Several of us were let into 1325 Laura this evening by the contractor.
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/staircase-1-1.jpg)
The staircase -- check out the cool newel post. There is a half newel up against the wall. The treads and risers still remain as does the landing.
(sorry this one is blurry)
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/staircase2-1.jpg)
The spindles have survived.
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/staircase21-1.jpg)
What you are looking at here is the underside of the second floor.
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/walls-1.jpg)
The inside of the exterior siding.
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/roofrafters-1.jpg)
Second floor inside of the exterior siding and framing. The damage you see is below the open chimney area.
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/rafter3-1.jpg)
Roof rafters and some charring from am earlier fire.
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/rafter2-1.jpg)
Roof rafters with the traditional "skip decking".
(http://i860.photobucket.com/albums/ab165/sheclown/1325%20Laura/column-1.jpg)
All I can say is it looks worse from the outside than the inside.
I have certainly restored worse damage than this.
It looks fairly sound.. and it is gutted , so a potential buyer can see what they are working with .. this home is somewhere around the time frame of my Grandparent's house , and prior to its renovation in late 2000 , FAR MORE structurally solid.
QuoteRe: 1325 Laura: A View from Inside
by markusic » Tue May 24, 2011 7:55 pm
The termite damage the contractor and owner has talked about is really pretty minor. Some of it I believe occurred due to the house being left open and most likely was not there when the did the interior demo. In any case, it is very fixable. The Contractor mistakenly believes the house was constructed with cedar joists and framing and so worries about the strength even if one termite was in the wood. The truth is they are all heart pine and much stronger even with a termite tunnel or two than what he would replace them with.
There is some amount of termite damage in the wood floors. Mostly in the rear of the second story. The rest would have been very salvageable and would have been gorgeous if not for the fact that now much of it has been open to the weather for 3-ish years. There is some evidence of subterranean termites around where the chimneys used to be, but hard to tell if that damage was there before the chimneys were removed at this point.
Basically, we have an owner and a contractor(s) that have not even one single clue how to deal with a hundred year old house and it shows. They indiscriminately cut out heart pine flooring (worth 10 plus dollars a SF) looking for proof that termites where there and when they didn't find any, just cut more out until they did.
The vast majority of the work now needed on this house was caused by the owner and his contractors rather than the house needed it to begin with. The charred wood that he pointed to and said it all had to be replaced is barely blackened and not in need of anything but cleaning and perhaps priming to stop any burned smell. And not even that as it is so old, it has lost any odor it may have had.
At a guess, there is less that ten thousand dollars of structure needed to done to the main house. They have removed structure that now has to be put back but none of it is major. The real expense is the details that were there and now are gone. Very little original historic detail remain. Even much of the staircase is gone, only leaving enough to really know what you are missing.
This house is very much worth saving and doing. It would have been very affordable to redo until it was unnecessarily gutted and lots of things unnecessarily damaged, but it will still make someone a great house.
A contractor that understands the old houses with the right engineer that also understand these houses may make it doable enough to get it done in the right budget even with the extra damage. Construction cost are at a low so now is the time.
I understand no permits and no COA had been pulled when this demo was done, perhaps the owner can be held accountable for that as well.
on myspringfield.org
So if the contractor is showing you around, does that mean the owner is willing to sell, rather than demolish it?
Kiva, I'm not sure if he would be willing to sell or not.
Preservation SOS asked for permission to enter the house which he graciously allowed.
Wow. This house appears to be in far better condition than my Ionia condemned bungalow (now restored of course.)
Kudos to the owner for letting us in.
I love the staircase and newel post.
Too bad it is gutted, but it does give a clean palate for someone to use.
If it were cleaned up a bit on the exterior (boarded properly and primed,) and listed for $10k, it would sell. He needs to list it and let it be restored if he doesn't wish to himself.
I think it is actually an advantage that it is gutted.. It allows for all the plumbing, electrical , HVAC upgrades to be done that would have to be anyway.. in other words it saves a few steps..
It should be cleaned up inside and out. and definitely should NOT be razed.
Quote from: Timkin on May 24, 2011, 10:12:26 PM
I think it is actually an advantage that it is gutted.. It allows for all the plumbing, electrical , HVAC upgrades to be done that would have to be anyway.. in other words it saves a few steps..
It should be cleaned up inside and out. and definitely should NOT be razed.
I disagree with you there Timkin. I hate it when houses are gutted (for no good reason). The plaster walls with horse hair fibers (talk about organic) makes fine insulation. The trim gets mauled as it is removed and is often lost forever.
Joe and I ususally gut kitchen and baths on a restore but leave the rest of the house alone.
But I understand what you are saying. Now that it is at this point, putting Humpty back together is like Nicole says working with a blank palate.
Donna Lynch restored an entire staircase for the Niedbalkski's after someone removed all but a small piece of it. She rebuilt the entire thing to match what was left. Do-able. The damage to the floors is really too bad, but there are homes here that have had to had floors replaced. Again, no big deal. I love the heart pine but, in a pinch, for affordability, you could put down a plywood subfloor and carpet. I didn't see how much flooring was left, but depending on that, you could use the remaining wood for public rooms and carpet the upstairs.
The Historic Planning Commission meeting is this afternoon, 3 o'clock at the Ed Ball Building. We'll see what happens. This will be the fourth time it has gone before the commissioners in as many months. The first time code enforcement brought it to the commissioners. At that point, the commissioners requested a list of items that they wanted code to do to prove that the house is unsafe. The next meeting, instead of code enforcement bringing it to the commissioners, the owner is now requesting demolition.
Each time the neighborhood, Preservation SOS, SPAR and neighbors have requested that demolition be denied (with the exception of the neighbor directly next door who spoke for demolition). Each meeting the decision is deferred.
We will see what happens today.