I started this hello in the fall but it became long-winded, going off on how I came to buy a house (first & probably last), why I like mine so much, previous ideas to build my own 'hippie house', what I've done thus far & have planned, etc. ...
So I shortened it and maybe will add that other stuff later. The percolated coffee had its way over too many weekends and late nights I guess. But I love my new house so much it's hard to not ramble on about it, and this became my 'house manifesto'; a writing exercise that has helped me clarify my philosophy to myself, always useful.
I've been reading this and other 'old house' web stuff for a year or so now (books longer) and maybe should've posted here earlier with hello & thanks & questions, but didn't since most every question I had I was able to find answers to (albeit sometimes after lengthy struggle all over the web and books though I have a little restoration carpentry experience from years ago summer college work). All this study & DIY is great fun and as they say great for the mind to learn new things.
I hope this group stays active since like mcmansions and particle board 'furniture', I avoid facebook and all that. The 'old fashioned' web forums are by far a better format with the benefit of less damage to intelligence & democracy!
My old house:
I bought it a year ago and this is my first and last house; the only house I hope to have ever bought (not only because I hope to not deal with any more real estate agents, but because it's just right for me!).
Here's one photo taken in first snow this fall.
This is a side that still needs paint! I've got better pix including fun 360°+ multi-season panoramas I'll post on my own website and link here if anybody interested since they're bigger in pixels & filesize than possible here.
It's an 1890 house (added onto from initial footprint until ca.1930); it's that 'standard' old house type here and most other places I've been in the Midwest, yet weirdly ignored in most 'house style' guides but sometimes called tri-gabled ell, or more generically 'farmhouse' or 'homestead' or 'temple' style (tri-gabled ell is best since it is exactly that; two intersecting 2 storey wings with N, E, & W gables).
Practical, sturdy, expandable, and frugal.
After I bought it, it took me months and months of trying to figure out what 'style' my house was, confused by the few Queen Anne elements of the vintage, but never quite getting a match... It's a wonder to me that was so hard to figure out with so many precisely '3GL' and related 'two gabled' houses making such a huge percentage of midwestern houses that there's not a book on this style.
That's the style of about half the houses in this town and probably more than 75% or more of others built in the Midwest in the 1880-1930 era, built from the wood of the vast forests that were being cut at the time in the area. Even in towns famous for their QAs (such as in Michigan: Marshall, Bay City, Muskegon, or Ludington where I grew up), most of the houses in those towns of the era weren't fancy Queen Annes, but 3GLs or 2G homesteads, but you'd think the opposite from the web and books on old houses. (An earlier house I almost bought had me learning all about 19th century company town houses, another common but oft-ignored 'style'!)
I've moved around a lot for work as a field ecologist so have rented for a long time. I've bought some land, even a cabin, but the thought of borrowing hundreds of thousands of dollars from a bank for decades is so anathema to me that I assumed I'd never be able to have a house of my own.
Let's hear it for the few places where one can still buy a cheap house!
Did I mention I prefer small towns to cities? Mostly for the lack of noise, proximity to big nature, & cheapness even if at the expense of culture and convenience.
In this small eastern Upper Peninsula town of 1500 houses are cheap (few jobs!). My decades of frugality & flexibility (sometimes poverty & sacrifice) piecing together science gigs finally paid off in getting me to the place and job I've wanted since college, and to where the cheap house and my modest salary match!
Also good 'junkshops' here (as in restore, charity shops, 'antiques', etc.) that have constantly provided good materials cheaply for both house work and furnishing to the point I am constantly amazed at how my place seems to me like a 'rich person's house'!
House has beautiful wood floors, trim, doors, etc. inside, yet not so ornate that it's prohibitively expensive or complicated to work on (this thought manifested itself often in last summer's painting, for example). And since hand-built by craftsmen with solid old wood & quality materials - well, anybody on this website knows! And largely unmolested in recent decades (but decently maintained in great shape) so I've got the wood clapboards & windows (with storms and much wavy glass), old plaster, etc.
The layout is fantastic, and doesn't have any of the spatial maladies often attributed to old houses. It has little wasted 'hall' space, great closets, a logical configuration, warm & cozy, etc. Also a great room for my home office since working from home a lot especially in winter.
It seems so far that all the 'big' jobs (roof, foundation, plumbing, electrical main, etc.) are in good shape so the projects I'm doing & imagining over next 10 or so years are all fairly easy, concise, and not horribly expensive plus satisfying with immediate improvement or appearance. Knock on old wood of course. And the 1950s boiler, while still going strong, will be a costly replacement (hopefully in 2-5 years with more efficient) and getting the asbestos off the basement pipes will cost a few thousand more. But most of the 'needs' are smaller, like the exterior clapboard repair & painting I started last summer.
In brief, so far I've done a lot of small jobs like restoring or replacing lighting & electric fixtures (with good old parts, thanks again junkshops!), minor plumbing, pipe insulation, interior trim, etc. plus the big job of (starting) the clapboard repair & exterior painting along with window restoration as I go along (and much help on that especially from this forum). (Actually the first thing I did was add fire extinguishers & new smoke & CO alarms all over!)
Everything's looking great so far. Hoping to finish the painting & most window exteriors next summer. Launching now on some plaster repair as start of converting two (of 3) bedrooms to a library. Also have plans to add brick patio next summer (now needed for the great old cast aluminum garden furniture bought cheaply in the fall!), continue on garden work incl. front rock garden landscape, getting bicycle/work shop set up in garage, etc.
Hmm, has become long winded again already! .. so won't go into 'future projects' .. that are piling up fast as I serendipitously come upon useful & quality bits on the cheap (new kitchen cabinets for example, recently moving up on the schedule after good hardware & cast sink finds...).
/robert, in the village of N___, somewhere in the UP about 50 miles east of beautiful Canada.
