Wednesday 3 January 2007

The bunnings revolution is on, baby

Hey thank you for all the congratulatory comments on my last post. You are good. It's pretty exciting. The house we have bought is the same one I referred to a little while ago as being my house of choice - at that stage, we planned to just wait around for a while and maybe make an offer on it after a couple of months, since people seem to not appreciate brownish 1960s houses with Rumpus Rooms. But we ended up offering just before Christmas, which worked out well for us, because the agent in charge was covering for another one who was on holiday, and he was clearly pretty keen to make the sale before the real one got back. There was a certain amount of counter offering and so on but in the end the owners accepted a price that I think's pretty good. There is no gimp cage but there is a weird boarded-up space in the middle of the house which could very well contain a mummified gimp. Either that or a drugs lab as the pest inspector helpfully suggested.

The house was also looked over today by an architect and is basically good. No pests either (though it will acquire a small furry lazy one quite soon) and nothing much the matter with it structurally, except the roof needs replacing, which we knew already and planned for. Now we just need the bank to formally agree and I don't see any reason why they wouldn't since they have already said they would lend us that much. We have to get out of this house too, and I still plan to bung through a thousand words a day on my thesis between now & the end of Feb. So posting might be light for a while.

I naturally want to show d'House off but as it's is still advertised for sale, with pictures and address, I don't intend to post any photos in public. I have put up a set of pix at Flickr which can only be seen by friends. If you want to have a look & you have a flickr account let me know & I'll add you as a contact.

It's kind of ugly-looking at the moment, inside especially; but as the post title indicates, there is an orgy of painting and wallpapering and so forth to come, not to mention ripping up grey office carpet, which just doesn't belong in a place where people live, and smashing away at sundry stupidly placed kitchen cupboards with sledgehammers and chainsaws. I have actually booked myself into a diy workshop at Bunnings to learn about floor sanding and polishing, which should at least supply some interesting blog fodder even if it turns out to be basically a sales pitch, as I expect it might.

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oooh, let me be the first to congratulate you on this post because i was away and missed the last one.

Exciting!

Are you going to use the rumpus room for rumpuses?

Is there any alternative to Bunnings for your floor sanding / clawhammer / plasterboard needs? It's still a subsidiary of Gunns Ltd - I think. Suing Grannies out of their houses is not a good look.


Cast Iron Balcony

lucy tartan said...

I'm kind of hanging out to use the rumpus room for rumpuses but I need to work out exactly what a rumpus is, first.

Thanks for the warning about Bunnings. There are heaps of alternatives, but I will still go to the free workshop and then get my macho tools needs met elsewhere.

Melly` said...

Congratulations on the house... and I look forward to reading about the renovations! It is going to dement me now every time I see something from the 70's at the op shop....

Oh well.. I do demented well. I hope.

Cozalcoatl said...

So grown up, I'm still advoiding that bit. Must be pretty exciting. Landlords No More.

Anonymous said...

Bunnings is a subsidiary of a conglomerate called Wesfarmers, not Gunns.

Wesfarmers also digs up coal if you need a reason not to shop there, but.

Congrats on the mortgage, Miss Tartan.

;)

Zoe said...

Oh, jealous! I like the ablutions block effect. And the cool little yard.

Mummay, I want a house!

cristy said...

I am so jealous. I have always wanted to redecorate a house (that I could then keep). No doubt I would tire of my projects about half way through them... but it would still be fun.

I can't wait for the photos of the mini-demolitions and the reconstruction job.

David Nichols said...

Belated congratulations.

I am of the firm opinion, having done three rooms and a hallway, that floor sanding is wonderful when left to professionals. But you may not be as lazy/ easily nauseated by the smell of heated chemically treated wood as me.

Miss Bates said...

Surely the definitive blueprint for the holding of a rumpus is to be found in Where the Wild Things Are?

R.H. said...

The definitive blueprint for a rumpus is when keytappers try DIY.

Kirsty said...

Just what every house needs, a drug lab. Those beautiful house-type magazines will be knocking on your door wanting photos of the latest in architectural innovations.

Congratulations, and all the best with the DIY adventure.

Anonymous said...

Congratulations. Have fun knocking holes in the place. Trouble is you then have to clean up the mess, but I'm sure it's worth it.

Anonymous said...

Well I have perused the photos, and I think it has much in the way of potential, especially the bit with the bar. Bunnings is evil but you know, if it's the only hardware place near your home it's the only hardware place near your home. At least that;s our excuse and we're sticking to it.

Meredith Jones said...

Dorian looks great in the lounge. Bags buying you a lemon tree for the backyard,

congrats xxx

GS said...

Congrats - sorry its belated, I've only just got back from hols. Very exciting. Looking forward to seeing pics. Can you add me to those who get the private viewing on flckr.

As for the crack lab...could be a space to put very naughty pussy cats :)

Anonymous said...

Congrats! Enjoy those rumpus rooms...

redcap said...

Oh, I'm almost feeling nostalgic. Don't sand your own floors, though. It's a filthy job.

Suse said...

Congratulations. Happiness at Sills Bend!

If you do end up sanding your own floors but don't want the nasty toxic chemicals, I recommend tung oil. Easy to apply (you mop it on) and definitely cat and human-friendly. I think Feast Watson do a good tung oil.

Looking forward to a great many home renovation posts.

Anonymous said...

Congratulations! Do get someone else to sand the floors. Really. Do.

lucy tartan said...

The voices of experience. We will pay for somebody else to do the floors and cut back on something else.

It's looking a lot more manageable now.

Just Like A Woman said...

Bazlotto! And I didn't even hit refresh once, is that some kind of record?

You will not regret one cent of the money paid to the poor blighters who sand and polish other peoples floors for a living - a hellish job best done while the house is empty. Then the smell will disappear faster as there is nothing for it to permeate.

Armagnac Esq said...

If you are actually in Prestonia or near thornbury or northcotia, ie in the centre of the universe, then I recommend the far nicer staff at mitre 10 on high street, thornbury, rather than the unhelpful tossers in bunnings.

lucy tartan said...

Always happy to get any kind of recommendation for future reference - but we're moving to the wild front ear.

R.H. said...

Well pardon me but I'm extremely reluctant to get into controversy right now as my literary career blasts off under the auspices of Bacchus Marsh, however if it please the court your honour, you are wrong. I'm renovating an ap-a-a-artment right now for a "client" living just behind that Mitre 10 and am happy to drive straight past the place and all the way to Bunnings Northland, because it is much cheaper, has a huge amount of good and bad timber to choose from, and the staff are indeed very helpful. Meanwhile I don't know how that bloke in Mitre 10 survives, unless it's just a hobby, because there's never anyone in the place. But maybe that explains why he drifts about there looking like an undertaker. Anyway y'all might be interested to know that the chinese bread shop over on the corner does a very good salad roll for three dollars, and the fish shop on the corner of Woolton Ave is probably the best in Melbourne. Meanwhile for people who change their underwear every day there a cute little cakeshop coffee joint just opened up the road. Only the one so far. Yes, but there'll be more. Latte has landed.

Ben.H said...

Congrats on buying a house! I got all misty-eyed and nostalgic for the Australian suburbs looking at the photos. Or perhaps that was the new year hangover kicking in.

Anonymous said...

Congratulations! What an exciting adventure. It seems we might be buying some apartment/townhousey thing off the plan this year, but I've already started thinking about wallpapers, at least for a feature wall.

I love those tiles - they'd match these cake plates I'm covetting ('dork' and 'nerd' - not that I'm casting aspersions:

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=46175

Anonymous said...

Sounds fantastic. So nice to be setting up a real place of oneæs own! Will examine the house pics next week when back in Syderny.

tigtog said...

"oneæs own"

*ahem* "one's own"

Silly Norwegian keyboard.

R.H. said...

Well golly I have to laugh, I didn't think that last comment of mine posted, and when it seemed not to I instantly decided it was a mistake, not wanting to send it at all. I haven't been here for over a week, and now I see it did in fact get through, what a joke. Well it's the "plans of mice and men" alright, and this blog thing has its own.