Mapgirl’s Fiscal Challenge

I just paid out $3084.00 to the contractor for my apartment. It’s done. It looks great.

Total cost was $5684.00. Not bad for a DC area bathroom remodel. They’re between $7K-12K for a low-end estimate. But since my bathroom is exceptionally tiny to fit in my studio, I saved some money by ripping out a tile backsplash around the room (but also spending $300 extra to remove some extra concrete under the tile). Paint is a lot cheaper than tile, plus you don’t have to wait extra for the grout to cure.

My contractor left me extra bath and floor tiles, just in case they cracked. He’s going to send a granite care sheet for the countertop. (Basically no ammonia cleaner and wipe up all acidic liquids right away.)

I saved money by telling my contractor about a special deal at Home Depot for a towel bar, toilet paper roll holder and handtowel and generally keeping my eye out for the things that I liked in particular so he would have an inkling for what to pick up for me. We sent a lot of pictures back and forth via email. It really does help to have a cameraphone sometimes, though it’s the most loathsome of all cellphone features.

Half of the construction was paid for by my tax refund, stimulus package payment and the insurance payout. I took out $5000 BT on a credit card, but I was able to payback $2000 right away. It’s put a dent in my finances psychologically more than anything else. I have definitely depleted my emergency fund and added a little to my credit cards over the same period.

Was it worth it? Well, if I add up my construction cost to my remaining mortgage amount, I’m slightly over my original purchase price. If I look around my bathroom, touch my fixtures, and stare into the mirror with really good lighting, I am satisfied. Pleased. Happy.

While I won’t recover all the cost of the remodel, I think it was a good idea. There were small little patches all over the place. Just little stuff, but it added up in a way that didn’t look good. I figure I’m more likely to get a premium for the bathroom now if I sell it because it looks intact and unified.

The only downside is still the dust everywhere, but at least now I can rearrange my closet more efficiently. (A lot of studios in DC have a walk through closet with the bathroom on the other end. I hate the layout, but it’s what it is.)

Que sera sera. I’ll just have to live with it now! muhahaha!

After a deluge of rain this spring, my windows are still leaking. I tried to tell the HOA about this 2 years ago when we had a crappy representative from the property management firm. However, they’re only taking action on it now.

So now that I’m done the bathroom, I’m going to have to move out and redo the entire back wall. And if I do that, I’ll rip out the carpet and put in hardwood flooring. And when there’s money once more, I’ll have to redo the kitchen.

But since my HOA is somewhat incompetent, I will wait to do all of this until the window leakage problem is fixed. Since that’s probably not for a few months, I’ve got time to save.
Blah blah blah.

At least the flooring is something I can do myself on the weekend with a few friends.

The main part of the construction is finally done. There’s one minor problem to fix, but it still renders my apartment unusable at the moment. (Sort of.)

I asked my contractor to retain my original tub because of an art deco detailing that matches the building’s exterior. I had him reglaze the surface so I could keep it. Doing that costs about $400 whereas a new tub would have been $200 + installation. To me, that’s about equivalent pricing with the added non-monetary benefit of pleasing my aesthetics.

Unfortunately, my contractor didn’t have a whole lot of experience with glazing. He hired an excellent glazer through his business partner who had used this glazer on other projects. The tub looked great when I first saw the work. It was awesome and I knew I had made the right decision.

However, my contractor told me on Tuesday that it would take 24 hours to set and then about 72 hours to cure, so I wouldn’t be able to shower in it till Friday. There were just a few more things to do like hang a towel bar and clean the work area and everything would be done. That was fine with me.

I get a call on Wednesday evening. The contractor has made a boo boo. He misunderstood the glazer. Nothing should have touched the tub for 72 hours at all. Because the contractor thought 24 hours was enough, he laid a canvas drop cloth in the tub so he could step in it and put in the plumbing fixtures. He had inadvertently marred the surface with the texture of the cloth. OOPS.

The glazer said he can’t fix this for at least a week because you can’t lay another layer of glaze down for 7 days after the first application. While I can use the tub over the weekend, it’s not perfect. So really, I’m not going to be able to move back in till June 21st after the reglazing is fully cured. YIKES. That makes it nearly 2 months since I started the project which should have taken 10-15 days.

At least I am only eating the cost of the extra labor for the surprise concrete under the waist-high tile backsplash on a spot of the walls that didn’t need tile. Yes, I went overbudget, but only by $300, less than 10% of the total estimate. And I saved a little money by buying less tile overall.

I will do an inspection over the weekend and hopefully cut a check for final payment next week. Then I will be able to move back in! YAY!

Usually I give myself a little allowance every week for lunch and general pocket money, about $100-140. I put gas on my debit card to track in Quicken. The allowance covers most of my weekly expenses, including a few dinners or beers. If I know I’m dining out, I’ll budget $140. If not, more like $100.

Now here’s the thing. I’ve had lots of cash leftover the last few weeks. It’s good, but it’s weird to have cash left over.

I’ve been going out a lot less and I guess it shows. Good thing because I need it.

As far as the construction goes, I budgeted about right. I am sure the final bill won’t be a killer. I’m holding about $4K in cash reserves, which is WAY more than I need, but should cover any overruns that might crop up.

The contractor won’t be done till next week when I’m gone for a wedding. So he’s not going to do the walk-through with me till after the holiday. Too bad for him, but good for me since I get to hang on to my cash all the more.

He’s definitely found a good deal on a granite countertop for me and I get to look at fixtures I might want. It’s nice to have a cameraphone and snap photos of what’s appealing. We’ve traded a few emails so I’m not constantly running around to view samples of things. I’m very clear about what I want and we always confirm by photograph. I think that’s very key with being satisfied with a construction job.

So far so good. It’s been about 2 months since I’ve been in my apartment. It’s been about 3 weeks since work started. One more week to go till it’s over, and another half week till I get to sleep in my own freakin’ bed.

You know, everyone tells you must add an extra 10% on top of your estimate on any construction project to get the final cost.

Of course, my bathroom remodel is going poorly and it’s sucking up my 10% overage.

There was some concrete under the tile in the bathroom that’s coming down. Unfortunately, to get an even surface on the wall, the concrete has to be removed. Don’t ask me why in the 1950’s they put up concrete halfway up the walls, but they did. All the extra labor hopefully will not be a huge amount more, but I have a feeling it will cost me another 20% on top of the estimate.

I wanted to have a special countertop cut for me so I can have a shelf over the toilet, just like I had in the original bathroom. However, it has a 10-day lead time for the order, which would mean I’d be out of my apartment for over almost 2 months. The contractor thinks he can get me a light grey granite countertop cut in the same shape out of scrap material from his usual granite supplier. It will only cost me $100 more but will take 3 days instead of 10. Is that worth it to me? You bet. It’s been over a month since I’ve slept at home and I’m cranky.

But things got a lot worse. The contractor had a drywall guy come in and they put in the ceiling piece early in the week. They came back the next day and the tub was full of water and the new piece was soaked. Apparently, there’s another leak coming from the unit above mine. ARGH.

I don’t know how all this is going to play out, but why do I feel like it’s going to cost me more money and time, no matter what happens?

Contemplating things further, I think I can finance a bathroom remodel. Especially since the estimate I received is under $6K. Add on 10% for overruns, as most places advise, and it’s still slightly under the $6K mark.

Resources available:
1. The insurance company will pay me for the repairs ~$950.
2. My tax refund is ~$1400.
3. My stimulus payment is $600.
4. Liquidating my savings accounts ~$1300.
5. Cash I can raise from my next two paychecks, $1200.
6. Balance transfer at 1% APR till January 2009, $5000.

So that’s $10,450 in resources, not bad. Of course, I have debts to pay. And to get my apartment ready as a rental, I need to do a few more things to the plaster and the kitchen. The plaster work is only about $1000-1200. However kitchens are expensive and that’s what gives me pause. I’m not sure I should go as far as fixing the kitchen up really nice. Should I stick to something cut rate? Should I only update the kitchen appliances? At the moment, I am leaning towards replacing only the dishwasher.

Right now, in the aftermath of tax season, I think the only way I can take on all this cost is to sink it into my apartment as investment or improvement costs on a rental unit. Make it all a Schedule C line item.

Renting out my condo at market value will end up having negative cash flow for me each month unless I find a really sick cheap room for rent, which is possible in my neighborhood. I looked at a sublet for $575 a month last week. I could net about $300 in my pocket from positive monthly cash flow and put it towards debt repayment. Then I’d also be able to reduce my tax liability from a Schedule C net loss. But all of this makes me exceedingly uncomfortable. I am just not confident I can make it work out in my favor though.

I would have the hassle of finding a stable roommate situation and signing a lease. I’d have to move all my stuff out of my house and find storage for it. Having moved 7 times in 2 years during a transient period of my life, and recently reliving those times while filling out a security clearance form, I really hate the situation I’m in.

Of course, I could stay in the place. But then I’d want to remodel the kitchen, tear out the carpet and really spruce up the place.

At least I’ve freed up some resources and have a plan now.

Since the ceiling needs repair, I figure I should do the entire bathroom. I thought maybe it would cost $5K, but after talking with a few people, I need to budget closer to $7K. I suppose this is a very salient lesson that everyone needs an emergency fund. Say 3-6 months of take home pay, which of course would cover the repairs. Unfortunately, my emergency fund has only about $1.5K in it.

In desperation for cash, I looked at all my options here. I have credit available on my HELOC and on my credit cards. I have a few CD’s expiring, which I was going to liquidate anyway to pay down debt. But since there is an emergency here and now, I’m going to use them to fund the repair.

With construction, you usually have to pay a deposit of some sort to get the work started. In my case, the earliest construction can start is in another week. The work will take approximately 10 days, taking me to early May.

In looking at my cash flow and available credit, I decided, rather sadly that I cannot attend my friend’s wedding in Boston this month. There’s just no way I can find a hotel room under $200 a night anywhere near the festivities or near the hotel where my best friend and her husband are staying. I’m looking at $1000 for just hotel and rental car alone at a time where I need the $1000 for something else.

I have balance transfer checks coming to my house all the time for a promotional rate less than 2% APR. Unfortunately, these BT’s have a fee. A friend asked me if that fee was capped out but reading the fine print, I couldn’t find any mention of a cap. I called the customer service line and asked about a cap. However the representative said he couldn’t change the BT fee. Instead he offered to change the rate from 1.9% to 1% APR after looking at my sterling payment record. It’s the best he could do, but I’ll take it.

Now the trick here is that I’m sitting on $5K borrowed for 1% APR. Do I pay off my 11.99% APR credit card balance of $4K only to ring them up further as the construction work progresses, or do I hold onto this wad of cash and wait to pay it out to the contractor? (It’s going into an account that doesn’t bear interest so there’s no arbitrage going on here and there isn’t enough time to move it around and take advantage of that sort of thing unless I’m paying off the credit card.)

The last $2K I need, I figure can come from liquidating all of my savings accounts and my next two paychecks. The problem now is that I’ve shot my 2008 debt reduction goals to pieces.

I’ve been sighing a lot this week. Life. It’s what happens to you. Dealing with it can suck, but I look forward to having a shiny new bathroom with better lighting in the shower and for the mirror when I put on make up.

Luckily for you, this week, several PF bloggers have Emergency Fund posts.
Five Cent Nickel: On building an emergency fund
Get Rich Slowly: Learning to love his emergency fund
Plonkee: On why they’re no fun

As of Monday, the leak in the wall was found and repaired. The plumbing company my HOA uses sent two different plumbers onsite to fix the drainage pipe from the kitchen of a unit two floors up and one unit over. Absolutely nothing was going down the drainpipe and all of it was going out the hole and down the walls for 4 floors. EEK.

What does this mean? This means my HOA’s insurance policy for the entire building can pony up the entire cost of the problem, or else split it with the unit directly above mine. And they can cover the moisture abatement problem that I can tell is an issue from the yucky smell in my apartment.

I have decided that someone is going to pay me the $1450 claim amount written up by my claims adjuster. Either way, the damage to my ceiling is the worst of any unit that I have heard so far.

All I am waiting for now is a full written estimate from the contractor I would like to use. I did ask the handyman belonging to the landlady upstairs who came in and also did a repair estimate. He gave me a ballpark $6-7K for the entire job and a repair cost close to that of my claims adjuster, but I got a shady feeling from him for two reasons. 1. He didn’t really want to commit himself to a paper estimate of any kind. BAD. 2. He was pretty reticent. I wasn’t sure if he was really listening to what I was saying about my desire to balance value with decor. This is my permanent home and I would like it to be nicer than your basic cut-rate rental unit. But maybe one day, I will rent it out.

I asked a friend of mine about a bathroom remodel he did and the cost. He gave me a figure in line with with the handyman’s verbal quote. Too bad it’s all more than I want to spend. But alas, I don’t get a choice here. It means that I need to adjust my budget and expectations.

SIGH. Where to find $6-7K?

The ceiling caved in on my bathroom about a week ago. My friend had been staying there and she didn’t notice anything funny. I never got a call that there was something going on. Instead, on April 1st, I went to my apartment to do my taxes from home on my Quicken installed desktop. All was well when I left the house to go stay at my boyfriend’s house that evening.

Later that week, I come home and there is a note on the door dated April 2nd from the unit below mine. There’s water damage coming from my apartment and he wants to talk to my insurance company. Well I check the kitchen first since that was the source of some prior water problems when I first moved into my house 3+ years ago. Nope. Nothing. It’s dry as a bone.

Then I walk into the bathroom, and my jaw drops. I see the ceiling has caved in completely onto my toilet. Not good. I have a 2 foot square hole in the ceiling. There are about 3 layers of drywall and plaster fallen everywhere. I can tell that the floor has been soaked and dried up already because the bathmat has some staining on it and feels slightly damp, but isn’t wet.

Over the last week, I’ve been struggling to deal with it. I am now imposing myself on my boyfriend’s hospitality and it’s bugging the crap out of me. I really just want to be at my own house. I love my place, but this is a little too much for me. The landlady upstairs is taking care of the ceiling repair, but get this, there is another leak in the building that is still causing a problem!

Because of my asthma, I don’t clean up dusty stuff. I just avoid it and pay someone to do it. That’s always cheaper than an ER visit. My boyfriend did the clean up for me and while he was taking stuff to the dumpster, he left the toilet lid down and then I heard drips coming from the hole in the ceiling! YIKES! The leak was supposed to be fixed!

So now it’s being all referred back to the HOA to find the damage. It’s in multiple units and the origin is still not found.

At this point, I think the landlady upstairs will reimburse me for the ceiling repair for my unit, but I’m going to tear up the whole bathroom and remodel it just in case I want to rent it out. And if I’m going to do that, then I have some other things I’d like to do as well to the unit.

I’m going to have to stare at my cash flow for a while and figure some stuff out. UGH. Who needs this?

PS - I ran into Debt Hater this morning on the way to work!