I've lived at the beach house for over 32 years. Richard and I bought it. Then He died. I made all the mortgage payments...sometimes out of unemployment compensation. I sacrificed to stay afloat...something many people are doing now in the light of all the housing foreclosures. I lived bare bones...no holidays, cut my own hair, no movies, no cable, heat turned down to so cold I wore my coat in the house. Many people can relate to living this way. One does what one has to do to make mortgage payments. As a result, I am proud of this house, proud of paying all the mortgage payments...not late once. I am now in a good position: no debt at all, no car payments, no mortgage payments. I don't even pay interest on credit cards. I am a little smug about this.
So, this house is important to me. I want to keep it in good shape, as it was well designed to start with and has a good location, location, location. The house faces the water. The builder must have run out of money as the project progressed, because He put in cheap utility grade windows and patio doors.
The house needs good windows and doors. Over time, I've replaced the windows with Owens Corning fiberglass windows. My parameter was to address exposure to water, rust, rot and insect damage. I think I chose the right windows. They are expensive, but work very well.
The patio doors had to wait until I had the money and found the right contractor. My friend Carol used Ted for her addition. He is a designer as well as a meticulous craftsman. I will hire Ted. Now, what type of patio doors do I want? I went through the home stores and window stores. My ideas began to gel. I want doors that are clad on the outside so they are weatherproof. I don't want to look through screens. I chose roll up screens. I like the idea of blinds between glass. This gives privacy if needed, a clear view if that is chosen, or some combination. The blinds between glass makes it easier to keep them clean...and prevents dog paws from getting at the blinds. Final choice was Pella patio doors. There are THREE layers of glass with this type of door.
Before the doors went in, I had a structural engineer look at the house. There is a problem with the slab in the basement. There are crack lines in the Sheetrock. The engineer did a survey and said the reason is that the house is settling at 2 rates: The center of the house is 2 stories high. The front and back are one story high. The extra weight in the center section is the cause of the crack. There is essentially no construction flaw. On that good news, I went ahead with the project. The doors are in. I am finishing the inside of the wood doors with tung oil...a slow and laborious process, but the end result will be worth it.
So, this house is important to me. I want to keep it in good shape, as it was well designed to start with and has a good location, location, location. The house faces the water. The builder must have run out of money as the project progressed, because He put in cheap utility grade windows and patio doors.
The house needs good windows and doors. Over time, I've replaced the windows with Owens Corning fiberglass windows. My parameter was to address exposure to water, rust, rot and insect damage. I think I chose the right windows. They are expensive, but work very well.
The patio doors had to wait until I had the money and found the right contractor. My friend Carol used Ted for her addition. He is a designer as well as a meticulous craftsman. I will hire Ted. Now, what type of patio doors do I want? I went through the home stores and window stores. My ideas began to gel. I want doors that are clad on the outside so they are weatherproof. I don't want to look through screens. I chose roll up screens. I like the idea of blinds between glass. This gives privacy if needed, a clear view if that is chosen, or some combination. The blinds between glass makes it easier to keep them clean...and prevents dog paws from getting at the blinds. Final choice was Pella patio doors. There are THREE layers of glass with this type of door.
Before the doors went in, I had a structural engineer look at the house. There is a problem with the slab in the basement. There are crack lines in the Sheetrock. The engineer did a survey and said the reason is that the house is settling at 2 rates: The center of the house is 2 stories high. The front and back are one story high. The extra weight in the center section is the cause of the crack. There is essentially no construction flaw. On that good news, I went ahead with the project. The doors are in. I am finishing the inside of the wood doors with tung oil...a slow and laborious process, but the end result will be worth it.
Labels: Construction update
posted by gardenbug at Wednesday, February 23, 2011
2 Comments:
Did you ever find out how to keep the basement dry? I'm wondering if you add a second story to the back - will that help? You could make it a second large bedroom.
Yes the basement is dry...unless there is an overwhelming tsunami...in that case the whole house will be ruined. The engineering solution was to run a drain line around the whole basement wall at the base...cover the drain with concrete so there is no open line visible. Each course of cement block that makes up the foundation wall was drilled into. A drain connects each course to the drain line. If any water gets into the hollow blocks, it gets drained away. Finally the whole system ends at a sump pump. The pump has a battery back up if the neighborhood loses power. One last step planned is to add an emergency generator. That should do it. If I was not confident that the space could stay dry, I would not invest all that money in the project. It is almost finished. It has taken me 30 years and 2 failure trys, to get this right. I think it is now solved.
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