Quote:
Originally Posted by weederr33
Went to look at buying a first house. Square footage was great, layout was great, outside looked pretty good, but wow did it take a turn. Go inside and BAM, instant pet smell. Carpet is all sorts of mucked up and the walls are clearly not well taken care of. It appeared the interior had been repainted several times, but whoever did it clearly didn't take art class or failed staying within the lines of a coloring book. Trim was horrible done and did I mention the smell of cat piss? A rational thinker would move on and forget about this home. But a part of me wants to rip the carpet out, deep clean, and remodel the interior. But then again, I like doing things the hard way.
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Spoken like a true soldier.
Anyways, I wouldn't compromise on any evident repairs because that is the very tip of the iceberg. This house had the landlords special for while, who knows what else is hiding.
I'm sure you'll find a house that is turn key ready to be moved in. Because the thing with owning a house is that yes, it is your house and you can do whatever you want (with town approval in some cases), but it also means that every repair is now your issue, and work never ends in a house.
Make a list of things that you could live with, and some that are a deal breaker.
For example, big ticket items like carpet, flooring, oil tank/furnace, water pump, roof, windows, electrical, HVAC (If applicable), Water well/Septic are some of the big repairs so those need to be in a good condition.
Washer/dryer are king of old? You get a nice 10% discount at Lowes for new equipment. No central air? Get a fan or 12000BTU window unit. Paint and walls look crappy? Take a whole weekend off, do your best spackle
the rest, finish with paint.