We got our (old) house!

15 years ago

We closed on our new home on Thursday of last week, and I'm THRILLED!! The home is a 1957 ranch home with screen porch and 2-car garage, three bedrooms, full basement with finished recreation room, on just about 3/4 acre. It is about 2400 square feet of useable space, which is wonderful for us considering that our previous home was 1050 square feet. (That house was destroyed in the flooding here in June, and we have been living in a camper in the driveway ever since. So it's a HUGE relief for us to finally have a place to move into!)

We spent a four-day weekend prepping and painting every room upstairs - the kitchen is all that remains of the painting work. I need to deep-clean every surface in the kitchen before we paint there, and we need to replace the carpet in the living/dining room, then we can move in - hopefully that will all be done by the end of the week. We also got the washer and dryer hooked up, re-secured the front door, fixed the leaking kitchen faucet, removed a damaged built-in headboard from one bedroom and repaired the wall, took up carpet in the bedrooms to reveal very nice hardwood floors, and a few other smaller things.

One of the neat things we found: We couldn't figure out why there was beautiful hardwood in the all the bedrooms and the linen closet, but only sub-floor in the hallway, living room & dining room. WHY would they not install hardwood throughout, we wondered? Well in the coat closet, we found some VERY 50's (VERY original!) linoleum affixed to the floor (covered by carpet)so we've decided that the entire LR/DR probably had this material on the floor when it was new. I'm going to remove the carpet and keep that little bit of remaining linoleum showing in the closet.

WOOHOO - we are on our way!!

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Comments (5)

User
15 years ago
Congratulations!!! Might you consider no carpet and installing hardwood in the living/dining rooms?

By the way, I'm older than your house so I definitely do not consider a 1957 house as "old":)
lauren674
15 years ago
Congratulations! Your energy and enthusiasm will get those pre-moving projects done in no time.

You're probably right about the linoleum tile throughout the house. Our house was built sometime around 1920, but in the 50's when my in-laws became the owners it had this type of flooring over all the hardwood on the first floor. I saw an old magazine ad from that tie showing how you could 'modernize those dark floors' with colorful flooring and the add showed the tile going over the hardwood.

I know you will be very happy in your new home!
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janetgia
Original Author
15 years ago
Thank you both for the well-wishes... Patser, I appreciate the frame of reference. I should have said we got our "older than me" house! I actually love the age of this house - it was obviously an executive home when it was built, and over the years has suffered through "updates" that reflected the trends of the decade in which they happened. So when I say "old" what I really mean is it needs to be returned to its original glory. As for hardwood in the living/dining, we are looking into it but I'm not sure we have the funds right now. I am just anxious to get *something* put in so we can be settled before it gets really cold here.

Lauren, I tried to take a picture of our linoleum patch yesterday but my camera could not capture it. I will be taking up the carpet in the next day or so and will clean that patch and try to get a better picture. It's orangey-gold in color and seems to have some sort of starburst pattern to it. I can't imagine how wild it must have looked through two whole rooms, but it definitely would have looked modern!

Janet
blackcats13
15 years ago
CONGRATS!!! Isn't it exciting? We have linoleum or vinyl (not sure which) in 2 bedrooms. It's white with glitter spots. It's just tacky enough that I would keep it if it were in decent shape (of course it's not). I know just what you mean about needing to clean the kitchen, ugh!

Post some pictures when you can.
concretenprimroses
15 years ago
Congratulations! I love screen porches. Enjoy!
kathy