Hellobee Boards

Are they just cosmetic issues, or are there structural/integral things wrong with the house? Ugly is annoying, but not impossible. Broken is another thing when you're not looking to spend too much. Some of the fun is making the house your own, anyway! Was our house perfect when we moved in? No. I want to change all the paint colors, we turned a closet into a pantry already, the master lacks a real closet, but it's okay because those are things we can handle. We saw houses that needed all new electrical or had foundation issues etc, and those were deal breakers, despite the "affordable" price.

Our house wasn't a fixer upper but there were some things that the homeowners never updated that we replaced immediately. Both bathrooms were PINK (toilet, tubs, toilets) so that was top priority. We also had wood paneling in the family room that we got painted instead of removing. We tried doing some stuff ourselves to save money but wow- you really have no idea how hard some of this stuff is until you dive into it. I would say everything takes 2x as long to do and costs 2x as much as you think it's going to (unless you are married to someone who really knows what they are doing). It's good to get an idea of what it really costs to do some of the things you want to do because you might not have any idea how expensive it is.

There is a ton of other stuff that I wish we had the time and/or money to do now. I got pregnant 2 months after we moved in so we didn't have a lot of time to focus on the house before we had to switch gears and start thinking about the baby. So I recommend getting as much done as you can before adding babies to the picture!

neither my husband and I are handy, and we don't want to spend time on home repairs....so we haven't really done much haha.

When you get a fixer-upper inspected (or even just go for a tour), you could always hire a contractor to come along for the inspection and give you real-time cost estimates of what it would take to fix things; and to tell you what items you could probably do yourself, and what you would need to hire professionals for.

Our house needed updating. We put in hardwood floors and lots o wallpaper removal. It's been worth it so far but lots of money even for small projects.

I think as long as it cosmetic, go for it! I'm from MA too, so I know what you mean about the market and cost of housing. Its like the only way to get into a decent area and not sell a kidney is to get a fixer upper. Keep in mind though that the start up cost for your first few project will probably be very high since you will have to invest in a lot of tools and stuff, but once you get going, it'll be well worth the cost and you'll learn so much about renos. We really enjoy doing things ourselves around the house - it's cheaper, you do it exactly how you want, and you get to live in and admire your great handiwork!

I'm with @merryc and think "ugly is (can be) a good investment"! DH and I always awatch "Property Brothers" and wish there were places like that near us and we could get on the show! haha!

Most of what you listed for this house seem mainly cosmetic/aesthetic, and those are THE BEST kind of ugly stuff I would want! If the # of rooms/bathrooms and square footage work for you, and the general layout, then all your "changes" would be minimal. It's when you want to start moving things around that it gets crazy! Also, changing things in the kitchen and the bathroom rack up the bill and are tough to do on your own!
DH and I are not the DIY-type but we have changed all the floors and re-painted all rooms in both places we own by hiring contractors. I'm pretty good at price-shopping and this worked out for us.
Back to your house in question:
- Ugly paneling can easily be removed or painted over.
- Ugly kitchen cabinets can also be re-painted, re-finished, etc, there's quite a lot of creative options out there!
- Closet doors easily and cheaply replaced! My family has done this numerous times over the years in our own home & rental properties.
- Bad deck is something I'd have your uncle check out.
hth! It took us about a year before we found the one for us in this home! But it's always good if you can keep an open mind so that you CAN see the "diamond in the rough"!

I say go for a fixer upper if you have the time, patience and money to make the changes you want!! We have an offer in for a fixer upper. It has good structure but needs a lot of cosmetic enhancements that we will need to tackle gradually. The seller updated two of the 3 bathrooms....this one needs some work:

@mrs. bird: I think those things are totally workable! Having your tile reglazed (basically painted) is really affordable. They even sell kits to do it yourself at places like Home Depot. As far as the stickers... there are lots of ways to get those off. Google will give you a bunch of recommendations for removing stickers. A little elbow grease, sanding, and painting and they'll look like new rooms!

PS: repainting and adding new hardware goes a long way in updating a kitchen! also, adding updated light fixtures is another way to freshen up a room on a budget.

@mrs. bird: I agree with pps: ugly = good investment. That's if there aren't any structural problems or anything broken. When we first bought our place, it was with the help of the women here (back then we were all on the 'wedding boards'). If it wasn't for the sound advice of you ladies, we wouldn't have gotten our place! (The nature of buying in our area is lightning quick so we had to make a decision ASAP!)

The most valuable piece of advice I had gotten was about location. You can add on to a house, renovate it, etc, but you can't change where it is! In the end we were considering 2 houses: one in a great neighborhood, but it was dated. It was large for just 2 people, it had all the potential of a forever home. The other was smaller, but newer, with a gorgeous yard full of different kinds of magnolias in a not as convenient neighborhood.

We picked the one in the neighborhood we liked and discovered the yard was also pretty damn nice (we bought it during winter and they never took summer pictures). We love our neighborhood. It's a sound old place, but there are still a lot of things we'd like to update.

During the end of our house hunt, I would hope for ugly paint! Good luck hunting!

BTW, there was one house that broke my heart. It was so perfect, the paint, everything ... I fell in love! But soooo many others did too! The price sky-rocketed! We pass by the neighborhood it's in all the time and thank our lucky stars we ended up not living there! Because there isn't anything near it! We totally overlooked that then.

@mrs. bird: go for it! We bought an "ugly" house in MA and in the past 5 years we've

-knocked down a wall and walled up a door to turn a garage-adjacent storage room into a mud room attached to the rest of the house
-tiled this new mud room, the downstairs bathroom and downstairs hallway (it was linoleum)
-replaced wood paneling with drywall
-made built-in bookcases in the downstairs family room
-replaced the slider in the family room (with FIL help)
-completely gutted our kitchen (put together and installed Ikea cabinets, installed new appliances, tiled the floor, backsplash tile)
-walled up the back door and put in a slider where there was a window (with FIL help)
-put in a new bay window where there was just wall before (FIL help)

things we paid people to do (too big for us to handle)
-refinished the hardwoods
-granite countertops
-knocking down a load-bearing wall to open the kitchen to the dining room and living room

DH was moderately handy when we bought the house, but he'd never done any of those things before.

@Shutterbug: It looks great!!!