We realized that Mike would be delighted and we would save lots of money if Mike did all the demolition work for us. We learned that contractors have to suit up in Tyvek and do a lot of fancy-pansy stuff if there is lead paint or asbestos in anything they are tearing out, but the homeowner can do it without the restrictions. Mike has been a one-man-demo-show. He takes pride in his work and cleans up meticulously after every project. I could barely keep up with the before-and-after photos. Four months and six roll-off dumpsters later, Mike had the house ready for the builder to start working his magic with our architect's plans.
Here is a SHORT LIST of Mike's Demolition Projects:
-Kitchen demolition (with exception of cabinets original to the house)
-Remove junk & appliances left in the house
-Demo both bathrooms (nothing worthy of saving except claw foot tub - more on that later)
-Remove all old wood from basement (down to the brick exterior walls and supports)
-Remove all asbestos from basement pipes (don't worry, he wore a respirator)
-Remove all old insulation
-Remove old wiring and phone lines
-Remove all old pipes
-Break out old sewer line
-Break out concrete in one of third of basement floor
-Clear debris from the fireplaces and chimneys
-Tear off roof & windows that were added to the side balcony (restoring original look)
-Demo closet at top of basement stairs (making storage space more useful)
-Demo wall between master bedroom and guest closets (to create one large closet)
If this does not sound like a tremendous amount of work, take a look at the process with photographs in a slide show. Use the link below, SELECT ALL the photos in the HOUSE DEMO album and click on SLIDESHOW.
To see the shared pictures Karen Blanc shared with you, simply follow this link:
http://www.cmphotocenter.com/photos/share.php?code=KjopOmHCGpwwwXislwQ1HFtGN_mGoZ4ZMike has been a busy boy and he gets absolutely excited whenever he gets to work on our house project. It is amazing... he never tires of it. Lucky for us.
The only parts of the upstairs bathroom (or what we call The Master Bath) that were original to the house are the claw foot tub and marble towel holders. We carefully set them aside when we demo-ed the space. This room will probably see the greatest transformation because we took out a wall and extended the space to the roof line. This will enable us to keep the windows (which were covered up!) and have space for both a shower and a tub. Note: Our architect is a genius.
In the months of January & February when asked "how the house was going" I would often say that out our progress was frozen - pun intended. We had all the radiators pulled for cleaning and re-designing of the heating system. We attempted to heat the house with an auxiliary heating system that Mike borrowed. After we got the first month's bill of over $300 with the toilet water still freezing, we unplugged the unit, bought a propane heater and decided to postpone any major work in the house until things warmed up. Mike was in the process of removing all the old pipes from the house anyway, so there was nothing to freeze. (Except anyone who tried working in the house.)
The yard at our Dream House required as much work and attention as the inside. Besides all the clean-up and demolition projects on the INSIDE of the house, Mike had his hands full with the backyard. Words alone cannot explain how overgrown and unkempt one backyard could be. It took weeks of days working in extreme manual labor mode to get the yard to the place where it was ready for Lanoha Nursery. There were wooden fences to remove, concrete slabs to dig out, chain link fences to remove, over-grown-weeds-the-size-of-trees to dig out and an alley to clear. We also dug out the old brick path and saved the bricks to be used in the new path from the driveway to the house. After Mike finished, Lanoha Nursery was ready to work their magic on the new brick patio.
