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Fixer Upper
Oct. 1st, 2011 01:09 pmThe local building contractor came by this morning (on a Saturday morning!) to show us the job quote for fixing the broken under-floor joists. (See photos of the cracked and notched joists for details.) He's going to do a thorough job, using metal brackets to hold the full-size additional joists that he'll sandwich against the older joists; that means he won't have to notch the additional joists and the resulting restoration should be stronger than the original floor was. The good news here is that he doesn't need to tear out the existing floor: he says he can access it through the crawl spaces. The not-so-great news is that it will cost $5200. We can do it, and I signed the contract and put the down payment on it, but it pretty much soaks up everything I had left in housing repairs for this year. That means we won't be able to replace the furnace until sometime next year, and there are some other things that Lisa says she'll have to do herself rather than have the plumbing contractor do. But we'll survive, and the trailer provides living space, which was why we spent the money on the RV hookups first anyway.
He also showed us where the cracked joist is relative to the kitchen floor and told us that it was okay to go ahead and install a refrigerator in the space where a 'fridge goes, because that space is away from the cracked joist and it won't affect the work that his people will do. We're going to look at refrigerators later today.
Incidentally, this contractor is the person who moved the Fernley Train Depot from its original site — which turns out to be just about right across the street from our house! — to a new location over on Main Street. (He also knew the original owner of this house, who was a railroad employee, not surprisingly.) He told us stories about how the local group acquired the depot and how his company cut the building into three pieces, moved it half a mile, and reassembled it on its new site. Sometime in the future, the restored depot may be open to the public, we hope.
He also showed us where the cracked joist is relative to the kitchen floor and told us that it was okay to go ahead and install a refrigerator in the space where a 'fridge goes, because that space is away from the cracked joist and it won't affect the work that his people will do. We're going to look at refrigerators later today.
Incidentally, this contractor is the person who moved the Fernley Train Depot from its original site — which turns out to be just about right across the street from our house! — to a new location over on Main Street. (He also knew the original owner of this house, who was a railroad employee, not surprisingly.) He told us stories about how the local group acquired the depot and how his company cut the building into three pieces, moved it half a mile, and reassembled it on its new site. Sometime in the future, the restored depot may be open to the public, we hope.
