Living Area - Before

This view looks out from the kitchen over the countertop into the far corner of the living room area. Yes, those are carved wood valances over the drapes. Yuck! Once again the same dark, heavy, color-coordinating drapes.

This was taken by standing in the “office” area that became our dining room. Notice the potbelly stove and pipe? That thing was sitting on a homemade hearth that was 3x4 ft, and the darn thing took up the entire corner of the room. Next to that was the useless wall heater. The first year we were up her we took out the stove, but it left a hole in the roof that we had to temporarily patch. At this point the only source of heat we had was the propane wall heater because the fireplace didn’t work. It was currently holding our TV. Eric and I used to joke about wishing we could find a DVD that had a fire burning on it and we could play that in the TV so it would at least look like a fireplace. Little did we know that later on down the line they’d have them. Anyway, the heater wasn’t that great. It was one of those two sided jobbies, so the front room would be cold and the bedroom would be sweltering. And what is up with that kitchen light fixture? It looks like it came from the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland!

That is our home inspector, what a waste of money he was! He wouldn't go on the roof to see if the roof was sound or needed repairs because it was sprinkling, he wouldn't go underneath the house to see if the plumbing was okay because it was wet, and he wouldn't reschedule because that would throw his month off. He checked the plugs but didn't tell us they weren't grounded. He ran the washing machine to see if the water was running and if it drained properly but because he didn't go under the house he didn't know that the drain wasn't connected to anything and just ran out under the house. He also didn't check to see if there was any hot water because as we discovered later the hot water wasn't connected and needed to be plumbed to the hot water tank. I can't believe we actually paid this guy any money at all.

As you can see there is more clutter to be had. I honestly believe these people went out of their way to see how much stuff they could get in there.