Office Space

Ty has his new digs and so do I, I am sleeping at my office! Yep, that's right, I'm sleeping at my office! I pop a cot and shower at the Y in the morning. It can be a bit weird, lonely and sleepless, but all in all, it's not all that bad. I have the internet, so I can get work done and watch a show or two.

Writing to Continue....May 2011!!!

I'll be back with more of our amazing and exciting journey!

Sure I Can be an Architect!

         1st Floor                                                       2nd Floor    
  
This is the original layout of our property. As you will see with future posts, it has changed drastically. 

Upgraded Digs

You are probably thinking...Ty's living in a hotel room? Not anymore! I have upgraded my digs. My new home is now a renovated mental hospital/state prison. Yes I said mental hospital/state prison, however, there is an upside to these condos - the upside is that they are very nice and not many, "living" neighbors. There is only one other person in the whole building so it makes for very quiet nights. Now every upside has a downside, the downside here being that I may not be as alone as I think ("living" neighbor), add to that the hundreds of unmarked graves in my back yard. But again, I am not in a hotel. (Pictures to come on the new place and the graveyard) 

During my time in my new place I have had an opportunity to work on some more drawings and begin our preparations for the Historic Review Board. I have also decided to read some of the literature from the Department of the interior on historic renovations. With that being said, let me explain to you some of the guidelines. One of the guidelines is that you must keep the historic integrity of the property (i.e. any historical features of the property must remain). However, within those same guidelines it states that exterior guidelines are meant only for properties that are visible from the street (I advise you now to remember this statement). 


Following these guidelines I continue the process for the Historic Review Board. Katie and I decide on a final layout(we think) and I put together the rest of the application to turn in to the planning office the following Tuesday. We are really excited. On Tuesday I turn in the plans, and now it is a waiting game until we meet with the Review Board.

'Special-Use' Request

The City Council meeting was the next month. Ty and I both committed to being there. At the meeting the City Planner stood in front of the council and recited the decision of Planning Commission. 'Bob' made another appearance to state his sewer plea and Judy decided to come. The City Council agreed with Planning Commission and approved our request with the same conditions.

Another obstacle completed!!!! We now need to meet the last requirement and receive the 'Certificate of Appropriateness' from the Historic Review Board (in Staunton, this group has another name, but for simplicity, we will leave it as such) At the end of the meeting a few council members approached us to wish us 'good luck' and to have them over to see the final product (we have decided that having an open house when the project is completed would be a great idea!).

One council member indicated that it may be beneficial for us to hire an architect before going to see the Historic Review Board---we didn't listen. We didn't listen, not because we didn't agree with their opinion, but because we knew that it would be expensive and that at this point we didn't 'own' the property and there was a chance that we wouldn't get the 'mixed-use' permit. We didn't want to put more money into this before we knew for sure that it was ours!


We proceeded to submit the application for the 'certificate of appropriateness'---mind you, Judy keeps calling to ask when we are going to 'close'....we tell her that based on the conditions of our offer, we need to wait until we meet with the Historic Review Board to get the 'Certificate of Appropriateness.' She indicates that the seller is getting antsy, but we asked of her to please explain to him that we are very anxious to close, but that we need to finish the process before we can do so. We 'assume' she will pass this on to Neil. We assume!!!

The offer...the infamous offer!

Okay, my turn---so Ty really didn't have a lot of convincing to do especially after we saw the other homes available in the area. Plus, I realized that the size of the property was actually more square footage than our first house. I quickly jumped on board and decided we should make an offer. Now, mind you, the country is dealing with the worst housing crisis since I don't know when...... but let's just say we recently sold our house and felt the pain shared by many today! So, we knew we would come in with an offer less than the asking. We called Judy and told her that we were ready to make an offer with conditions----these included:

-inspection
-financing
-receiving contractor estimate (we wanted to make sure we could afford to take on such a project)
-approval from the city's Historic Review Board --this may sound easy, but we quickly learned that it involved a 3 month process and for us it was five!

At this point I should mention that we are using Judy because she is the listing agent, not because of all of the fun we had with her on day one---day one should have been a red flag! We move forward and sign the contract that states that she will be dually representing the property, which means (typically) that she can't side with either the buyer or the seller and she can't give advice to either on financial decisions. (I'm sure it means more, but that is the important part!)

At this point in our lives, Ty is living in a hotel to start his new job and I am still working at my job 2 hours away and living in the apartment we rented there. (something I once said I would 'never' do!)

The offer was made, than a counter offer and we reached an agreement--or so we thought! We called a few contractors and found one that was eager to do the project. Ty meet with them a number of times and on weekends I joined them for some discussions. Ty quickly downloaded smartdraw and we made a number of floor plan options. We thought that we would be able to move forward without hiring an architect (how naive!). The contractors provided us with an estimate that we were comfortable moving forward with.

In the meantime, we realized that 'special' agent Judy had the property listed wrong and that it wasn't indeed a 'mixed-use' property. It was, in fact, a commercial property. Judy indicated that the seller told her it was already designated mixed-use ( but isn't that her job to verify?!--another red flag!) We asked that the seller, Neil, apply for the mixed use permit. He indicated that he lived out of town and didn't want to fool with it. So we agreed that we would handle the process, but that the offer would be lowered to reflect the up front costs of the permit fees.  He agreed.

This process, which is why it took 5 months, involved completing an application for the planning commission to review and pass on to City Council. Unfortunately, we missed the application deadline for that month, so we had to wait until the next month. Neither Ty or I were able to make it to the Planning Commission meeting, but our 'soon to be' new neighbor made an appearance. Let's call him 'Bob' ( we won't reveal his true identity because he will soon be our new neighbor!).

I don't think Ty mentioned but our property is adjoined to another property that for city code needs to be considered a 'condominium.' (we learn more, a lot more, about this later) Bob told planning commission that at one point all buildings in the area were owned by the same owner, so the current sewer line is connected to his building. At one point they had a problem and the sewer backed up in his property. He asked that our new sewer line be connected to the city's sewer line in the street down the alley from the property. No big deal, right? Well, not so fast. (we'll talk about this more in detail later!) The planning commission approved our request with the following conditions:

-the new sewer line be run to Frederick St.
-we obtain all necessary building permits
-approval from the Historic Review Board

YEAH---one step down and on to City Council!!!!!

This Idea is Just Crazy Enough to Work!

December - 2009

Staunton, VA

I think I need to start this blog with a little explaining about Katie and myself. You see Katie and I definitely live on a whim, in the past year leading up to our current change we have lived in three different locations (so we are not afraid to pack up and move). Our plan was to be in Atlanta someday (more to come on that story later). Well I decided to throw a wrench into our fabulously, laid-out plan. I decided to apply for a job in Staunton, VA. Now I will understand if you are asking, "what the heck were you thinking Ty?" Well you see my dream job was to be an Executive Director of a Boys & Girls Club of my own, so it kind of made sense, to me. So to make a long story short, I was offered said job and now we find ourselves looking for a place in Staunton, VA. 

We first began our search for properties in Staunton while we were in a hotel in Atlanta, believe it or not. During this search I came across a loft in downtown (my dream). Katie tells me to call the agent and try to set something up for the following week, now introduce Judy Armstrong, real-estate extraordinaire. So I call Judy and ask her about the loft in downtown that is on Frederick for $169,000. As I am speaking with her she is confused and says, "the property on Frederick is only $57,000." After a little back-and-forth we figure out the problem. The listing that I saw was old, however the property behind it was available, but it was a rehab. A rehab is exactly what I was looking for, and $57,000 seems much more reasonable as a rehab than $169,000. So we set up an appointment for the following Saturday to view several properties in the area. So I proceeded to give her our requirements, or thoughts on types of properties we had in mind, including our price range. 

Saturday the following week.......

So Katie and I proceed to Staunton to view all the properties that Judy (Super-Agent) has picked out for us to see. When we arrive we head straight to the rehab property, if you don't have vision you should probably stop reading my Blog NOW.......................!!!!!

Okay this is for those of you who can see potential in things that aren's so pretty, and see that hidden beauty. My guess is you have probably watched HGTV a time or two, here is the property:

(Front Entrance)

(1st Floor)

(2nd Floor)

When we pulled up, I knew this was the property I wanted. I had to figure out how to convince Katie. I also knew I was finished looking at properties in Staunton, this was the one. When we went inside I got even more excited because their really wasn't an interior, just 4 brick walls and a ceiling (well there was also a lot of junk that was stored on the inside as well). 

Katie as usual was skeptical of my decision, but I knew I could sell her on this one. You see her problem with it was not the rehab aspect, but instead it was the size of the structure. Another thing you need to know about Katie is that she always says she wants a small house. Me, I am the opposite, I prefer a little bit bigger with a basement, unless......unless it is a loft (which should be the only property that is small, that and an Airstream. Check out aluminumbliss.com for a cool life inside an airstream) Anyways, I knew this would be the easiest convert I would have to do with Katie, our friend Judy helped in this conversion by showing us such "amazing" properties.

So after touring the property and talking about how we would potentially layout the space, we continued on our home tour with Super-Agent Judy Armstrong.  Now if you remember, a few paragraphs ago I told you that we gave Judy some stipulations as to what kind of property we were looking for, as well as the price range. So let me tell you what those stipulations were:

1. We would like to be in downtown.
2. We would like for it to be a fixer-upper. 
3. We would like it to be under $200,000.
4. We also said no Ranchers (I think she actually heard this one)
5. We would also like an "Open Concept"

So the first house we go to is a house that was recently renovated and $269,000. It was in downtown so she got number 1, and it wasn't a ranch, #4. So we go inside to entertain Judy and go through the motions. The house was nice enough, it had a small kitchen, and it wasn't very open (another miss, #5). So we made it through this house quickly and we were off to the next one. 

At the next house we pull up, again, a newly renovated #2 (miss), $280,000 #3 (miss), oh and this one was right outside of downtown (an area that is up and coming) no soup, #1 (miss). So we go inside, sure it was renovated, back to the "70s, so again a quick visit, but hey at least she got #4 again (she is consistent). 

So there are several more properties that we see, all are out of our price range #3, all have already been "fixed up" #2, and one even had a bunch of cats (not one of our criteria, but I think I will add it now #6 no cats). I stated earlier I was finished looking after the first property. So after many unsuccessful property visits we decide to go to lunch, but before we went Judy had one more surprise for us. I have to admit we kind of got excited. 

So when we arrive at the "surprise" we were floored, I hit Katie a few times to indicate that this lady must be nuts. Anyways, Judy decided to take us to a property that was not actually a property for us to live in, rather an income producing property that was completely full with tenants. Again recall the list of stipulations.......You're right income property was not on that list. So we said we did not want to even go inside, as we were not looking for a property like that. She calmly stated, "You're missing a great opportunity". 

So we had a long day of looking at nonsense, but discovered a property that could be our potential home. I believe Katie would say the best part of that day was that we got to eat at Baja Bean, I cannot lie I enjoyed that part as well.