We've Started Work

We were able to take possession of the house last week, and we started on the remodel right away. One of the first things we want to do is get the heat and air done. The house has central heat and air which has not worked for some time. One of the first things we want to do is replace the furnace and compressor, using the duct work already there. There is an extra closet in the master bedroom we can use for the furnace, but it isn't deep enough. Also, we want to move the water heater out of the bathroom.
Les and a friend tore the walls to enlarge the closet to enclose the furnace and the water heater.
He KICKED out the wall!! Whoo hoo! Ninja skills! You can see his stance in the first picture.

After he tore the walls down, he began building the new walls, taking the closet 6 inches into the living room.

      

I got involved in the work this afternoon. I tore out carpet, very dirty, dusty carpet. Les insisted that I wear a mask.

Can you see the panic in my eyes? I felt like I couldn't breathe in it. I am so claustrophobic, it was awful.

When we started this work, we realized that there would be a lot of surprises, and we should expect anything. Well, our first surprise was not a good one. When the water was turned on, water POURED out of the washing machine connection. We were very glad that Les was in the house and heard the water, or we would have really had a problem. He quickly turned the water off. Tomorrow, the plummer will come. The washer connection is added to his work list.
The second surprise was much better. When we pulled the carpet up, we found nice hardwood floors in fairly good shape. So far, it looks like we can sand them down and stain them and have really beautiful hardwood floors.

We were surprised because the man who inspected the foundation said it looked like the house had been added on several times, and there were a lot of seams with different floors, so we probably would have to put in new flooring.

A little interesting find was the original wall, which was wood, covered with wall paper. The demolition revealed this where we pulled off the door facing.

This close-up shows the pretty detail.

Tomorrow, Mangrums Heat and Air will come first thing in the morning to install the new heat and air conditioning.
The plumber will come to repair the leak in the hall bathroom and move the water heater to the new closet (and repair the leak in the laundry room).
The foundation repairman will come shore up some damaged piers.
We are off and running.