The renovator's nightmare

I have had an ongoing relationship with this old house for over 10 years now.  It gets a lot of the money I earn, it needs more than I can give it, there are days I think it hates me, but it is my home and my sanctuary from the world.

The last owners were living examples of filthy white trash, and when they finally got out, the house was crawling with cockroaches and reeking from urine and feses, but I could finally start working on cleaning it up and repairs.  

It was months before I could move in, and even then, after several thousand dollars and many long and hard man hours of work, I washed dishes in plastic tubs and had no kitchen cabinets and counters.

Several years down the road, I refinanced the original loan and had half the foundation replaced.  And in the summer I hand dug the trench for waterline, sand is easy to dig but it wants to keep sliding back in too. 

And then the roof began to leak, and that got worse and worse, but I could not afford to refinance, not just yet.  About 3 years of leaking roof later I was in a bad car accident and I still had to deal with a leaking roof.

But the other driver at fault had good insurance, I pushed hard to get my life back and go back to work, that took 8 months and 17 days.  And a long wait on the settlement from the insurance, and living with a still leaking roof.

The settlement put central air and a new roof and a battle in small claims court with a rather dishonest roofing contractor.  It cost me a lot more in legal fees than I won, but he lost and he did have to pay his lawyer and me.

And I put a lot of work into the sub floor and the knee walls and paid for work to be done, now that little 1900 house with 4 rooms has an attic which is still being worked on, still needs a lot of drywall and some other work but someday will get finished.

But I battled with the bank to refinance once again, this time to buy this old house a very handicapped friendly kitchen.  And last night the cabinet installer was here to do needed measurements and tonight I put the first coat of primer on the new drywall, tomorrow I will start the painting.

And as soon as all the paperwork is to Lowes for the cabinet order, I will do my part, the bank will finance this as a builder's loan and the cabinets will get ordered.  It might be late December before the kitchen is done but I will be glad to go to work so.i can pay the bills, and keep working on this old house.