I don't like to move it, move it !!!

Moving day has come and gone and we are now in our beautiful, circa 1922 duplex rental, a block from the beach.  It has all the 1920's charm that you would expect; sunny rooms, crown molding, hardwood floors and lovely Mexican tiles in the kitchen & bathrooms.

That said, 8 (scratch that )10 days later, I am still surrounded by towers of boxes, piles of cords, stacks of electronic equipment, books, vases, bags of stuff and a potpourri of various & sundry items, housed in plastic containers.  Most of these things are wedged into "free" spaces in any available room or hallway.  My dining room set, wine bar, buffet and over-sized chest of drawers now reside in our single car garage.  The car resides on the street.

You may be thinking, "Kris, why the hell don't you just unpack your crap and stop your stupid whining?!"  But before you start to speculate on my inability to put things away,  it is not because of pure laziness that I find myself navigating a maze of banker boxes on the way to the bathroom every morning...

As it turns out, our "new" place has major rain damage, characterized by water filling up the lighting fixture on the dining room ceiling and gray, fuzzy mold sprouting, unimpeded from various layers of drywall & plaster.  Consequently, our dining room has been rendered useless - mainly due to lack of a ceiling, but let's face it, who wants to pick out pieces of moldy drywall from their food?

I am assured by very capable people that things will be back to "normal" by Monday (scratch that) Tuesday.  Which should be just in time to start digging up and replacing the mainline pipe on the side of the house.

If you've never had the pleasure of doing a mainline pipe replacement, you are missing out!. We did one on our last rental house (circa 1950) during the first week of move-in and were able to skip a couple days of pesky showers while the water was shut off.  BTW,  Trader Joe's has wonderful bathroom facilities if you have to "go" between 8am to 9pm - anytime after that - it's a 24 hour grocery store.

Good times.


The upside is: we like our place a lot, we're saving several hundred dollars a month and we will probably only be living like this for a few more days.  The cherry on top is that we don't OWN this place, so repair bills for the roof, the ceiling and the mainline are not coming out of our pocket - so we get all the benefits of living in a charming older home and someone else gets the bills.  Yes, we are inconvenienced for a couple of weeks, but since we plan on staying here a long time, we're willing to deal with it.

I have a friend that is purchasing a CHARMING house built in 1928.  You know that Chinese curse?      'May you live in interesting times' - I think the same curse is implied for 'May you live in a charming house.'

They have chosen not to do a camera inspection of their 1928 mainline pipe or a further roof inspection, even though the inspector suggested it might need to be replaced soon.  They are also flying solo - without a real estate agent.  I'm guessing they will be in our situation about 6 months from now, but with a huge difference - THEY will be paying the bills.

Yes, I've warned them.

Frankly,  I love places with character and I'm always drawn to homes or apartments that are unique and not just a cookie cutter, clone of every place on the block.  I'm a sucker for built-in shelves and coves, glass door knobs, original tile and wood work, etc.  I know why my friend fell in love with the house they are buying -  but you have to understand what you are getting yourself into.

A "slush fund" of about $20k is mandatory if you are buying any older property and that will probably only cover the first incident or two.  But hey, that's the price of falling in love.

That said, when I start buying property, I have a list of must haves: Must be built after 1990, Must have a new mainline pipe, Must have copper plumbing, Must have insulated windows and Must have a leak-proof ceiling over the dining room.

Screw charm.
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