Due Diligence

And the lessons I will keep in mind as we look to do it again...

Hello!

At our home, my lush spring garden is becoming seriously overgrown, but I’m leaving it for now because it is positively buzzing with pollinator activity. (Too corny? Oh, well.)

Due Diligence

At the Graham house, we are almost at the end of the due diligence period, and the biggest thing on our before-closing punch list is water.

When we bought the place, our kind neighbor warned us that the basement has a tendency to flood when it rains, so we made sure to install a sump pump, so we figured we were good to go. And we didn’t experience any flooding down there during the renovation process.

But we have had quite a lot of rain this past week or so, and while the sump pump is working just fine, the water was still finding a way to hang out in the basement crawlspace.

See how dry it is right there by the sump pump? Ha!

So yesterday, our contractor was out there with his crew digging a trench around the edge of the foundation and installing a moisture barrier to reduce water getting in, and pipe system to carry any water that does get in over to the sump pump. No more standing water.

Other Water

We also have developed a pretty bad leak in the ceiling of the porch. We had this looked at once before, but no professional could determine how the water was getting in, so the crew flattened some flaps (am I just making this up now?) where the porch roof meets the main roof, put up new bead board on the ceiling, and repainted the haint blue.

Guess what? The leak is back. With a vengance. Still, no one can find the source, so later this week, a new roofer will be coming to remove the shingles, lay down a new (stronger) water and ice barrier, re-shingle, and then once again, the crew will re-bead board and re-haint blue the ceiling.

Murphy’s Law is a thing, isn’t it? Of course it rains like crazy the week of Due Diligence and we have to do major work right before closing. But you know what? I’m glad. We mean it when we say that we want to give our buyer a house she feels confident moving into. We’re not trying to get out of there (Run! Quick, before she realizes it’s still broken!) and pull a fast one on anyone. We’re proud of this work and want to lead with a commitment to quality.

Thank you all so much for being here and following on this journey of our very first property investment house.

I’ve said it before, but I don’t regret this project at all, despite it being a less-than-ideal time to be putting a house on the market.

I’m focusing on the lessons we learned and the experience we gained.

Next time, these are the lessons that I will keep in mind as we move into a project: