Striving to create a better life for everyone by sustainably solving real estate problems

(512) 807-8777

Monthly Archives: July 2017

How Not to Be “Dated”?

After my endless series of posts on decorating trends that instantly “date” a house that we are working hard to renovate and sell, I thought I ought to work on ideas for creating a nice looking house that will keep looking good for many years. (Note: I realize most of the work we do as rehabbers is focused on selling a house NOW, so it makes sense to stage renovated houses to appeal to current trends. Still, a house could look “of the moment” in such a way that the poor new homeowners won’t feel compelled to re-do everything in a couple of years.)

I read a lot of decorating magazines (you know, as part of my job, heh heh). There are often articles about homes that have not been re-decorated in decades, other than small refreshes. These timeless settings don’t NEED shiplap to be beautiful. The original decorators chose colors, surfaces, materials and objects that retain their beauty. It can be done.

But How?

kitchen

All the downstairs walls in my ranch house are neutral. The color comes from accessories (and the red backsplash you can barely see). The cabinets, floors, and counters are all natural wood or stone. Real rocks are timeless.

I was looking for some guidance on timeless decor, when my friend Meg posted an article on my Facebook timeline that was exactly what I was looking for. Check out How Can I Decorate in a Way That Won’t Date? by Anna Baddeley for some great ideas (also it’s on a great site, in general). Most of her ideas make sense, and a few of them might be new to some of us. Hmm, how am I doing in creating timeless decor in my own homes and renovations?

Keep Walls Neutral. Baddeley says, “Grey, especially when offset with flashes of yellow, is already looking a bit tired. Unless you are very confident with colour, it’s safest to stick with boring white.” (You can tell she’s British.) Other than vindicating my personal ennui about gray and yellow, she has a good point. If your backdrop is a serene neutral (and there are so many shades of white), the rest of your furnishings can shine. I kept the original color in my most recent family home for 15 years. You can always change pillows if you want color.

Continue reading →

0Shares

We’re in the Chamber!

Cameron Logo

Proud to be a part of our small town, as well as the big town of metro Austin!

While our networking activities in the Austin area focus mainly on meetings with fellow real estate investors, we spend more time in our Cameron offices with business-to-business networking. As we mentioned a while back, Lee has joined the Rotary Club, and has even done a presentation to the group.

Encouraged by our enthusiastic friend, Melanie Reed, we also recently joined the Cameron Chamber of Commerce, which is a smaller organization than the one in Austin, for sure, and where there are already plenty of people we know and do business with. They do a lot of good work in the area and it’s great to get to meet other business owners.

Let’s Cut a Ribbon!

New businesses that join the Chamber get to have a ribbon cutting ceremony in their honor, attended by members and friends from all over the greater Cameron, Texas area. It’s like we get to be a big fish in this small pond, at least for a day.

When we found out, Mandi and I immediately started planning our theme, food, and decor for the event. Our Oriental Trading Company package has arrived, and as soon as next Saturday’s bake sale is over (10-sell out!), we go into ribbon cutting planning mode.

Please join us:

  • When: Friday, August 18, 2017
  • Time: 4:00 pm
  • Where: 1600 N. Travis Ave., Cameron
    (parking next door by the warehouse–there’s plenty)
  • Featuring: Refreshments and NEW Hermit Haus merchandise!

For more information and a sweet message about us, visit our ribbon-cutting page.

0Shares

Old House, or Traditional Office Building?

The building where Sue Ann works in Austin has a nice courtyard, but it’s still a corporate office. Click to see her actual window. Luckily she has a window.

Yesterday our city had a major water line break which caused an outage of water to the entire city, except those few who have wells in city limits (Thanks Dad!). I think that the water was restored sometime yesterday evening between 6 and 8. So here I am this morning at the office bleeding the water lines, and watering our green friends who are not very pleased that they missed the regular Wednesday shower. If you have read any of my blogs about our office, you know my opinion is that it is the most perfect office that ever officed. I did start to think though about what would kinds of  buildings are appropriate for what types of offices. This could go into a whole year long blog series, I am sure, but for now, I want to look at 2 of them. Old house offices as opposed to a building devoted for offices. Both of which I have experience with, so while this is an opinion, it is a more educated opinion.

Office Buildings as Offices

Let’s begin with buildings that are built with the sole purpose of being for offices. Companies that have several employees greatly benefit from having the space to accommodate more people. These usually consist of some actual closed-in offices, and open spaces for cubicles. You can fit more people into a workspace this way. Think about it like this. If you own a chain of stores and you have a main corporate office, which of these buildings make money? The corporate office is necessary for accounting, human resources, media, marketing, and those types of things, but the products you sell and make money on are at the stores. The stores are where your money is made. That is where you spend the money. You spend the money on those to make them bigger, cleaner, brighter, hold more equipment, and all of these wonderful things that we shoppers expect.

Continue reading →

20Shares

Water, Water

Water running from a bathroom faucet

We have running water again in Cameron today, but it’s still not safe to drink.

We take running water for granted. What happens when we don’t have any? We found out a little about the issue that faces much of the developing world yesterday.

Yesterday morning, a construction crew hit the main water line in Cameron and left most of the city without fresh water for most of the day. The city workers strove to restore service as quickly as possible and had water restored to most of the city sometime yesterday evening. But as late as this morning, the water wasn’t safe to drink, and the city was flushing the lines—pouring hundreds of thousands of gallons into the ditches that feed the local rivers and creeks.

Most of us have experienced a water outage like this one. We know how it directly affects us:

  • We have to buy bottled water to drink or make coffee.
  • Toilets only have one reserve flush.
  • Our yards get a little browner, and our gardens may wilt.

But we may not think about the economic consequences of a water supply interruption. I’ll give you one specific example. Most of the restaurants in Cameron were unable to open for business this morning. The ones that were open were in buildings that predate the city water supply and have their own wells.

Restaurants require a safe water supply to cook. Besides that, “Employees must wash hands….” How do they do that without water? Continue reading →

0Shares

Trends. Which Will Last? Which Will Die? Part 5

It’s our final installment of the Trends Which Must Die series! As  you may recall, it’s based on this article: 15 Most Hated Home Decorating Trends That Need to Die in 2017. I’ve shared my thoughts on white kitchens (nope), granite counters (yep), and so many others. I’ll link to the others at the end of this post, in case you want a review.  What’s up for today? A couple more items that bring out strong opinions in me! Let’s go.

These nice folks posted their shelves to Pinterest. They just have FOUR of everything, except mugs.

Open Shelving

Now, this is a trend I truly don’t get. I think the photos in magazines and the images on television shows of these kitchens with only open shelving are beautiful, yes. However, it brings up a question. Who ARE these people who can store all the contents of their kitchen cabinets out in the open? Where do they get all that matching stuff? How do they LIVE with so little kitchen stuff?

The answer I propose is that all of these people have giant pantries, or better yet, separate, closed-off butler’s pantries to hold their food processors, waffle makers, ugly plastic kid stuff, and mis-matched glassware. Also, there are never more than 6 people eating at their homes, since there are usually six pristine plates, bowls, glasses, and cups displayed with plenty of space around them, so they can breathe (I guess). And those three matching mixing bowls. Those are nice.

On the other hand, maybe the folks with open shelves just don’t have the funds for cabinets. I know a few folks like that, and their shelves are filled with fun and funky treasures. That’s sort of cheerful, really.

I’m all for a couple of nice shelves to display beautiful kitchen treasures. However, my dinner services for 12, 6 sizes of glassware, endless storage containers and serving pieces are much happier behind nice, opaque cabinets. Maybe one or two could have glass, you know, to show the Fiesta Ware that Anita has. I have china cabinets for nice things. Kitchen cabinets are for work horses, seldom used but helpful things, etc.

Prediction: In the next five years, contractors will be very busy replacing open shelves with cabinets that feature doors.

Continue reading →

18Shares