House of Pain

or whatever you want to call it!

our house has literally decided to fall apart...again.

a little history (and i wont even attempt to link back to the posts on it: light covers falling, furnaces going out, refrigerators quitting, main sewer lines breaking, water in the crawl space from the AC, etc.):

we live in a house built in 1928. i love our house. but it's freaking O.L.D!

the advantages:
it's built really well. so we think.
it has lots of character.
it's in a great part of town.
it's beautiful (we think)
bottom line: we love it.

but seriously!

we started noticing a few extra cracks here and there. sure. two years ago was the drought. and then about 6 months ago was the flood. we're on a pier and beam conventional foundation. again. it has it's advantages and disadvantages compared to a slab foundation. i've lived in this city all my life except college. i can live with cracks and expect to!

here's the scoop:

• foundation specialist #1. the left side of your house is falling off the face of the earth. recommendation: call the structural engineer he recommend out of Birmingham. total initial cost: $1000. i think not.
• structural engineer #1. has 11 years of history on the house. continues to say there is nothing wrong and we don't need to get anything fixed. owes us a report from the '07 inspection, so comes free of charge to update the report and write two. pretty much talks down to me the whole time.
• general contractor #1. there is something wrong. something seriously wrong with the left side of the house. not his specialty, but he suggests we get that figured out before we stabilize the kitchen floor, put down a subfloor, replace the flooring, move the washer/dryer to our bathroom or create a beautiful pantry IN the kitchen. oh...and fix the cracked plaster ceiling that he confirms is dangerous. or even blow that insulation into the attic. as we're trying to figure out what exactly is underneath the kitchen flooring, I find wet wood. I do not like water! his concern: maybe we have some water underneath the house?
• general contractor #2. doesnt show up.
• structural engineer #2. scheduled for next thursday.
• general contractor #1. came back friday.

and so Thursday, I get home from taking Addie to gymnastics. sit down to feed the girls. hear Addie in the kitchen (probably admiring her ladybug picture or potty chart on the refrigerator), and I hear the BIGGEST SPLAT, CRASH, CRUMBLE ever.

my mom runs in to find plaster all over the kitchen floor (literally from one side to the other) and addie standing across the kitchen from it. no lie. it would have knocked her out had she been hit by it. you see, old plaster ceiling is made from concrete mixed with real horse hair (i know, sad). this was coated in plaster and then recoated with drywall mud. one tiny piece weighed so much!

um...so much for waiting to fix that ceiling.

can I please have a "pass GO and collect $200" card? make that more like collect $20,000! if only that monopoly money was real!

so friday i call back contractor #1 (who we like) to tell him about the ceiling. he was headed back from pike county where he was finishing up a job (near Troy). he is at my door in 30 minutes, plywood, screws, and drill in hand. probably as much or more of the ceiling fell as he was putting up the plywood, but there won't be anymore falling anytime soon! it may not be pretty, but it's secure!

But I think the biggest surprise came when this contractor went in our crawlspace. You see, we had a new AC/furnace put underneath our house about a year ago (the same thing that's in most people's attics). We had its checkup about 2 months ago. Perfect. No problems.

Well apparently there is about an inch of water sitting under the unit (that a pump is supposed to be removing), and the insulation around our ductwork is soaked to the point that water is dripping off it. I guess that would explain the wet board under the small piece of kitchen floor I pulled up the other day. Have I mentioned my dislike (and fear) of water in the wrong place at any time? That might explain the mold I found in a small broom closet that carries a pipe (from the unit) up into/out of our attic.

So...who wants to buy our house?