Ok.  So hi.  This is Steve, one half of Steve and Dave, here to introduce our blog about our latest renovation project.  I wanted to put a little background in for those people who don’t know us, in case this blog ever becomes valuable for more than just showing off our cool new house.

Dave and I met in December 1989 (don’t worry, this part moves fast).  We moved in together in January, 1990, having fallen madly and deeply (mostly madly) in love.  In January, 1993 we bought and moved into our lovely little house on Clarion Street in Philadelphia.  This is where we cut our teeth in home projects.  15 years, lots of powerful memories and great times with family and friends, a new front, new floors, new kitchen, new bath, completely gutted and renovated 2nd floor and numerous iterations of backyard design, fast forward to 2007.  Casa Clarion was only 850 sq. feet of living space, and every inch of it was used to the max.   

I’d been itching for some time to get our hands on a place that was a little bigger, maybe looked out onto a tree or two and possibly had a view of the city.  We could use an extra bedroom and some more room to maneuver when we had parties and such. 

In 2008, after identifying some neigborhoods and building our wish-list, we spent our first day with our new realtor, Stephen (a fine name and a fine realtor).  By the end of the day we were deeply disheartened by the available options.  Our walk through homes in Center City, Queen Villiage, Bella Vista and South Philadelphia was loaded with homes that were either (a) way too expensive for us, (b) way too expensive for the condition they were in, (c) well priced but too small, (d) in areas we didn’t want to live in.

At the end of the day as we approached our home we noticed a house facing a nearby park – 1234 Reed Street – for sale by owner.  A few conversations with the owner led us to see the house two days later.  It was a mess.  Every wall, floor and ceiling in the place was dated or falling down.  The knob and tube wiring was original, most of the piping and drains weren’t worth even considering saving and the rear of the house was falling off.  Perfect!

See, what we had learned was that the place we wanted was going to have to be cheap and need everything.  After having seen what we did, we had a sense that no one else’s taste was going to meet what we wanted.  In our opinion it was better to pay less for a place and put the money into renovating it to meet our need.  I write this now at the start of this project.  We’ll see how we feel a year from now when it’s all over.

I made the first call to the seller on Sunday, she called me back Monday morning, Dave and I saw the place Wednesday morning and we had our offer in by Wednesday afternoon.  It was accepted Friday, March 7th.  We went to settlement on Thursday, April 3.