Deferred Maintenance

The old home's truest enemy.

We've been in our house for more than six years now, and we're still fixing problems that pre-dated our ownership.  Part of these repairs arise from our own knowledge and growth, but also from the things that should have been addressed before we lived here. 

Deferred maintenance is really the truest problem with any home.  In order to sell, there are plenty of owners who cover problems (This is especially true of typical flippers.).  The biggest issue is this leaves problems to get worse over time, and small problems can become big ones very quickly.  

​The Exterior Envelope

This is really one of the most important areas to maintain in a home.  From keeping windows and doors sealed and in working order to keeping woodpecker holes patched and painted, the exterior envelope protects everything.  There is almost no area of ours that hasn't needed maintenance.  Most we've worked hard to stabilize or repair and replace, and others are still on the waitlist.

The spring after we purchased this house, we went through the large expensive process of stabilizing the foundation and partially levelling the main floor.  With older homes that have gone crooked, it's nearly impossible to get the floors perfectly level while keeping them intact, so we elected to get it as close as possible.  It was an expensive endeavor, that didn't include the (now previously) sealed crawlspace.  

We still have some work to do in the crawlspace, but we have stabilized it for now, and plan to add additional support underneath it.  What was a hole filled with concrete debris and construction trash from previous owners, it is now a well sealed area from the exterior with rigid board to provide a thermal break and insulation factor.  We had no frozen pipes for the first time last winter.  

This year, we also finally replaced the roof.  This was a project that we knew was close when we purchased the house, and to be honest, we could've done it sooner had the financial ability been there.  It was desperately needed by this year (Read more about that project here).  Our waitlist is still repainting the wood portions of the exterior, namely the trim, eaves, fascia, and cedar shake siding on the upper floor of the house.  I'd hoped to do it the last two years, but there have been so many things that needed attention, it has been dropped along with fixing the porch windows.  

​Interior Systems

We didn't necessarily have a ton of systems that were desperate when we purchased, but there were a few things that were... questionable.  One of the things that immediately changed when we bought this house was upgrading our electrical system from 60 amps to 100 amps and switching from a fuse box to breakers.  We also inadvertently lost the dryer connection at that time, since it was hotwired into the main electrical, bypassing the fuses all together.  Not so much a maintenance issue as a major safety one.  We quickly got rid of that laundry system, and are still patiently waiting to be able to get a new set next year.  It's been a long six years without a washer and dryer in the house, but safety always has to come first.  

The other problem with the electrical system was the tied in knob and tube through half the house, and the poorly run BX cabling in the basement.  Over three years, we painstakingly had it all removed, rewired, and upgraded, along with upping our service a second time from 100 to 200 amps. The house has all modern wiring now, and that should last longer than our lifetimes.

Plumbing hasn't been a huge headache, though once we turned the water on after closing, it seemed like some of the pipes had exploded.  When the water and the heat were turned down during its brief vacancy, the pipes were never cleared.  Those were repaired fairly quickly, and we luckily were left with pipe heat tape on the supplies going through the crawlspace. 

Finishes are always a mixed bag.  The deferred maintenance in the kitchen contributed to us gutting it during our 3-year anniversary in the house, and we've done a lot to keep it from falling back into disrepair.  Old houses are lovely, but they take a lot of love too.  Especially kitchens.  Appliance maintenance is a step many don't take: cleaning filters, sweeping under and behind appliances is one of those tasks that falls by the wayside until appliances fail.  

Elsewhere, paint touchups are needed, floor scratches need to be addressed (we have some mighty ones at the moment), and windows need washing and seals examined.  It seems like there is always something to do with old homes, but these things aren't unique to old homes.  

No matter what the age of the home is: chimney flashing can fail, shingles can get brittle and break off a roof, and scuff marks just happen.  But be patient with your neighbors who are working through the years of deferred maintenance on the big systems.  Sometimes, we're a little overwhelmed.

This one was a bit of a downer... so more on the benefits of maintenance to come! I promise , even with these needy first years in the house, we are so happy to be here.