So straight after I published last Saturday’s epistle our Realtor called to see if we were interested in any of a few listings he sent over. There were two of interest, three bedroom/two baths though both on the small side for our taste, but we met him in the afternoon to see them.
(Ed. Note: I misunderstood the situation regarding that bid last week. The listing agent did respond, with a verbal no, and told our’s the seller’s bottom line was about $840k.)
The first was a short block in from Central Expressway with a large sound barrier at the rear helping keep the noise level down. About 1350 sq. ft., IIRC, in decent condition with a corner lot large enough to support perhaps a 500 sq. ft. expansion. We’d seen another home from this development the Saturday before which had been expanded a few years earlier, providing a good model of the possibilities. However at an asking price of $878,000 plus probably $80-100k for the work, compared to a list of $935,000 for the one already increased to 1990 sq. ft., made us keep looking.
The second was over near Middlefield Road on a quite little street around the corner from my first apartment in Mountain View 11 years ago. (11 years, that’s hard to believe.) This house was smaller, officially 1150 sq. ft., and 57 years old, but the corner lot is 6300 sq. ft. with lovely wall of bushes just inside of the sidewalk on boths side and a next door neighbor which recently added a second floor. The house has a nice big kitchen, high ceilinged, that it shares with the living room.
This house also had a ‘bonus’ room. That is, many years ago someone essentially enclosed the patio to create a 19′ x 9 1/2′ room whose outer wall was all windows. The room was done, as best we could tell, without permits! Everything comes down to money, I suppose, but that seems like a foolish decision to me considering the possible complications in case of fire and so on. Anyway, getting the room up to code will cost ~$10,000.
The price was right, TS1 and I thought: $723,000 but we offered $710k and the seller settled for $712k. We were under contract!
And under the gun too, with only seven days to clear the contingencies. The seller had done termite and property inspections recently, turning up no red flags, and the mortgage broker we’d used previously said even in this market we could get approval.
The tricky bit for us was getting a realistic handle on the price of adding 610 sq. ft., refreshing the kitchen and master bath, and bringing that extra room up to code. The first two contractors who came out to look at the property felt they could do the job and certainly the zoning would support even more enclosed space if we liked, but neither wanted to give us an estimate.
In my fantasies we got the work done and dusted for $90-100k. $800,000, more or less, and we’d have 1900+ square feet of up to date living space. The third contractor went by Thursday morning with our Realtor and they called after to give us a verbal estimate of $110-120,000. A little tight for us but doable, and with the clock ticking we decided to give the go ahead for the bank to start the appraisal and approval process.
This is when reality began to intrude on us. First the mortgage broker told us that her bank currently classifies Mountain View as a distressed market(!), so instead of putting 15% down and keeping more cash on hand for the construction we had to go with our original intent of 20%. Even tighter but getting nervy.
Then Friday morning the contractor faxed the written estimate. Ka-boom! as they like to say on KFOG. Instead of somewhere in the $110-120k range as he’d told us, this one was $137,400. His explanation was bringing the extra room up to code was $10k and removing the ugly, massive red brick fireplace and chimney from the wall between the kitchen and living room $6200, neither included in the verbal.
But this estimate explicitly didn’t include plans and permits: another $10k. No plumbing to where, down the line, we could add a third full bath in the new master bedroom: another $5k. No refresh of the kitchen or existing baths: $25-30k or more.
So not $137,000 but really $180,000. Whoa! That’s a whole ‘nother story. And everyone I spoke with about this emphatically told us that whatever the contractor tells you, add 30-50% because invariably there are overruns and unexpecteds.
Enough. We sadly had no choice but to cancel the contract and pull out of the deal. Too much stress for me, I can tell you that, and so we’re taking a break from the hunting for a couple of weeks.
Of course if some really attractive house comes on the market…
BillSaysThis 