimage

We bought a house!

imageIt’s been 10 days since my last entry because I have been extremely busy this month, just like in July. Our offer on this house in the town of Wendell was accepted last night. I searched all over the Internet and discovered you can buy A LOT more house for your money outside of Raleigh/Cary/Apex. In short, once the deal goes through on this property I will have saved almost $60K over any comparable house I’ve seen in Raleigh.

We’ll have half an acre of yard and 2200 square feet of living space. The first floor has three bedrooms, two full bathrooms, kitchen, living room and dining room. The upstairs has two 15×16 bonus rooms and a full bathroom. It’s located about 10 minutes from where Dillon Supply will be located after the move in December (so I’ll be just as close to work as I am now). The best part is that there will be a lot of yard space between us and our neighbors, something unheard of in Raleigh subdivisions.

It’s not a done deal but if the contract goes through we’ll be closing on September 23rd (one day before Connor’s birthday). I told Amy that once we move it’s the last time we’re going to do it for many years. Later we can add a kid or two to this house and still have enough room to keep our sanity. I just don’t know how I’m going to afford to furnish it.