what to do? now own 2 houses, which to keep?

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

thanks CatJac and Seedcorn for some advise.

it was something i had asked my dh if he would be ok if we had to live there or chose to. he has lots of memories of the place and the neighbors growing up. some good and some bad. i would hope fixing things up and putting new paint on walls would help to make those memories a little better for him. (i should have mentioned that the house is still stuck in the 1970's color scheme with the dark wood panels and gold colored carpets and they're really grungy from 34+ years of traffic)

i found out from someone else on here that a friend of her's also has chickens in the neighborhood. and just up the hill about 1/4 of a mile is farmland that has been protected from development. so i am sure that i will be able to get the OK from the neighbors for the chickens if we put in a soundproofed coop so i can keep my roos quiet till i let them out in the morning.

the hospital would have to snatch up a lot of property around the house to be able to get the needed variances to put in any new structures. and in NH all hospitals have been placed on a construction hold for a few years. so they have to finish up their current projects before the state will allow any more construction. i don't think our friend who is not in the RE business even thought of that when she told us we could get more than we thought.

looking on our city's website they had a few rehabilitated houses they fixed up and resold recently. these houses are beautiful now but i was surprised to see one sell for $130k for the tiny piece of land it had (1/10 of an acre) and on one of the worst streets anyone could live on! (the street is known for drugs, violence and lots of crimes where the pizza delivery guys will not go near the street! :/ )

we originally bought our house for $158k. we've paid it down to about $150k with the way it works with mortgage loans and paying mostly the interest before going to the actual principal. i don't think we can sublet our mortgaged house since i think that was a restriction when we signed the loan. i've been looking at one of the RE websites that lists all for sale houses in our area and lots are getting higher prices than what ours would be listed for, and many homes have smaller lots.

for now, we are just trying to get a lot of the junk out of the house and take any clothes and dishes to the local thrift/second hand store. with the taxes paid up to June we're going to just use the time to get things cleaned out and decide on what to do. my dh is happy i have been giving this a thought that if we had to live there i'd be willing to.

 

[thistlebloom]

You seem to be in a good position by having some breathing space to think about all the ins and outs of either place.
And it's really amazing what a little minor remodeling will do to change the feel of a house. Paint is relatively cheap and covers a multitude of ugly! It could be a fun project that you could work on together, whether you decide to move there or not.

Our last house was a MAJOR fixer upper, but with some elbow grease and a lot of "sweat equity" it turned into a really cute home that repaid us tremendously when it was time to sell it.
Wishing you the best!

 

[HunkieDorie23]

I live in my parents home and I don't have a problem with the memories, that actually is better. We put in new carpets, floors, took down paneling and wall paper, replaced bathrooms completely, change pretty much everything so it's our home and I still have good memories. We did have to do some foundation work but the house is brick so now it's in really good shape. And I love living out and I love the acreage. Now we have a garden and chickens.

 

[April Manier]

with the market the way it is we chose to rent our second house. It pays for itself, paying down a few bills and is our "retirement". It took a bit to get a renter, but it has been worth it.

You could rent and try moving to the new place. It sounds wonderful. Old houses are work. you have to love them. Ours was built in 1883. It has had ALL SORTS of things replaced, but we love it. It suits us.

I advise prayer and asking for a sign....

 

[catjac1975]

I would also check with an accountant and a lawyer. You are better off inheriting a property rather than it being given to you. If you sold Dad's house can you apply it to your mortgage with out a big tax liability? I don't think so but would ask a professional.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

if i remember this right, when my uncle sold his father's house about 7 years ago he got hit with the 'gross income' tax since he made a profit on selling the house. not sure the exact amount he had to pay on it. inheriting it shows you got it for nothing and now you will be selling it for a profit. so you would still get hit with about 33% tax i think my dh said (it's probably lower than that though) as long as we don't sell it for millions we won't get hit with an inheritance tax which i thought jumped back up to 55%!

we have also thought about trying to fix it up to rent out but my dh doesn't want to become a landlord. i originally wanted an old house since i want to make some nice stained glass windows and panels and i love some of the art deco/nouveau styles i've seen. i was going to do the stained glass here with my garage windows that are cracked and broken but i've been trying to decide on what to use for a pattern. we might just replace them with the windows that the former owner left behind.

 

[momofdrew]

Deb you've seen my house...it also was istill in the 70's when we bought it... we have been working on it for 19 years ... the wrap around porch and deck and new roof on the out side and everything on the first floor inside has been redone... we had rust colored rug ,avacado walls... we hd also old horse hair walls which we tore down... old houses are very interesting we found a boarded up window we didnt know was there...sorry going off on a tangent here...If all you have to worry about with FIL house is taxes and the water bill...and you could sell the other house for what you paid for it...then you could take out a smaller loan or mortage to fix up this old house...what is the plumbing and the eletrical like... how old is the roof??? how good is the foundation... We bought our house mostly for the land... only a half an acre but lots in town are usually smaller...an acre of land in town is huge...as for your chickies the law is you can have 10 hens and 2 goats here in good ole' Rochester... let me know how it goes...ps Peaches is setting on more eggs!!!!!

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

heh, i've added a few more eggs to my incubator since then so if they are still good they may have a few more friends to grow up with at the same time!

the roof was replaced 10 years ago. FIL had some local that did renovations helping to get the house fixed over the past few years. the electrical needs updating but i have family that is licensed in electrical and i figured if we could update at least the basement and the main floor we should be set.

a friend is a licensed master plumber and had already looked over the house and replaced some of the plumbing that needed it. the water pressure is lower than what is normal here in Rochester so i called the DPW and got a list of people that are licensed to do any water and sewer pipe repair just in case we needed to reconnect into the pipe at the street. when i spoke with Peter the city engineer he said that it seemed unusual that we were getting water but not full pressure, so he was going to have them try and do a pressure test at the street to be sure it isn't on their end that needs repair (this is done for free!) if it is the pipe coming from the street going to the house we might have to dig that up and repair it. our plumber friend traced the lines and believes that is is outside the house that the problem comes from.

the foundation looks decent. the sill plate needs to be replaced but we need to check to see if it is just in sections or if it is the whole thing.

oh, Pam, there is a Church of God in Rochester, it is a few streets over from the house. for those that i haven't mentioned it yet, this house was owned by a church for the pastor and his family's use over the many years before my FIL bought the house. i'm not a follower of any particular religion but i do think there is a creator so this is sort of a reason i would like to keep my FIL's house.

 

[catjac1975]

I don't think your mortgage could have a restriction for renting. I've never heard of such a thing. If you could rent it for at least near the mortgage and upkeep, you could use it for retirement or educating the kids. Take your time in the decision. Consult professionals.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

well, we're planning on moving over to the other house!

we found out that with the outdated fuze box that it won't be able to sell till it gets updated. there is a neighbor down the street from the house that is a friend to our plumber friend that is a licensed electrician and can do the updating to a circuit breaker for $1200! and the really neat part is they are interested in getting chickens and grilled me about mine! the guy is really handy too! he's building a 'caboose' coop for his cluckers, and almost has it done!

we really can't afford our current house with the cost of the mortgage being so high and dh still being out of work. he did get a couple of interviews a couple of weeks ago, but he hasn't heard back on those yet. :/ we're also waiting for that final medical bill from the hospital for FIL's death about 2 1/2 months ago. from what i've been hearing from co-workers, many medical offices are now outsourcing their billing departments across the country. so that could be part of the delay. you would think they wanted their money a little sooner.