A New Old House

[Gothichome]

Welcome to the District Willa, we are in Chatham, we have another yellow brick owner here as well, London Guelph region. I realy like your home, and you have made a great choice of homes, wish Gothichome still had its ginger bread. The home looks to be very habitable just as is. Don't fuss the little stuff rite away, most of us here strongly suggest living with the home as it for a while, if the home needs some thing, it will tell you. Foundation's good, roof is good, there's nothing more you could ask for. Once again, welcome.

[Kmarissa]

Nothing of value to add except that this home is just darling! Of course it has some oddities and some odd aesthetic choices (like the yellow hallway) but I think you really have a great little house there.

[mjt]

Cute house. It has good character and if it has good bones, you have a great house. Poor color choices are easy to fix...

[eclecticcottage]

Love it!! I love the steep pitched roofs that seem so common in Ontario. Adorable house. I agree on some of the unusual paint choices.

The Bungalow Project has a half bath off of the kitchen as well, but it wasn't updated and the sink matches the one in the full bath-I think the original owners altered the typical layout from pantry to WC for some reason, since it is unusual, or so it seems. Perhaps yours was this way as well.

I completely agree with Gothichome, live there and the house will let you know what it wants. It sounds weird, but it is very true-like you need to "commune" with it somehow. I did this with our Old House (now sold), especially when choosing exterior colors, as well as the Cottage (I can't tell you how many things started off like "lets do this" then turned into something quite different). The Bungalow Project not quite as much due to time limits, but I did spend time just wandering about and sitting in different places by myself to see what it told me. And as much as I was fighting a specific paint/color choice, I think the house wants it to stay as it and it likely will. It's pretty amazing what they "tell" you when you try to listen! Just have an open mind and somehow it seems that you'll find the right stuff/colors.

[Nicholas]

Very nice house, nice details on the outside, but I agree what a mish mash inside.

Are you going to keep that kitchen bath or revert back to pantry? A bath in the kitchen was one turnoff especially for my wife on the houses we looked at. I have a small laundry space in my kitchen, which is not desirable either but its out of the way and ok as long as no one was doing laundry while I was cooking.

[eclecticcottage]

Are you going to keep that kitchen bath or revert back to pantry? A bath in the kitchen was one turnoff especially for my wife on the houses we looked at.

I've seen that as a big objection for a lot of buyers on shows. It's funny, but it seems common here in older houses. I think (although I might be wrong) that it was to keep the plumbing all close by for one reason or another-cold weather perhaps? The Bungalow project (half bath, although the full bath is directly above)is the second of three houses we've had that way, and the Cottage has them next to each other but the bath is accessed from the hall instead.

[Nicholas]

Are you going to keep that kitchen bath or revert back to pantry? A bath in the kitchen was one turnoff especially for my wife on the houses we looked at.

I've seen that as a big objection for a lot of buyers on shows. It's funny, but it seems common here in older houses. I think (although I might be wrong) that it was to keep the plumbing all close by for one reason or another-cold weather perhaps? The Bungalow project (half bath, although the full bath is directly above)is the second of three houses we've had that way, and the Cottage has them next to each other but the bath is accessed from the hall instead.

My grandparents house in the historic Germantown section of Philly had a large bathroom actually in the kitchen, no window either. So yea an old house thing in the day I guess.

[Lily left the valley]

In my grandparents mid century split level in PA, all the plumbing was to the one far side of the house's long ends. So if you could look down from the roof and see through the floors/ceilings, you'd see: full bath on one floor, kitchen the next half floor down, and 1/2 bath next to the laundry in the walk out basement level.

In the home my other grandparents built in southern NJ, there was very little clustering like that, and it was a multifamily. I mean, in their part of the home, the bath and kitchen backed each other (though the bath was not visible from the kitchen), and they had the laundry in the utility room that divided the apartments where the hot water heaters where. However, in the other apartments, the two kitchens were above one another, and the two baths were farther off to the east, also above one another, so sort of clustered, but not really.

[Wackyshack]

That house is great!! You got a gem!

Chiming in on bathrooms off the kitchen. When our bath was added (figuring 1920's) it was added off the kitchen. When the house flipper got a hold of it he swapped out the bathroom to a smaller space that was used as the laundy room (also a bump out added on to the original house). So the laundry is off the kitchen and we are fine with that... old house thing and appeared pretty common in the New England area.

[Willa]

Thank you all for your kind words. When I saw the listing I had some strong feelings. It was the most right of all the houses I had seen listed to that point.

What is most bothersome about the kitchen is the way that the cabinets on the wall with the stove protrude into the doorway to the powder room. It's really claustrophobic. The photos are quite distorted. The stove is a 30" model. I am looking for a more compact stove, and plan to move it to where the giant fridge is, and install a small wall mounted sink on the wall (currently pictured with the stove). The giant fridge is gone, and I have a much more compact fridge in the corner by the back door (pictured with the little cart with the microwave). I purchased antique cabinets awhile back. They have uppers that go up to the ceiling with glass doors, and lowers with drawers and solid doors. These will go on the wall that currently has the sink. This should give me as much cupboard space as what is in the kitchen now ?

I'll need some plumber quotes, but I was thinking that I may slide the toilet along the joists then turn it around. Psychologically, seeing the toilet in the kitchen is unpleasant. I have been measuring, and if I move the powder room sink to the opposite wall, then I could install a conventional door that opens into the powder room. If I don't move the toilet, but keep the door closed, that may be the simplest and least expensive solution ? The bathroom window faces south, so it is a bright little room in the late morning. I also need a door to the porch type room behind the kitchen. I am thinking about a door identical to the back door, with textured privacy glass for both rooms. The Home Depot offers a wood door in this style. This may be the most straightforward solution as I doubt I could find two antique doors in this style in two different sizes ? Painted to match with antique knobs they would probably blend in ?

I have wondered how the kitchen was originally configured ? I've been in other old homes where the sink was in a small room like this off to the side by the kitchen, which was a pantry type room. The four doorways are vexing.

I do like having a second toilet, so I won't be getting rid of that.

The kitchen has troubled me the most, even before I viewed the property. It feels blocked and wrong. I am not looking forward to chipping all that orange painted tile off.

There is cheap vinyl type flooring over a plywood subfloor. I suspect there is a pine or fir subfloor under this. I am debating about linoleum or VCT tile floor as they are easy to take care. I am worried about pulling up the plywood subfloor floor which may reveal a mess below.

I think my first project will be to repair the plaster in the stairwell or the bathroom. I am pretty sure there is calcimine paint in the bathroom and in the kitchen. From what I have read getting rid of that requires a great deal of scraping and scrubbing. Does anyone here have experience with specialty primers for calcimine paint. ? Does such a thing even exist ?

My other question is about how ceilings are properly painted in rooms where there are sloped areas - like the bathroom and green bedroom. There are some strange angles to consider. Painting the walls and ceilings the same color doesn't feel quite right, either ? What do others do with this ?