Holy shit. $40k for a house?!? Last night I got the bid from the landscaper for my back yard: $30k. And that's just to get it ready for all the work that I will have to put into it, with planting, etc. Then again, I do have a Seattle address, so...
My parents own two rowhomes in West Baltimore, and my mom thinks she'd could maybe get 50k for one of them. But yea, cheap houses exist. Though I don't like the sound of asbestos removal rd95, it can cost hundreds of dollars an hour to get that stuff removed properly. And you want to do it properly.
There are a few things we won't touch. Asbestos (both siding and insulation), plumbing (galvanized pipes that need replacing, missing pipes altogether, etc.), electrical (cloth insulated wires for example), foundation issues, frame issues, and a few other things here and there. The one thing that we are kind of worried about is buying up a house that the seller has "neglected" to disclose was a previous meth house. What a fucking world we live in when that's a legit concern.
Foundation issues are expensive and constant but the other shit ain't bad. As a home owner you have much less strict guidelines on asbestos work than a contractor hence you can do it cheaper. Housing electrical is really simple just time consuming to run wire and pluming has been simplified a lot with crimp on pex plastic lines. I've never done plumbing drainage that seems a bit more tricky but on most houses you already have that setup unless you need a drastic layout change. Point being that you can do a lot more than you give yourself credit for and a lot of the items you listed could net you a heavy discount. That being said, in your price range the cost of materials would be a huge % of cost
Yeah. That's part of the problem I'm working with. I'm figuring, if the cost of fixing up a house that's on the level of "meh" and making it somewhat decent pretty much costs the same as a decent house, finding a decent house at a good deal seems to be a better way to go. Less hassle.That being said, in your price range the cost of materials would be a huge % of cost
I was approved fro $200K when I bought the current dump. I ended up buying a $85K house. Two days a month I work to pay off the mortgage, most of the interest is already done and everything I pay now is mostly principle. I've been thinking about a smaller house in a better area for about the same payment, but I am too busy and I hate moving.
I swear every contractor in Seattle is out to rip you off... I too tried to get someone in to do a little landscaping last week. All I wanted them to do was areate and seed my lawn... 300-600$ and they couldn't actually be bothered to show up on schedule. So I rented a aerator and ended up doing my and neghbors lawn for 65 bucks plus the cost of seed. 2 hrs of work for 300 bucks of work gotta be kidding me.
Well, the key element is a rock wall that spans the 65-foot yard, and is about 3-feet high. So there's heavy equipment needed... three-quarter-minus gravel base... tearing down the fence to get the heavy equipment and rock into the yard, and then rebuilding the fence when they leave... But all of that was only $9k. The problem was replacing the tiny decrepit front lawn with semi-permeable stone pad that I can park the RV on... And that's gonna be $23k. But still... a house for $40k... wow...