I think I left off last time with us thinking about making a purchase of a little cabin in upper Kings Beach. That thought took a nose dive when Kit gave it a good investigation and discovered some glaring issues that would need to be remedied to make it anything close to cozy and warm; things like the bedroom addition missing a foundation and floor insulation, a leaky water heater, and other various issues...Basically, another project, even if not nearly as much of one as our current house was. Poop. There went that great idea! If it goes way down in price it might be tempting to re-consider this one, and pay someone else to fix the most glaring issues right away.
In the meantime we didn't think much would happen with the next door lot, laughing at anybody who would spend $90,000 on a piece of dirt in the middle of Little Mexico. Surprise turned to shock when Kit got a call from el creepo realtor threatening to sue him for the full value of the lot if we didn't immediately move all our stuff. Apparently there was a serious buyer and he didn't really like us occupying this piece of property. A cascade of worst-case scenarios ensued, causing a boatload of stress to everyone on our side of the situation and horrible feelings of helplessness.
Lesson 1 from the situation: California apparently has some very tenant-friendly laws regarding this kind of thing, especially for those holding a lease. We could have occupied the lot up until the end of our lease on August 31 without any issues, giving us perhaps a little more time to find places for some leftover things. Unfortunately we didn't find out about this until after moving most everything of value and losing a bunch of firewood and other lumber to the cleanup crew he sent in on a Sunday of all things. I'm sure we both came close to losing our sanity due to the rough treatment, and I'm still trying to unravel everything and get back into mental balance afterward!
Lesson 2, unfortunately, was a firsthand experience in dealing with people who lack any compassion for others or their situations, and whose concern is focused mainly on growing their bank accounts. I think this was such a shock mainly because I have been so fortunate in my life to have met so many wonderfully generous folks, the kind who actually enjoy helping others or at the very least working out solutions to keep everyone involved happy. This was a great reminder to avoid as much as possible dealing with bad apples like that in the future, especially a certain name in Tahoe real estate. I hope karma will be involved for all parties opposing us in this situation.
The chicken coop and hens were distributed to some friends last week, and my happy little vegetable garden was transplanted into pots with the help of a few other friends to whom I am so grateful. Most of the plants looked quite unhappy for a week or so but even the largest squash and tomato plants are making a recovery now. The cherry tomato even has tons of fairly large green tomatoes on it, and two of the squash plants have little squashes on them, one which gets bigger daily and is about 5" across now! I'm guessing it's a kabocha squash from its round shape. So far the garden's survival has been one positive coming from the situation--yay miracle plants!!
Back on the real estate roller coaster Kit found a house up several blocks from us, decided it was awesome, and we needed to look at it immediately. It was enormous by my standards but nearly the entire bottom level was a garage, a huge bonus for the man-cave situation. We went out on a limb a little by putting in an offer but it ended up being too low and I was more than a little relieved to hear they got a higher offer. Everything else we've looked at so far has ranged from a complete dump to just not quite right, and it's becoming obvious that in most cases a small house with a big garage/shop is an anomaly in Tahoe. Big house=big garage, cute small house=no garage. Then the issue of the kitchen: I'm very happy right now with 13 square feet of counter space, while most small houses have maybe 4 or 5 square feet like this one used to. A pain in the rear for someone who loves to cook a lot and make messes! The conclusion, then, is that we might have to find a small house, remodel the kitchen and build a garage...or buy an empty lot and build everything. My logic here is that it might be the same amount of work and expense as reviving a haggard house with all sorts of can-of-worms situations once the walls/floor are opened. Maybe. I've never built a house before, but we darn near rebuilt Kit's. Maybe we could even pay somebody to do some of the work. Or, find a house that's good enough to compromise on and deal with it being large and awkward or having to build a shop. I think all we've decided on at this point is that selling the house first is the best idea so we are ready to pounce when something really exciting comes up.
Speaking of the house, it's gone through a pretty major transformation in the past weeks, since Kit decided it was going on the market. Finally the exterior got painted with the help of one of Kit's good friends who kindly donated his weekend to the cause. It is very green, and the grumpy next door neighbor lady had some choice words for it, but our friends all think it's cool. I like it myself but it does look just a bit out of place here where everybody tries to blend in with brown houses. There are a couple more projects to finish when Kit returns from a much-needed trip home to Wisconsin next week. After that I am not really sure what is going to happen. I think we'll be moving into the studio behind the house to keep the main house clean, and looking for a place to rent if it ends up selling soon. We have one friend of a friend who sounds really interested in it right now, and would be a perfect fit for the place...it would sure be nice to not have to worry about people come by to look at it all the time.
Some photos by Cline of Roundwood Furniture --I really should dig up some "before" images somewhere for contrast, it's like a whole new house here:
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