We’ve been living at the house for around a week now. So far so good! There’s a lot of work to be done, and we’re talking with a lot of folks in the trades. There are some pressing issues to fix right now.
First up is hiring an arborist. We have beautiful trees on the property. Unfortunately, one of them is near-death and needs to be taken down (it’s close to the house). Some of the trees are being strangled by grape vines; and there is brush that has grown out of control throughout the property. “Volunteer trees” have also grown everywhere; they need to be removed. The longer they’re growing, the more difficult they are to remove. We’ve talked with a few arborists already and hope to hire one soon.
The second issue we need to deal with is the state of the garage roof. It’s a slate roof, and during a recent storm a 10-foot section of one of the nearby trees came down and smashed several tiles. They need to be replaced. There are also several holes in the eves due to tree damage. Finally, one roofer pointed out that the ridge, flashing, and hips of the roof are loose enough so that you can see light from the inside. There’s even one part of the roof that’s leaking so much that the wood has rotted away on the inside and you can see the slate. The inspectors both noted that there were roof problems in the garage, but it looks like it has gotten worse.
During this time of Coronavirus, everyone is taking steps to stay far away from each other and wear masks. Unfortunately, the longer we put off this kind of essential work, the higher the risk to the house and the garage.
We’ve taken care of a few other things while we’ve been here:
- Moved the gas and electric to our name
- Paid the remainder of fees for the closing
- Started to order essentials, like garbage cans, toilet paper, and light bulbs
- Installed Verizon Fios as Internet access is critical for us to be able to work from home. Cell service gets far too expensive too quickly
- Installed a home security system. We’ve chosen to use Abode with professional monitoring
The water and electric work well enough for us to get ready for work in the morning, and the kitchen is good enough for cooking nice meals!