For those of you that bought a house with potential...

what is your game plan for getting it where you want it?

DH & I bought a small ranch on a large plot with the idea that we will expand our 2br 1 ba ranch into a 4br 2.5 ba colonial or victorian. We are doing some minor renovations in the meantime, but we are having a slight difference in opinion as to when we can begin the expansion. I say 2 - 3 years, DH thinks 5 or more. (Of course I do the $$$, so I think I am more on target, btu DH is always a little cautious anyway.)


What is everyone else planning?

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

We did not add an extension or anything, but we did mostly cosmetic work inside. It's taking a long time because we are doing it and DH's uncle is in construction and helps when he is able to . I would say we only put in 10K so far (no labor costs) and we just had our home reappraised for $75K more than when we bought a year ago I think your scenario might be different since you might have to finance some (all) of the work, you want to make sure you get a good rate (and the rates are still good).

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

We also have a small home. We decided not to expand until we need the space, which will likely mean when (if) we have a child, and when that child walks. So maybe in 5 years?

We will basically dormer and extend the back a bit. Nothing too crazy, I just want to make the kitchen bigger (we have a 20in stove now!) and add a bath. The dormering will be nice b/c then we can have the bedrooms upstairs.

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

We started right away....well, kind of. We moved in in September....and started trying to find a contractor in November. We found one...and then we started with the architect, the permits, zoning, etc. We are finally starting our project right after Labor Day.

We are using money from a HELOC to do the job. We are dormering the top of our cape...making it into a master suite with a bathroom, walk-in-closet and a loft/study area.

For those of you that are doing the work yourselves...I never understood how you just do things without getting permits, etc for tearing down walls, new electric, etc? Can anyone fill me in....I feel like we are the only ones going through the permit process.

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

Thanks everyone for sharing.

To respond to you, emc:
I am glad that your investment generated a good return on value. That is very reassuring.

We are using the extra $$ that we got from the appraisal. (our house appraised for more than it was selling for, so we got the full mortgage for the appraised price) and we put that into an interest-bearing account. That account also gets X$$$ into each paycheck, plus all the monetary gifts that we have received as well as DHs bonuses from work.

We have contractors in the family, so we have that advantage as well. The only people that we have to *hire* are the mason to lay the foundation and the framers. They will help us with the permits & such. We also have an architect in the family, so the drawings are pretty much done.

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

Well, you guys can see where we are right now...

We *plan* to build up in 5 years or so...Most of the houses are already built up, and they are just so beautiful!!

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

Dh and I bought in Aug 2004 and just completed our renovations in July 2005, we went from a 2 bed SMALL ranch to a 4 bedroom house. It is in queens so the property is still small but we are happy. The hard part is that we did all this and had our daughter in Dec2004. It was difficult at times, and I wish our timing was different so it would have been done before the baby, but we are happy now!........

Here is a before/after

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

I took it slow. I wanted to see how I would use the space. Good thing I did, because shortly after I bought the house, I met FI, and now we use the house much differently than I would have imagined. We ended up taking down some major walls and opening the LR & DR into one huge room (I have a TINY 2-story cape). That one change made all the difference in the world.

We've re-done the 2 bathrooms, kitchen, roof, windows, driveway, wood floors, LR/DR and 2 bedrooms. We're done. Now it's time to tie up all the loose ends to sell it. We've found that it was a great investment, but not where we want to be long-term. So glad we went slowly, because everything we did, we paid cash for (we did all labor). Now our return is going to be even greater because we don't have to clear any debt.

Re: For those of you that bought a house with potential...

We did the new kitchen, bath, floors, removed some walls, added some walls, etc. now.
Our house has plenty of room for expansion. Right now the upstairs bedroom is like a cape upstairs with the slanted ceilings. Our neighbors got rid of the slanted ceilings and now have 2 large rooms up there. This is something we may de in the future if we decide to stay here after 2 kids.