The Hermit Haus Enterprises team in Cameron has just signed a contract on another renovation project. We’re really on a roll, aren’t we?

Aunty’s house was brought to us by a local friend. Like many of the houses we buy, this one was an inheritance deal; a beloved aunt, who’d lived in a house for decades, passed away last year. We were able to buy the house from them in as-is condition, so that they’d have money to do a project they need to do, and would not have to figure out the time to fit in renovating this old house while doing a huge renovation of their own. This saved them a lot of realtor fees and other money, like payimg people to clean the house out, putting on a new roof…all the stuff they’d need to sell at retail.

You can’t really put a price on the mental stress and strain of having to deal with inherited property. There’s so much emotion involved, plus time and effort. We are happy that we are letting this family move on, while we get a lovely property to renovate.

The House!

So, Aunty’s house is a charming one-owner cottage (the late owner was a teacher at the school that’s right down the street, and the house was built for her) in a great neighborhood. It’s just two bedrooms and one bathroom, but it was very well loved. It’s the house I wrote about last week, when I was considering bringing a house back to its former glory rather than gutting it and making an “open concept” modern house.

The tiled kitchen and bath in this house would do well to keep some of the original charm. And I’d hate to tear down the kitchen wall, because there is a custom bookshelf unit on the other side of that wall. It was built with love and has so many memories from the earlier residents.

The interior floors are some fascinating kind of tile, maybe cork. It’s quiet and comfy.

The foundation has shifted over the past 60 years or so, and we’ll need to patch up some walls, for sure. But mostly it’s in good shape on the inside.

Outside

There is the usual deferred maintenance to be done. Lots of volunteer trees around the house, some very sad soffits, and a roof that needs to be worked on. The good news is that is is not currently leaking (yay!).

Its good parts of the outsideinclude cute planter boxes that I hope we can keep and turn into features, and a very large yard with beautiful trees and plants. Someone who likes to garden would love this place. It’s on a quiet street, and even the dogs next door don’t bark. Wow.

There’s a nice attached garage, currently with Aunty’s extremely cool old car in it, but that will convey to the seller. It’s a sentimental attachment kind of thing.

We’re really excited at the opportunity to work on this house and bring it up to the neighborhood standards. Whether it becomes a rental or we sell it, we think we’ll be proud of it, and so will the former owners.

Below are a couple more photos of the house from our initial walk-throuogh. We’ll have more later.

Before!