I realize that I haven't blogged about the new house much since we moved in. That is mainly because the new house has proven to need a series of expensive repairs. First, the day after we moved in, we discovered a major leak in the basement. Archer had to pull out the carpet and the padding, and then it took another 2 weeks to determine precisely where the leak was. We had it fixed in late October, at a cost of $1,000. At that point we made plans to replace the furnace, not out of an immediate need but out of a desire to purchase one that was more energy efficient. We shopped and compared, and we finally found a local company we liked. We made plans to have it replaced in January.
In the meantime, we discovered what we though was a minor leak in the roof of the playroom. Now the playroom was used as the den by the previous owners, and this room was added to the house about 8 years ago. When we had our home inspection done, the inspector assured us the room (including the roof) was in great shape. Now, we've had a very rainy fall in CU Land, and several storms have been very windy. When we first noticed the leak about 6 weeks ago, we'd just had one such storm. Archer inspected the room, although he didn't climb up on it, and he thought the wind had pulled a few shingles loose. He made plans to fix it as soon as he could. In the meantime, we've had a few more storms and the leak has gotten bigger. This past Sunday it rained all day, and water literally poured out of this leak. It was apparent this was more than just a few loose shingles. So Archer and I dug through all the paperwork the previous owners had left us, and we found some information from a roofing company. It looks like they repaired the roof in 2005, so Archer called them, hoping the repairs were still under warranty. The owner of the company came out to the house yesterday, and as soon as he saw the roof, he remembered the house.
It seems that the previous owners did as much of the addition as possible, including the roof, and they didn't do a very good job on the roof. This company came out to repair their mistakes on the mudroom, which was built at the same time as the playroom. The leak is not something they've fixed before, so the company is sending someone out tomorrow to go up on the roof to give us an estimate on repairs. In the meantime, Archer has called our lawyer to see if we have any recourse, as this is clearly an issue that the previous owners knew about and did not disclose to us. We doubt that there is anything we can do, but we figured it didn't hurt to call. Once we get the estimate we may have to put the furnace on hold altogether, and we may also have to cancel our trip to Home State for the holidays. I refuse to go in debt to fix the roof. We have the money saved to pay for it, but it will mean using the money we've saved for the trip. I don't relish having that conversation with my parents or with Archer's mother, but we have to have a roof over our heads.
In the meantime, I'm a very bitter home owner.
2 comments:
I started writing a comment yesterday, but then wanted links to old blog posts and didn't post it, but now I will (sans blog links because talking to you is more important than talking about me!)
Oh dear... I know ALL about that, particularly the roof situation (as you can see in some July 2009 posts of mine). I'm really sorry that the sellers were less than honest. Ours was too... but then, again, the house was ostensibly sold to us "AS IS" -- clearly the home inspector (who was a very detailed guy, but not enough) was unable to determine just HOW BAD that "as is" was. and it looks like your situation is the same. :(
I hope you can do the repairs without too much expense. I'm really sorry about the bad timing (holiday trip vs. roof above head), but... you know, maybe it will be OK in the end, maybe the trip would have been too stressful, right?
I'm thinking of you and hoping you don't have to go into debt (as you know we HAD to go into debt in order to "fix up" our house to sell it. :( and thankfully that's not the case with you guys.)
Thanks, Lilian. The most frustrating part is that there are some really great things about the house. We knew buying it that we would need to do some work to it, as it is an older home, but it seemed to be well-cared for. Also, the inspector assured Archer and me that this is a "solid" house. Given that the house is 60 years old, we were prepared to do some work; we weren't prepared to spend over $3,000 within months of moving in.
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