Trying to Spend Money, But Can't!

I have this extensive To Do list of projects around my small house. This past week, I gave myself permission to work on two of them. One project was to install some flooring in my bathroom, the other was to put in a new closet system. 

I did my research on products,etc, trucked off to Home Depot and bought my materials.  The bathroom flooring was a breeze. I used a product called Allure vinyl flooring. It's a floating floor and the pattern I chose was a tile pattern.  It took me longer to remove the toilet and sink and re-install the toilet and sink than it did to lay the new flooring.  BIG pat on my back to me, I now have flooring instead of sub floor!

The next project was to put in a new closet system ($100).  The people I bought my house from used this funky piece of furniture, not quite an armoire, not quite a free standing closet in the closet to store clothes.  I've been using a basic plastic shelving unit to store all my folded clothes. I found a system at Home Depot that had both shelves and rods to put hangers on, it was not wire, I am trying to avoid wire, it's a manufactured wood product.  I put together enough IKEA furniture in my time to decorate a show room. I thought this should be fairly easy to do. Like a half an afternoon project. How wrong I was!

The closet system, well, even for a "manufactured" product.. sucked.  No other word. I used a rubber mallet as detailed in the instructions to tap in some hardware parts.  Said mallet cracked the veneer.  When I went to use a screw driver to tighten up some bolts, it caused the part being tightened up fall out of the shelf, a huge chunk of particle board just broke off.  Nothing about this unit seemed sturdy or strong. I decided this was a waste of my time and money.  I had no way of taking all the bits of hardware out of the shelves, so I loaded up the parts, bits and pieces, and took the whole thing back to Home Depot.  I got a full refund and I spent the better part of the afternoon going to and from the store and attempting to put the piece together. 

Ah well, right now all my clothes are packed in laundry baskets and garbage bags. I had to dismantle the plastic shelving before I could start on the new system.  I will have to go back to square one and figure out what I want to do. It may be a wire system after all.....

A New Years Resolution

In general, I find (like so many people) that I often fall short of my New Year's Resolutions. Most years I don't make a specific resolution, I find I do much better with an on going goal list. I seem to do much better with a "goal list" as compared to a "New Year's Resolution list". This year it's going to be a bit different.


If you've been following my blog, you know I live in a very small house that needs a lot of work, work that I am just not capable of doing in a DIY fashion and work that costs big $$$. I've spent the better part of the past month taking a good long look at my house and making up a punch list of work that has to be done, work that should be done and the cosmetic work I'd like to do. The punch list is long and lengthy. So much so that it almost drove me to drink an entire bottle of wine because it depressed me sooo much. When I bought my little house, I honestly did not think I'd still be living in it, now almost 10 years later. I figured I'd sell it and move up, or rent it out and move to a new place. Ah yes, the grand plans one has. I underestimated the work that needed to be done and the cost of the work, and I overestimated my DIY skills.

I really would like for some DIY show to come and rescue me and my home, do the work, I can help, I'm actually a very good assistant and feature me on one of their programs. Hey I'd go public with my real identity if that were the case~can we say lovely small home done over in a "green" renovation. I think it would make a great HGTV show.
So after thinking about this long and hard, and doing some research my goal this year is to see if I can qualify for an FHA refinance/rehab loan. Based on the worksheets from a number of FHA lenders and the FHA itself, even with the Bankruptcy in my past, I may be able to qualify for a loan.


What I have going for me is the following. My house in not underwater based on the current market and where I live (thank goodness). My outstanding debt consists of my car loan and I'm in the home stretch on the last of my student loans (like it should be paid off by December of this year), my credit card does not carry a balance, I only use the card once or twice a month for gas or the odd purchase. I have not been late on any payments since I started the Bankruptcy filing and my mortgage has always been current.  What is not in my favor is the Bankruptcy discharge (now 2 years old!), my reduced income from my "full time job", and the fact it may be hard to find good current house comps on my small home. I will get a 1099 from the weekend job which may help to offset the reduction in income from the weekday job.

You may ask in astonishment, But Betty, why do you want to take on more debt? Simply, I want to be able to move to a house that is a bit bigger and in better shape than this one. In order for me to sell it and not take a massive hit, I do have some repairs that must be done. Even if I decide to stay in this house, it needs work. As I stated above, I don’t have the DIY skills for those necessary repairs. Houses, especially older ones, need repairs and maintenance. I’ll put up a post later about the list of repairs that I’ve come up with.


Part of the bouncing back from Bankruptcy was also to see if I can qualify for credit again without paying astronomical interest rates. I’m not overly thrilled with my car interest rate, but it was the price I had to pay to get a car so soon after the BK was discharged. I will let you know how the process goes. I plan on starting the process in earnest once I do my 2009 taxes, which will be the beginning of February and I’d love to hear your thoughts, good, bad and indifferent.

The Joys Of Home Ownership

I got the first quote on new gutters for my house.  All inclusive, it's going to be about $775.  Sigh-that will be July's second job and most of August's second job income going towards the gutters.  They do need to be replaced and it's something I can not do, nor do I wish to do......

I have three other companies coming to give me quotes.  From what little research I did do, this is going to cost me about what the first estimate is.

I also priced out new lawn mowers, to find one that will meet my needs, I'll be spending about $150. I am hoping that Home Depot or Lowes or any other store of that nature will be running an end of the season sale and maybe I can get one for less than $100.

At least today is lovely and sunny here in Southern New England! Yesterday was miserable!

Ask and You Shall Receive

Ask I did! I ran into a freind of mine over the weekend. The topic of the conversation was "What are you doing this weekend?" I rattled out my to do/errands list and also said mentioned my impending insulation replacement project. I also said I was having a tough time finding reliable home improvement people that would 1) take on my small jobs and 2) not charge me an arm and a leg. We chatted for a few more minutes and went on our merry way.

The next day I got a call. My friend gave me the number of a young man who works in her company. He does things like painting, odd jobs and yes, would even do the insulation work. I talked to the young man, he offered references, understood the scope of the work (working in a very small dirty crawl space) and said he would stop by to give a quote. His hourly rate for painting was $11/hour and the odd job rate as $15. This may be too good to be true, but in the course of our conversation he said he is doing select small jobs to help fund a down payment account for his first house. He said at this time, he prefers to "hand select" a few customers who pay promptly and can work with his full time schedule.

All of the above, I can handle. Sooo, keep your fingers crossed, I'm to get an estimate in a couple days and lets hope it all works out!

Bouncing Back is Becoming a Tool Belt Diva.

I am not a Toolbelt Diva. In fact, I fully admit, my DIY skills are lacking, mainly due to the fact I never seemed to have the time to learn decent DIY skills, other than painting. Plus I'm afraid of power tools, especially things that cut. BUT I have a list of home projects that need to get done, so it's time to learn new skills, especially since the quotes I've been getting for various home improvement projects are outrageous. I dragged out the circular saw and cut some landscaping ties to size for some planned raised garden beds, I figured out how to divert water from a storm damaged gutter from flooding into my bedroom every time it rains, I put up new brackets in my bedroom for curtain rods (I can use a drill and a screw driver) and the big project was to finally install my new bathroom vanity. I had hoped to convince, bribe, pay my neighbor to re tile my bathroom floor (total square footage is only 27 SF, easy peasy for someone else), when he does his mudroom, but that project is on the books for July 4th weekend and I will be at my part time job that entire weekend, I wanted the sink OUT of my living space today.

I started at 4 PM, and finally gave up at 7:30 PM. I was able to remove the old vanity, disconnect the faucet (I'm using the faucet on the new sink), got the faucet installed on the new vanity top, got the vanity bottom into the bathroom and leveled and then spent the next 90 minutes trying to connect all the plumbing.

Mind you, before I started this project I made a list of all the bits and pieces I would need (new supply lines, drain pipe extensions, washers, caulk, etc) and then went out and bought said supplies. I'm just not getting the drain pipes connected as they should be and I can't get the stopper hooked up to the stopper plunger thing (is that a real phrase, stopper plunger thing?). I can and have installed several sinks and toilets in my life, I'm actually pretty good at it, but for some reason, it's just not happening today.

The good part is I no longer have the vanity sitting in my living room and I really like the way it looks in my bathroom. The bad part is I'm going to spend tomorrow after dinner fixing what I started today. I just have to remember to brush my teeth in the kitchen sink and not in the bathroom. I'll be happy when it's done, because the next project is flooring for my bedroom. I did a little on line research and found flooring I would love to have in my bedroom for less than $225. Remember, I live in a small space, so the cost for the flooring is not that much and if I can get over my fear of things that cut, I can install some pretty awesome bamboo or engineered wood flooring. I did help a friend one time install some Pergo (they did the cutting), so this shouldn't be too bad?

Ah well, I look at it this way, I've just saved myself $125 (the quoted price from the plumber) on sink installation and when it's done, at least I can say I did it myself.

Why Emergency Funds Are A Good Thing-Part 2

A couple months ago I posted that I had to use my emergency fund to pay for a broken window on my neighbors car. I had thrown an old fence post through his back truck window and he did not have glass coverage on his insurance. At least I was able to pay for the new window as soon as it was installed. It was my own fault, I tossed the pole and damaged the rear window.

In all the fuss about the car, I forgot to post that I need a new storm door. We had a lot of very windy weather here in New England last week and one day I just did not latch the door properly. One of those gusts of wind (one day gusts up to 40 MPH) "grabbed" the door and somehow it came unhinged and got badly damaged. I'm lucky I did not have glass everywhere, but I did have a door that was unhinged, warped and frankly, only good for the scrap metal pile. My first thought when I pulled up to the house was that someone had broken into my house, but I realized that my front door was locked and the screen door was just "unhinged".

I was able to get a new door and someone to put it on the house today (and fix the damaged trim as well) for the whopping fee of $275. It's times like this I wish I was a little more DIY savvy. Hanging new doors is just not my thing.

I love owning my own home, but when I have to shell out unplanned money, ouch, it hurts. What it means is my plan to paint my kitchen cupboards is put off a month (need new paint) and I'll focus on re-seeding my lawn when (if, or ever) it warms up. Right now I have a huge patch of dirt where I should have lawn.....

Using Part of my Return to Make My Living Space Better

I'm taking part of my tax return and getting a couple things I need for the house that I have been putting off. It's nothing major, but it's things like new window shades for the windows, and and new door handle for the screen door. I got a new set of drapes (on sale at Bed Bath and Beyond) last week and a new curtain rod is needed. I also had a handyman come in to do about two hours worth of work on some little home repairs that I don't have the tools or skill to do (fixing some exterior trim, fixing the screen door, repairing the outdoor front door light).

I'm giving myself $50 to either spend on a couple Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts or Panera Bread Gift Cards (for use for travel later this summer).

The remainder will go into my emergency fund.