Crown Molding And Ceiling Vents

Crown molding are highly desirable these days, they make a room more finished and classic. For new home constructions, crown molding placement may already be a part of the plan and may pose no conflict with the location of the air vents. But for older homes, that were originally built with no crown molding, and crown molding was not a consideration in the past, the location of the vents placed in the ceilings may sometimes interfere with the placement of the new crown moldings. Having ceiling vents placed way too close to the edge of ceiling, just an inch or two near the walls, may complicate the idea of adding a crown molding. If you are serious about adding crown molding to a room with vents placed too close to the edge of the ceilings, these vents may need to be moved in order to give clearance to the crown moldings. But moving the air vents may not sound as easy at it look because hidden above the attic, on the other side of the ceiling vents, are huge ducting system attached to these vents that will make vents moving a complicated process, specially when you need to move the vents some feet away, in different part of the ceiling.

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Written by Jazevox

Buying Store Display Products

One of the most expensive renovation in many houses is usually the kitchen area which can easily range from $5000 to $50,000. Most homeowners nowadays demand top-notch, high quality kitchen cabinets, state-of-the-art home appliances like refrigerator, dishwasher, and stove range. But these things don't come cheap at all. Most double door stainless steel refrigerator can range anywhere from $1000 to $3000, depending on brand, quality, performance, and added features. Dishwasher prices range anywhere from $200 to $1500 depending on variety of factors like branding, functions, design, maker, etc. One, if not the most expensive expense in kitchen renovation is cabinetries and countertops which can range anywhere from $1000 to $25,000 depending widely on quality, material, as well as branding and added functionalities and state-of-the-art upgrades and conveniences features like lazy susan in corner cabinets, pull-out drawers, etc.

Although, it is not widely advisable for everyone because you sometimes compromise best quality and flawless product, but buying store displays clearance can sometimes be great finds because they are mostly great bargains. Stores sometimes clearance off old store displays of their products in order to replace it with new models and new arrivals. Although, some clearance items have damages and have signs of wear and tear from all the store customers examining such product displays, but most of these items are never been used before, and work just like brand new items fresh from the box! Minor scratches and bents maybe bothersome at times, but with savings of more than fifty (50) percent off or possibly more, sometimes it is worth dealing with little flaws and boxless products.

We recently bought a store display customed cabinets for more than 70 percent off the store listing price, it was such a great deal. It is in great shape, some little scratches in some of the wood, but the overall appearance is great and they still look very high-end. Although, we needed to modify the layout of the cabinets and countertops in order to fit with the kitchen we are working on, with some rearranging and few ommision of cabinets, we were able to work the clearanced store display cabinets and make it work with the kitchen. On the positive note, it is great to have a high quality cabinets without paying the high price.

The only pitfall with buying store display clearance items is that you have to learn to deal with imperfections, damages, and flaws sometimes, other times just boxless. To get an amazing deal, clearance buyer may need to do some thinking and lots of creativity to make the item work with the existing place somehow. Because with clearance items, what you see is what you get, there are not a lot of choices, you need to think outside the box and think of ways to make it work. If you cannot find ways to make it work, another option is to pay the full regular store price and save the headache :-)

Written by Jazevox

Quest For Kitchen Cabinets

Replacing kitchen cabinet and make a kitchen look more current and up-to-date is one of my favorite job in a home renovation. Kitchen renovation is one of the most important changes in a home renovation specially when it comes to selling homes. Equally important to put a lot of thought and budget into is the master bathroom or all the bathrooms in the house.

One key item that will hugely affect the overall result of a kitchen renovation is the style and quality of the kitchen cabinets. There are several choices and styles of cabinetries to choose from, that is why it is not the easiest job to decide which one works the best. One major factor that widely influence someone's decision to choosing kitchen cabinets is the budget. Kitchen cabinets for a 10 feet by 10 feet kitchen can range anywhere from $1,000 to $30,000 depending on the cabinetry components and materials the cabinets are made of. Quality, design, manufacturer and branding also widely influence the cabinetry pricing.

There are plenty of choices when it comes to cabinetries. Knowing your budget and the maximum amount you can spend on it, will largely influence the type of kitchen cabinetry that will end up in your kitchen. Commonly, custom and special order cabinets are usually more expensive compare to the ones that are ready-made and already available in the store shelvings.

Sometimes, higher prices is not always the best ones that may work the best in someone's kitchen. In a design point of view, the colors and stained, design and style of the cabinets needs to work with the appliances and the wall paint as well. Personally, choosing kitchen cabinet may not be the easiest decision there is, but it is definitely a fun process (i think), and seeing the kitchen overall result and seeing everything all come together is a rewarding experience.

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Written by Jazevox

Painting Task Today

I was painting the ceiling today and consumed a little more than a gallon of paint. I was using a regular paint roller, so it was a little messy to handle specially that there is no drip catcher that comes with the roller design. But the extension pole helped a lot, eliminating the need to use a scaffolding or a ladder entirely. I personally think that using a ladder or scaffolding while painting a ceiling can be dangerous at times and complicates ceiling painting all together. My painting job was not too bad, just required a lot of patience with the preparation, trying to cover all the furnishings and items that i didn't want any paint drips.

The good thing is, we recently bought a new non-stick paint tray that eliminate the need to wash it up with water after painting. The non-stick tray is such a great product, it saves me time and water during clean-up specially that the paint tray is usually the biggest painting tool in a regular painting job, and it eats up a lot of water trying to clean it up, not to mention scrubbing hardened paint residues! With non-stick paint tray, it is so easy, just let the paint dry in the tray after a painting job, and peel off dried paint afterward! I absolutely salute the person who thought of this idea, definitely time-saving tool!

Hint: Although the non-stick tray works really good with regular paint, basing on my experience, primer did not work really well with the non-stick tray.

Written by Jazevox

Mini Blinds For Privacy

The new windows that we installed looks great. We installed double-paned with grid vinyl windows, and its an high energy efficient design.

But there are times, no matter how nice the view is outside, there instances that we need privacy specially in the evening, when it is dark outside and we have the lights on. To resolve the issue of privacy with the glass windows, we decided to install room-darkening mini blinds. Room darkening mini-blinds is great for being out of the way in the morning, and serves its purpose in the evening or at anytime when needed.

The good thing about mini-blinds is that they are very flexible, you can collapse it, adjust the angle of the blinds for light and view control, and if the mini-blinds are installed within the framing of the window, it can also work together with curtains!

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Written by Jazevox

Challenges That Come With Replacing Windows

One of our building permit includes replacing windows in the house. The house has single pane windows with aluminum framing. When it comes to upgrading windows, single pane windows are probably considered obsolete nowadays, and the upgrades are mostly being dual pane windows, which are more energy efficient because it had better control and proven performance over the air around it, both hot and cold air. Dual pane windows keep the warm air in and keep the cold air out, and vise versa, which minimize the use of heating or air conditioning furnace to keep the room cool during summer or warm during winter.

By replacing windows using different sizes, part of the indoor walls, sheetrock, had to be cut off inorder to remove the old windows and place the new ones. So there could be plenty of patching of the interior walls or the sheetrock specially if you are replacing a window with a different size. Even more difficult is when the existing sheetrock have texture in them, which means that patched wall had to be textured as well to match with the existing texture. Texturing is not an easy task, you need to find the right texture that match with what is existing and price wise, they usually don't come cheap. A single spray can of texture cost around $12 to $15 that have coverage around 50 to 100 square feet, depending also if its used sparingly or economically. After the texture application, primed paint had to be applied before the colored wall paint can be applied. Paint color has to match the existing wall paint, or else the whole room wall need to be repainted so that it will not have multi-colored or patchy finished end product.

Another major challenge when replacing windows is when the new window had to be move to a new location, or move few inches away from the original location because the header above the existing window will be affected and had to be moved as well. And if the header will be move, you will have to deal with the wall studs as well, possibly add or relocate the 2x4 studs to properly support the new header location, the windows, etc.

But having new dual pane windows are definitely worth it! As simple as replacing windows have dramatic transformation in the look of your home.

Written by Jazevox

Getting A Permit For Room Addition

We needed to have a laundry room and a master closet added to a house but doing so requires building permit here in CA. So we could not proceed with the project without having the permit approved and ready for actual implementation. To get the project up and running, we needed the permit, first by having the application submitted and have it approved by the building department of the city hall.

Getting the building permit in itself was a lot work. We were required to submit scaled drawing of different plans. There were all types of technical drawings that were required together with the permit application including plot pan, foundation plan, structural plan, roof plan, floor plan, electrical plan, and more. It was definitely a challenge and loads of work for me because I had to prepare all the drawings myself.

In the end, it was a relief to have the permit finally approved after second visit to the city hall. It took two (2) visits because there were additional drawings that were requested the first time. And CA laws requires Title 24 report for the particular permit that we were seeking.

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Written by Jazevox

Buying Oops Paints

Earlier today we went to Lowes to buy some stuff for the house. We passed by a clearance isle in the painting department. Everytime we pass by in the painting department, we always try to check out their oops paint to make sure that we don't miss any great deals on some paints that we might need. Normally, a semi-gloss gallon of paint can cost around $19 to $27, depending on the brand. But with oops paints, most paints in a gallon is priced-to-sell at around $5, which is a huge deal compare to $19 to $27! The only pitfall about buying oops paint is that you get what is available, what is there is there. With oops paints, you really don't have a lot of choices. The reason why it is called oops paint in the first place is that the paint was mixed wrong (oops!) or whatever else is wrong with the paint (oops!).

Just for the record, we don't really buy every single oops paint there is. We only buy one when there are paint colors in the oops section that we like that we think we can use later on in a project or a job. There is really no reason to buy a bargain oops paint if we know that we can never use it even if it is a bargain price. It is not making sense to buy oops paint and ended up just storing it, taking valuable space, and after years of having it we will realize that it will never be used! So we only buy ones that we think we can use, or paint colors that we can bear to stare.

If you have limited budget for painting in one of your to-do project, why not check out the clearance section in a painting department, who knows, there might be a paint that will work for you, for a fraction of the cost. Saving, is never a bad thing :-)

Written by Jazevox

Paints Combined Into One

We have several different color paints in our garage. The other day, we decided to check them out one by one, to see if there are anything we can use to paint a bedroom wall. Unfortunately, none of the colors were satisfactory enough, paints were either too dark or too light. We even tested each paint in the wall, walls where we wanted to paint, to see how the color would appear if applied in the wall, but none of the paints worked. Most of the paints we have in the garage come from all different sources, some were leftovers from old painting projects, others were bought in the opps paint sections of stores that we couldn't resist the prices, while others were special orders with high prices but we changed our mind about the color and couldn't return the paint and decided not to use it. All different reasons how and why each paint ended up in the garage, in the effort to find a common ground and a use for it, since most of the paints have been stored for awhile unused, and who-knows-when we are going to really use it individually. We decided to mix some of the paints, the same type paints, all water-based, indoor and acrylic. We decided to combine the dark orangy color with the white and the cream ones, hoping to achieve a lighter version of the dark orange. In the end, we ended up with a nice lively peachy color, which we ended up using by painting it in the bedroom wall.

When you try to mix different colored paints, do make sure that they are the same types and classifications, to make sure that it will mix properly and not flake on you, etc.

Written by Jazevox
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Do not copy this article. Do not republished this article without any written permission.

Test Paint Before You Paint

We recently bought a customized colored paint for used in kitchen and bath. Before we made the purchased, we checked how the paint swatch will work with the existing wall and floor tiles in the bathroom by putting the swatch next to a tile piece, it was perfect combo, so we thought. The color swatch was a nice shade of green that went really well with the tile, which is an exact match of the existing tiles in the bathroom. We decided not to buy a paint test sample by the quart to test the color we choose, basically just went with how they went together visually, side by side in pieces. When we got the customized paint ordered, the color matched perfectly with the paint swatch, so we painted the bathroom wall with it. After the painting was done, the green paint in the wall looked very yellowish as the natural sunlight goes through the window. The existing lighting of the bathroom didn't help either, the painted wall definitely didn't look the same as the color we ordered because the lighting of the bathroom changed the shade of the green into yellowish.

Lesson learned, it is always a good idea to buy a quart of paint with the desired color before purchasing by the gallons, specially if you are planning to purchase five (5) gallons or more. By running a sample painting, not only will it save you money when it wont turn out as expected, but save you lots of time and effort as well. With all the effort and time it took to paint and had to change to another color after that definitely consumed a lot of time and sweat and the remaining unwanted paint will be unusable and usually cannot be returned because most stores do not allow special orders or customized paint colors to be returned.

So if you are planning to refresh a room or two by painting the walls, it might not hurt to run a test painting in the same wall first where you are planning to paint to make sure that the paint color you choose will still look as you expect with the electrical lighting and the natural sunlight that goes through the room. Best yet, check the test paint at different times of day to make sure that the new paint color you choose work well both day and night!

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Written by Jazevox
Please do not copy. Please do not republished without any written permission from author.

Energy Efficiency Report

In order to determine and plan the overall energy consumption and efficiency of the whole state, applying for a permit for a home remodeling or room addition in CA may require a Title 24 Report, showing the performance of its units like the central air and heat, lightings, and other energy consuming devices. It is definitely more additional work and complication for a home flipper or contractor in order to obtain such report to get a permit approved. Just like a home inspection, a Title 24 Report requires a licensed or trained HERS Provider to analyze the report and such report will further undergo documentation review for accurrary before it will be forwarded to the city hall during the permit application process for approval making sure that the home remodeling or addition is in compliance with the energy efficiency standards. I guess the Title 24 Report will help ensure that each dwelling will be more energy efficient and consume less energy specially with the growing concern of global warming nowadays. Oh well, never filed for a Title 24 Report before, so its gonna be a learning process, as we go along.

Written by Jazevox
All Rights Reserved. Do not copy or republished without written permission.

Knocking Down Walls

People love the feeling of openness in their homes. A lot of times traditional rooms are separated by four cornered walls, but sometimes, walls separate you from the things that are happening in other rooms! There are times that a wall feels more closed in and makes you feel missed out from the fun and family activities. Nowadays, a lot of family wants an open feeling in their home, being able to see the kids or participate in the conversation with friends in the living room or dining area while cooking in the kitchen. Having a nice flow in foot traffic and having the house visually look larger is ideal for a lot of people these days, and one way to achieve these goals is by knocking down few walls that separate one room to another, and give it a new open feeling and smooth flowing. But before you get so excited and start knocking down walls, wait, knocking down walls maybe the design solution to eliminate the cramp and closed-in feeling, but be sure to consult a Structural Engineer first, to verify that the wall you are removing is not a load bearing wall! Bearing walls are functioning integral part of the whole house, so it cannot be easily remove without resupporting everything else that relies on those walls. Bearing walls maybe supporting your whole roof above or your second floor. So if you will blindly remove a load bearing wall without resupporting those loads first, it may cause your roof or second floor to collapse or sag, which you don't want to happen. So before getting so excited above removing those walls in order to achieve those open feeling, make sure that you properly consult with a license Structural Engineer in order to help you decide how to resupport all the existing loads that the existing bearing walls are carrying. Bearing walls or non-bearing walls, there is a way to knock them down, it just have to be done right and properly. One popular way to resupport all the loads of a bearing wall is by installing the right size beams. But beams installation can be a lot of hard labor and heavy task, and needs knowledgeable manpowers. Installing huge beams requires manpowers and requires temporary supports of existing loads while the beams are being placed. If you are willing to spend these extra costs and works of removing a wall or two, you can possibly achieve that open feeling in your home that you are aiming for.

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Written by Jazevox

Saving Those Original Hardwood Floors

When you buy older homes, lets say, houses that were built around 1960s to 1970s, it is more likely the you will uncover a genuine hardwood floors underneath those headious carpets! Nowadays, hardwood floors are a crowd favorite flooring for a lot of homeowners and buyers. But real hardwood floors nowadays cost a lot per square foot, easily ranging from $3 to $10 per square foot, and if you are lucky to have a hardwood floor hidden underneath an old ruined carpet that had seen better days, repolishing those hardwood floor maybe worth all the works to save it. There maybe a lot of other alternative as far as recreating the look of those hardwood floors like using laminate flooring or vinyl flooring with wood designs, but nothing can compare to have the original hardwood floors that originally came with the house when it was first built! If you are selling the house, hardwood floors that comes originally with the house is definitely a great selling feature and it is a definite hot item for many prospective buyers! You gain a lot of benefit by saving the original hardwood floors, not counting the cost you save if you have to recreate the same material, nowadays, this type of flooring will easily cost you a fortune. By saving the original hardwood floors and putting it back to its original glory can be quite a task for a house flipper or a house investor or a homeowner, but if sanded and properly stained or protected, all the effort that is put into saving those real hardwood floors maybe all worth it, not only because it looks great and natural, but also because it could save you tons of money trying to replace it with the same exact materials. So, if by all means, you uncover an original hardwood floors, it might be all worth it to save those genuine stuff!

Written by Jazevox
All Rights Reserved. Do not copy or republished without written permission.

Flooring Choices

When it comes to updating or changing the floor, there are so many choices out there. Among the popular ones are hardwood floor, laminate flooring, natural rocks, tiles, carpet, vinyl, etc. Deciding which one to choose is a major challenge for a house flipper or designer. One main factor that may largely affect someone's decision when it comes to flooring is the time and budget to renovate the floor.
Real hardwood floors are normally more expensive but definitely more desirable compare to wood laminate flooring. But both hardwood and laminate flooring will definitely make a nice upgrade and finish if installed and done right. Carpet flooring are widely desirable in areas like the bedrooms and family room, where people usually want to walk barefoot, but definitely won't work the best in bathrooms nor kitchen where they are normally wet areas. Deciding the right color of carpet is not an easy task specially that there are tons of choices out there and aside from color choices, there are also several different materials and textures that needs to be considered. The type and quality of carpet you choose will definitely affect your budget depends on the price point. Tiles and natural stones are great alternative, although they may be more complicated to install than other type of flooring but easier to maintain and clean. For wet areas like bathrooms and kitchen, ceramic tiles and natural stones are usually most prefered. Vinyl sidings are usually the most affordable but if you wish to speak quality and elegance to your potential home buyers, vinyl sidings might not be the best choice for this purpose. Like ceramic tiles, vinyl sidings are easy to clean and maintain.

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Written by Jazevox

Easier Clean Up After Siding Demolition

House siding demolition can be extremely messy and the demolition crew or house flipper may have to deal with all types of nails both big and small falling all over the ground, sometimes hard to see and spot them all. When the nails fall into the grass lawn, or in the dirt, cleaning up the mess may tend to be even more challenging and difficult. So for easy clean up, job would turn out to be so much easier if a canvas tarp is spread against the wall prior for siding demolition. For safety, it might be best if the ladder will not be positioned on top of the spreaded canvas specially if the canvas tarp have a plastic lining on the other side. With the tarp being spread below, it is so much easier and faster to collect most of the fallen nails and tiny little pieces by gathering the ends of tarp together and pour all the collected items in a bucket or into the trash. If you don't have the tarp spread in the ground to catch all the nails and other little pieces, it might be extremely hard to spot them all one by one specially in a loose dirt or grassy lawn.

Written by Jazevox

Grid Or Gridless Windows And Doors

When it comes to maximizing the enjoyment of a beautiful outdoor scenery from indoors, it is hard to decide which type of window or sliding french door is best, with a grid or with no grid. I personally think that windows with grid looks very nice from outside look and it totally defines the whole space specially looking from the outside. Looking from the outside, grid windows definitely stands out and looks more defined. But the problem with windows with grids is that it kind of chopped and pixelate the beautiful outdoor scenery when you are looking from inside. The square grid pattern in a window may sometimes take away the scenery as a whole because of the lines crossing each other right in front the view. Although sometimes, outdoor view is not very pleasant, so having grid may work wonders with such scenery to cover and disguise the view, at least it minimizes or hide the unpleasant view a little bit. But when you are talking beautiful views of the lawn, beach, or mountains, then having grids may sometimes feel like it is taking a little bit of the scenery.

 
So before you tear down windows and start buying the replacement window, it is wise to check out the view or scenery that will be visible where the window will be placed and installed in order for you to know which type of window is best for what you want to achieve. If you wish to open up a wall and put a window or french door inorder to showcase an amazing scenery outside, then you might think twice about having square grids because sometimes it does take away some of the view from inside by making it looked pixelate and chopped, and you might not like how it will come out but once the window or door is installed it might be too late to decide that the grid is not working for you, unless you have plenty of budget you can always change things. Specially that new windows and the cost to install windows and doors nowadays are quite high, so it is definitely quite costly to make mistakes and to change minds.

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Written by Jazevox

Before Upgrading The Bedroom Windows

After a visit in the city hall to inquire regarding changing the outdoor sidings, we also find out that replacing bedroom windows in our area now requires a permit and/or detailed scaled plan also not just the exterior sidings. Permit and scaled drawing is required regardless if it is the same window dimensions, smaller window, or bigger windows to ensure that the new code is meet. The code requires that for fire safety and having working emergency exit there should be a open space of at least 5 square feet and a certain minimum measurement is also required from finished floor to the bottom of the window edge for easy escape route incase of any fire or emergency.

So trying to upgrade the same size window in the bedroom is now more expense than before because if the current code is not meet, then the new windows needs to be adjusted and positioned properly in order to meet the required code. Adjusting the position and height of the window may mean tearing up the sheet rack wallings, or re-framing the whole 2x4 frame boards, and possibly moving moving the header board to accommodate the new code.

There is definitely good and bad side to this new code. On the good side, having safety measures is definitely ideal for most household because no one may never know when they need an escape route or emergency exit. But on the bad side, if you just want to upgrade your bedroom windows from single pane to dual pane or more energy efficient windows in order to save electricity bill then the new code in replacing bedroom windows in some areas or cities will turn out to be more costly than before because as mentioned earlier, doing so may mean tearing interior walls and re-framing, so more cost of materials and cost of labor will be added to the total expense.

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Written by Jazevox

Replacing The Bedroom Windows

After talking to the city building and planning official, we just learned that replacing the existing single pane windows in the bedrooms will not only require a permit but a detailed and drawn to scale drawing as well. The official said that the new city code in the area requires that a new or a replacement bedroom windows must have maximum 44 inches length from the floor and more than 5 square feet of opening for fire safety to allow easy exit for anyone out of the house incase of fire in the house. This make sense in a way, but what doesn't make sense is that the original plan is that just trying to upgrade the single pane windows to more energy efficient ones using Star Energy Low E windows, but the replacement windows will remain the same dimensions, but in order to implement the new city codes, it would mean that the existing sheet racks will need to be opened up and existing framing will need to be modified in order to lower the framing and the headers to accommodate the required 44 inches length or less. So instead of just replacing windows, it will turn out to be a whole redo of the walls and sidings as well, which is turning into a very complicated process and a permit is now required with detailed and drawn to scale drawing. In order to implement this new city codes, not only will it double the work load but the budget as well because not only do we need to buy the replacement windows but have to worry about header and framing modifications and patching the opened sheet rack as well.

Written by Jazevox

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Saying Goodbye To The Dark Green Walls

It is amazing what a coat of paint can do. Its only been few days ago when we were staring at a dark evergreen bathroom wall in the house, that didn't take very long for us to decide that the paint color just doesn't seem to work in anyway with the bathroom tiles and floor. It took us two major coats of super strong white primer to cover the dark evergreen paint in the wall. Although, after two hard coats of paint primer, we still noticed several holidays in the wall, it is looking so much better than the dark wall that was previously there. The third coat and final coat will be the paint that we will decide to put in the wall, but we are still in the process what paint color to put up in the bathroom since we are not sure if the tub tiles will be removed or we will just keep it, since there is really nothing wrong with it but the color is neutral not quite colorful.

Written by Jazevox

When Is The Best Time To Flip

Personally, I think the best time to flip a house is during summer and spring time because that is when the weather is most generous and accommodating. Rain and snow is not in anyway very friendly when you are trying to knock down walls, tear up the roof, paint the ceilings and sheet rock inside with no outside ventilation. The only pitfall when it comes to summer time flipping is the ability to bear summer heat specially when it is three digits temperature outside, its not only uncomfortable and unhealthy, but it is hard to concentrate on the task at hand when the sun is beginning to toast you.

Although, summer and spring time is probably the best time to flip and you only have few months target to get the renovations done, then that could be a problem because the timing to sell the flipped house might not be so good when it will be listed on a winter time, where there are probably less people coming out to look for properties due to weather conditions. The good thing is that when it comes to real estate, anything can possibly be accomplish at anytime, may be bad timing or good timing, but where there is a well, there is a way. But then again, if you want to flip and want things done in your timeframe, weather doesn't matter sometimes, rain or shine, the main goal is get it done specially when the carrying cost is outrageously high.

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Written by Jazevox

Flippers We Will Be

I would like to do some flipping in the very near future, and would like to share my experiences and adventures here as I go along with all the different projects that we tackle, fix up and renovate.

This blog will house all things renovations, tips on how to fix things up, and any other concerns and interests that comes with flipping like choosing the right floor, why the carpet needs to go, or should the wall be knock down or not!

Please check back soon, I will be updating this blog as soon as new data and experiences comes along.

Buying Bank Owned Properties

For the past few years, there were a lot of properties in the United States that ended up in default and/or foreclosures. Some properties in default were thankfully been saved by homeowners, while other properties ended up in the hands of the lenders. Properties that were not recovered by the homeowners usually ended up being owned by the lenders, and most lenders are banks. So when you are planning to purchase a once foreclosed property, you probably ended up buying such property from a bank, as the seller.

Nowadays, you heard it all over the radio and television regarding properties that were foreclosed, but finding all these properties to purchase is not always easy as it sounds. Because although there are a lot of available properties that are owned by the banks that are ready for sale, dealing with the bank to buy a property is not always the easiest process. For one, banks are not in the business to sell properties that is why they usually cannot accommodate all interested buyers right away. Some banks may have designated realtor that they hired to take care of all the sales of properties that they acquired via foreclosures, but probably not all banks have immediate real estate agent that you can approach regarding their properties for sale. So having access to this properties may not always be a breeze as anyone thought and imagine! Even if some banks do want to get rid of their acquired properties, it is still difficult for some buyers to check out these properties specially if some of these properties are not being listed in the MLS.

And if you get lucky that you find a property you are interested to buy from a bank even if it is not listed by a real estate agent, many still find it hard to purchase such property due to the fact that many banks are busy doing banking and could not accommodate customers right away who are trying to purchase any of their properties. The hardest time for most real estate buyers is the waiting time specially that for many people, time is gold, and not knowing when a bank is gonna reply on a purchase interest is definitely a buyers nightmare! Although there are lenders/banks that are highly motivated and may answer to any purchase interest in a matter of few days, some buyers may not be so lucky if they ended have to wait for few weeks.

No situation is ever the same, so definitely buying a property from a bank or a lender is a case to case basis when it comes to determining if it is easier process or more complicated process. One of the easiest way to find properties for sale is definitely properties that are being on MLS and online.

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Written by Jazevox

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This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me.

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The compensation received may influence the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. That content, advertising space or post may not always be identified as paid or sponsored content.

The owner(s) of this blog is compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. Even though the owner(s) of this blog receives compensation for our posts or advertisements, we always give our honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the bloggers' own. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider or party in question.

This blog does contain content which might present a conflict of interest. This content may not always be identified.

Effective Date: January 1 2007