Been absent a little while due to...

[BruceK]

...working through the process to relocate homes.   I currently live in the DFW area and I'm working to move to the Texas Hill Country, about 5 hours south. (the Hill Country is a huge area sort of south of Austin and north of San Antonio, but it extends a good bit west too)

So, in preparation, my wife and I have been going through the collection of 'stuff' we have accumulated in closets, on shelves, etc., and then donating a whole bunch of things we don't need/want and just giving other things away to neighbors.  Feels really good to have less crap cluttering up our lives.  The house in DFW should go on the market next week and we are down in the San Antonio area house hunting right now.   The only reason we were in DFW anyway was due to a corporate relocation when the headquarters of AT&T moved there in 2008, and I was one of about 500 people who had to follow their jobs and move there.  Now that we are retired we can get back to San Antonio where we have friends and family.

We are also looking at getting out of the suburbia situation in which we currently live and instead going to something more rural.  Less traffic, more space, cheaper property taxes, etc.  One thing I really would like in the next house is a larger garage space. So if the next house we pick does not already have that, I'll be looking at building a separate garage.  One that does not need to also do double duty of housing non-automotive stuff lawn mower, water heater, ladders, saws, etc.  So a place devoted to just my car/motorcycle stuff.

[gr8kornholio]

Glad to see it's moving along. Agree on the less stuff aspect. Good luck with the house hunting.

[BruceK]

Glad to see it's moving along. Agree on the less stuff aspect. Good luck with the house hunting.

Thanks Mark.  I'm going to miss having you right around the corner but look forward to seeing you at Mini events when your car is back together.

[94touring]

That sounds like a good move.  Weren't you asking me at the bbq the size of my shop?  Going to do something similar?

[MiniDave]

Whatever size you build it won't be big enough!   ;D ;D ;D ;D

I'd think a 30X50 minimum, that's only 1500 sq ft, 10 feet extra each way gets you 2400 sq ft - 40 X 60.

Do you need to heat it, or only add A/C?

I envy you guys getting out of suburbia, but it's pretty hot down there - not quite Phoenix hot, but pretty hot....

[BruceK]

That sounds like a good move.  Weren't you asking me at the bbq the size of my shop?  Going to do something similar?

Yes I was.  I would love something the size of your shop.  But don't think I will be able to afford it.   But I'm going to try for more than I "need".   ;D

[BruceK]

Whatever size you build it won't be big enough!   ;D ;D ;D ;D

I'd think a 30X50 minimum, that's only 1500 sq ft, 10 feet extra each way gets you 2400 sq ft - 40 X 60.

Do you need to heat it, or only add A/C?

I envy you guys getting out of suburbia, but it's pretty hot down there - not quite Phoenix hot, but pretty hot....

Yeah, I would love to build a full-on Garage Mahal.   But it remains to be seen if that will be possible.   In any event, I would like to have at least a 2-car size just for my toys.   

[94touring]

Not sure how much a 1500 sq ft shop cost to build in that area, but I know the mortgage on mine is very affordable.  In time I will build out my car ports to expand.  Hopefully you can work the numbers and make it happen.

[MiniDave]

It's cheaper to build it the size you want than to add on later.

[gr8kornholio]

Glad to see it's moving along. Agree on the less stuff aspect. Good luck with the house hunting.

Thanks Mark.  I'm going to miss having you right around the corner but look forward to seeing you at Mini events when your car is back together.

Yea, I was hoping to have you around for the assembly stage of the build, even if just to hang out and watch me do everything twice since that's the pattern so far. 

Will be nice though to have someone down in the hill country.  More reason to head down there for drives. 

[MiniDave]

So Bruce, have you guys narrowed down a town or two to look in, or are you looking more for the house as long as it's roughly in the area you want?

[BruceK]

We were looking far and wide across the Hill Country - no particular town.  But now we've found a house and we will close on it in 3 weeks.   We decided not to go with a mortgage on this house - paying cash instead- so we worked within a slightly tighter budget. The new house just has a two car garage - I wanted more - but the plan is for me to build another garage in the back of the property after we get settled. 

Things are already in progress and yesterday morning I headed out at 5am and towed my motorcycle to a storage facility near San Antonio.  I wasn't too keen on riding it in 100+ degree temperatures for hours on the highway, so towing with a/c made sense.  Leaving before dawn  allowed me to miss rush-hour traffic.  Down there and back to DFW took about 14 hours with stops for fuel, food, and getting the bike settled into the facility.  My MINI did a wonderful job.  The trailer and motorcycle combo weighs slightly less than when I flat tow my classic Mini.  And U-Haul's rental price of just $14 a day for a motorcycle trailer is a bargain. 

[MiniDave]

Cool! Where is it? Looks like there's plenty of room for a shop too.....

Remember, 30X50 is a good size, but 40X60 is even better!   77.gif

[MPlayle]

Looks really nice.  I'm jealous.  Likely outside my budget, though.

Echoing Dave's question: where is it located?

[gr8kornholio]

Cute little place.  Is that all mulch in the front yard?  Sure with all the trees it'd be hard to get grass and that's just another hassle.   77.gif

[BruceK]

Cool! Where is it? Looks like there's plenty of room for a shop too.....

Remember, 30X50 is a good size, but 40X60 is even better!   77.gif

Our new house is in the Hill Country due north of San Antonio (not going to say where here on the public Interwebs).  It's not a huge by any means, but it has plenty of trees for shade and it is level.   Having shade is a big plus during Texas summers.

Regarding garage/shop size, I will have to see what the budget permits.  And I need to figure out whether to go with a metal or wood structure.    Those are some BIG suggestions.  The larger one would have more square footage than the house!  That's fine with me but I'm only half of this team.  ;D

[94touring]

Congrats!   4.gif  Build the shop and we can have a shop party!

[BruceK]

Cute little place.  Is that all mulch in the front yard?  Sure with all the trees it'd be hard to get grass and that's just another hassle.   77.gif

Yeah, the lot is xeriscaped and there is hardly any grass at all to cultivate or mow. Doesn't need mulch but they put it down anyway.

[gr8kornholio]

Or a shop building party  8.gif 11.gif 50.gif 9.gif 4.gif

[BruceK]

 I'm just getting over a visit from the "house inspector from hell" today  on the house I'm selling. 

The inspection was booked at 2:30 PM  and since the buyer is paying for this inspection and may accompany the inspector, my wife and I cleared out by 2 o'clock.  We took the dog, and jumped in the car.   When it's 102° outside  as it was today  and you got a dog there's not too much you can do.   Other than visiting a Petsmart or Home Depot there aren't too many places that are dog friendly and it's sure not comfortable to be outside in those temperatures.   

So we basically just drove around for two hours, returning to our house at 4pm. Our thinking was that the inspection would be over or very nearly over by then.   Boy were we wrong! The Home Inspector had just arrived minutes before us at 4 o'clock. When we questioned his tardiness he explained that he had booked the time from 2:30 PM to 7:30 PM for his inspection. Yes that's right -  a full five hours!   He also informed us he been doing this for 18 years and each of inspections take 3 to 4 hours because he is very thorough.  He also told us that the buyer would arrive around 6 PM but we are welcome to hang around in the house while he did his work.

So we killed some time in the house as he worked. He was the most thorough, anally-retentive, nerd type of guy you've ever seen. Perfectly suited for his job. He took everything to the nth degree.   For example, there are a pair of French doors leading into my office. He took the time to knock on each pane of glass in both doors to make sure that none of them were loose. (they passed!)   He not only filled up both tubs completely to the brim to check the overflow feature, but he left them full of water for an hour to do a leak down test on the tub drain stoppers!

We cleared out again before the buyer arrived and did some more driving around.   We drove back into our neighborhood at 7:30 PM to see that the buyer and her entourage we're just hanging out in front of our house chatting with the nerd inspector.  We parked a block away until they finally left at 7:45pm.

I'm sure he found  a ton of faults with the house that a normal inspector will not find - or care about. So I don't even want to see his inspection report in case this deal falls through. Will just negotiate on repair costs and not worry about the specific items because I don't want to have to disclose that  crazy level of detail of issues to the next buyer (if there is one).

[MiniDave]

The good news is that you're getting some action on the house. From the buyer's perspective, the nerdy anally retentive inspector is exactly what you want, but from the seller's ....not so much!

I'm going thru a similar situation on my south property, a couple of years ago my pond was invaded by rushes, they have since multiplied till they cover the entire surface of the pond, about 75X75 ft. and about 8 ft tall. Couple that with a dry summer and my pond has gone from about 10 ft deep down to the muddy bottom. We had our first serious client out to look today and they're arranging a contractor to come in and tell them what it would cost to "fix" the pond. This is a drainage pond only, no natural springs or creeks, only runoff from the surrounding properties provide the water, but this is the first summer it's completely dried up like this.

Good luck with yours!

[MiniDave]

Good point about the emotional investment.....

[gr8kornholio]

Housing market around here has significantly cooled off lately, supply out pacing demand.

When we bought ours we just had them fix the major stuff and didn't sweat all the minor things.  Rusting drip pan for AC and windows with broken seals.  Most of the stuff they find and point out is really ludicrous hopefully the buyers aren't the same type of person as the inspector I'm sure you'll be fine. 

[BruceK]

Just found some traces of the pendantic Home Inspector from Hell when I opened the circuit box.  He has apppied blue tape on various breakers.  Apparently when the house was wired 18 years ago the electrician mislabeled some of the circuits.  And that cannot continue!    So in a perfect world these corrections would apply!

[gr8kornholio]

Those are actually handy. My house box labels are so messed up it's not funny. Finally bought an outlet tester and flipped each breaker one at a time and went around the house so I could make a table of what did what.  Dumbest one is upstairs second bath is gfci for both outdoor plugs.  Finally figured out why outdoor plugs weren't working.