Upper Level Beams Going Up

The layout changes in our house require a variety of structural work. Most of it will be invisible, such as anchor bolts at the foundation or plywood-reinforced shear walls.

For the main structural supports we opted to go with beams versus a moment frame, an option discussed in an earlier post, due to cost and difficulty. Some of these beams will be exposed, supporting the "farmhouse chic" aesthetic in addition to the house itself. Our contractor has already put a few of them in place.

In the dining room, there are two hidden Parallam beams, one hidden in the E exterior wall and one running E-W, transecting the ceiling of the dining room (pictured above). Our contractor has already installed these, and as our early holiday gift even opened up our dining room ceiling for free and raised the rafters, giving us an extra 6" of height! This is something we had opted not to do originally due to cost issues.

There will be one very large exposed Glulam beam running N-S dividing the dining room from the kitchen and living room. Already in place but not permanently installed is another exposed Glulam beam running E-W dividing the kitchen and living room (pictured, below). All of these beams are required structurally, but to balance the space we're adding two additional exposed Glulam beams in the kitchen-living area, for decoration only.

There will also be new beams on the lower level, but we'll elaborate more on them once that work starts.

The Wall Saga Continues

The recent rains have been a real obstacle in the construction of the wall, and the waterlogged soil caused additional pressure on the already failing wall causing it to bulge alarmingly an additional two inches into our neighbor's property. This also caused the post supporting the NE corner of our dining room to slip, jeopardizing the structural work our contractor is presently working on upstairs.

We had to scramble to ensure everything was shored up properly before continuing work on either the wall or the upstairs. Plenty of contractor drama ensued which we won't elaborate on here; suffice it to say, communication and trust is very important in a contractor relationship (which is why we value our general contractor so highly!), and things seem to be smoothed over now.

Above is the photo of the first section of wall, completed more than a week ago. As of today, the concrete construction company has put up additional shoring for the dining room post, knocked down the remainder of the old wall, and are a good way through digging by hand through bedrock to excavate the footing for the new wall, which is deeper and thicker than the completed section. They move surprisingly fast considering what they have to do.

The temporary shoring consists of a massively long 25-foot parallam (engineered wood) beam, supported in our neighbor's yard, visible in the lower picture. This provides maximum safety such that even if the wall had collapsed into our neighbor's yard, it would not have compromised the shoring and cause further (potentially catastrophic) damage to the house.

Full Guest Bath Finishes

We've purchased the fixtures for the Full Guest Bathroom:
•KWC Designo and Hansgrohe Raindance/Uno chrome fixtures
•Caroma Bondi Dual Flush Toilet
•Restoration Hardware Hutton Single Console Sink

We are holding off on the tile, medicine cabinet and glass shower partition until we have more specific measurements:
•White subway 3x6 tile in the shower and on the south wall
•White carrera marble hex tile on the floor
•Carrera marble door threshold
•Robern M Series Medicine Cabinet with outlet (space permitting)
•Benjamin Moore Wickham Gray paint on north and east walls

The existing white cast iron tub is in good condition (except for the duck decals), so we get to reuse it.

Media Closet

As the electrical work wraps up this week, the details of our media closet come into focus. There are a significant number of electronics that will back our living experience, and we want to make sure we've designed the right space for the components and the connections between them, for our expected and future needs. Dedicating space for them in a closet on the main level means they're accessible but hidden away, so their appearance and noise does not disrupt the feel of our home.

The media closet has a 27" x 16" footprint. The upper portion of the closet will hold shelves upon which we can store DVDs, spare cables, and other related equipment. At counter height (36") will be a clean desktop surface with access to outlets, upon which we can place phones, iPods, or any other device that needs charging, convenient but out of sight. The bottom portion will be a set of ventilated wire shelves devoted solely to housing electronics.

Of course, all of these electronics will require cooling. Electronics radiate 99% of their consumed power as heat, so computing the expected heat generation is fairly easy. With everything running we will be using about 150W of power, or roughly 500 BTU. For future-proofing (say down the road we install a real desktop machine as a server, at another 150W) we want a cooling capacity to support double that.

The space to be cooled is only what's underneath the counter, which is only about 15 cubic feet. We're going to start with passive cooling - just a vent into the kitchen - to keep noise and energy consumption low. But we're putting in wiring for a fan in case things are hotter than we expect and we need to add one later. A good ventilation rule of thumb is to turn over the entire volume of air in the room at least every minute, which means we'll want a fan that does 20cfm or so.

Wiring

Figuring out what wiring needed to go where was a careful planning exercise. The media center in the living room will have a TV with surround-sound system, and we'll be going with Sonos and multiple built-in speakers for our around-the-house music needs, including the outdoor and lower level areas that won't be finished this phase. In addition, there's a studio where we'll house a separate TV and music equipment, and we'd like the speakers in that room to able to play from many different inputs: the house music, the TV, or input from a laptop or keyboard plugged into a jack on the wall. A media closet will tuck away components that don't need to be in a specific physical location, to keep the home's aesthetic as clean as possible.

Ethernet needs to be easily accessible so we don't tax the wireless with any device that could be wired, so we generally have at least one port in each room. I fought (and lost) a half-hearted battle to have one in the bathroom; it's probably for the better.

We don't anticipate needing too much dedicated video (i.e. HDMI) running around the house, but we do want to be able to watch the same video in the studio as in the living room so we are running cabling there. Most other video connections will be local (e.g. a DVR connecting to the TV in the same room). And if something comes up later, the ubiquitous gigabit ethernet connections should provide bandwidth for streaming video wherever we need it.

The end result is to house several Sonos base stations in the media closet, along with our wireless router, cable modem, file server, and 16-port ethernet switch to serve the various ports around the house. We expect this setup to handle our audio, video and network needs for the foreseeable future.

Once again, such planning would be nigh impossible without such drawings as the one above, rendered by the illustrious Jamie.

Window And Door Frames

The framing for the bathroom windows and dining room window and sliding door has taken place. Above, the frames for the three 2' x 2' windows in the bathroom, which will bathe the room in natural light. We're going with aluminum for our new window frames, for both durability and aesthetic, though we are still deciding on the color and styling in the full bath.

Below, the openings for the (roughly) 8' x 6' dining room window, and the pair of Fleetwood 6' x 8' sliding pocket doors. The doors are one of our "wow" pieces, providing a virtually clear floor-to-ceiling view out of the back, and in good weather can be opened completely for a seamless indoor/outdoor experience. The window will be a single fixed panel, its dimensions communicating between the more traditional windows in the living room and the modern doors.

Framing

Demolition and reconstruction continues at a frenetic pace; something new is in every day and we're having trouble keeping up with blogging it. Apparently, once construction starts things really move quickly.

First the plumbing throughout the lower and upper floor was completely replaced with brand new copper pipe; all the lines have been run to where they're supposed to be. Our contractor is also a plumber and electrician, so he can do these things himself. This is a real win because he can intermix this with other work and not have to wait for a subcontractor to come out and do it all at once. It's a savings of both time and money.

The framing for all the rooms on the upper floor is done, though the old framing is still in place temporarily for structural reasons. If you squint, you can basically see the new floor plan and it's the first hint at how our vision is materializing. The entire upper floor is now open (only studs are left - see pictures) and it feels amazing. Room sizes, like that of the walk-in pantry, can now be experienced, and they're spot-on.

In posts to come, we'll share some details on our plumbing and electrical choices.

When The Wall Fell

Our concrete subcontractors have done demolition on the wall and made some great progress. After excavating the soil from one side of the yard and piling it up on the other, they dug a trench - by hand - through several feet of solid bedrock. It's in this trench that they'll pour the concrete footing for the new retaining wall. Shown here is the rebar they've laid in the trench, to reinforce the concrete that will surround it.

Apparently pouring the footing only takes a day or two, and building the wall itself will only take a day or two after that. They've divided the work into two phases, so that they can fit all of the excavated soil in our yard. We are saving tons of money by not hauling it off-site, and having to haul new soil back in. After they finish the east wall and a 15' section of the north wall, they will repeat this process for the remainder of the north wall.

Demolition!

Demolition finally began last week, and our contractor has made an amazing amount of progress. The old back porch is gone and hauled away, as is the furnace. Plaster everywhere has come down and the lower level floor is being opened up for new plumbing. Tomorrow the retaining wall subcontractors will move their equipment in and start taking down the existing wall. Demolition on the bathroom will begin and preparations will be made for new electrical and plumbing.

Our contractor has informed us that the laundry room ceiling will need to be dropped 3" to accommodate all the plumbing and venting in the area, but that's no problem, we have plenty of room.

Potrero Hill, November 3rd, 2:00pm

Sunny and 81° in November! The weather today helped me remember why we live in San Francisco.

As for the house, our permit was pulled last Tuesday and we're finalizing details with the Retaining Wall subs. Our contractor is setting up to demo within the next week.

Permit Set!

We finally have a Permit Set of drawings that should be approved by the Building Department within the next couple of days. Maybe we'll start construction by Halloween!

Retaining Wall

It's become clear during our planning that the retaining wall in our backyard needs to be replaced sooner rather than later. We knew that it was a liability, and a significant expense. When we bought the place our inspector, agent, and contractor all suggested it could cost around 20k and would probably have to be taken care of within a few years.

Both the north and east walls, which hold our yard about eight feet above our neighbors', have problems. The north wall is buckling and leaning a foot over our property line, and even a steel brace installed a few years ago has only postponed its inevitable collapse. The east wall is cracked and crumbling, and will clearly need replacement but is less urgent.

Unfortunately, we can't defer repairs because they could compromise the structural work we're doing on the lower level by resettling the soil, so we must address the retaining wall first. Also, the estimate came in way above what we were expecting - around $39,000 to fix both walls! The combined urgency and magnitude of this expense have really impacted what we can afford to do in the first phase of construction, so we've been trying very hard to pare back.

We have contracted with a structural engineer, who we liaise with via our architect. This is an arrangement recommended by our architect (who also recommended the engineer). This has caused some communication problems; since we don't have direct contact with or control over what's produced by the structural engineer, we have had trouble understanding what our options were, or providing necessary details to our contractor to get proper estimates.

The engineer produced three options for the wall - our contractor ruled out two of the three because they required extensive drilling, and our backyard is solid bedrock so this would be very costly. The remaining option is a key-and-footing design.

Drainage

Every retaining wall needs to account for the water that accumulates in the soil. Either drainage must be provided, or the wall must be built stronger to account for the higher static load of water-laden soil. The least expensive option is usually to "drain to daylight" which lets the water run out to some neutral place like the street or an easement.

Of course, we can't drain to daylight and a thicker wall would be too expensive. So we need to use a "sump pump" to pump the water from the bottom of our wall up to the level of our sewer. Drainage wasn't part of our original estimates, and the pump needs maintenance lest it get clogged. This is disappointing, but if it saves us tens of thousands of dollars, it's worth it.

Cutting costs

This is a huge expense, and doesn't really provide any improvement in quality of living, so we're open to deep cost cuts as long as the wall does its job and is seismically safe. Here are some things we are doing (mostly at the suggestion of our contractor to save money):

• Using concrete block (CMU) instead of solid poured concrete. This is weaker structurally but our engineer approved its use.
  
• Doing only the north wall first, not the less-urgent east wall.
  
• Piling the excavating soil into the yard and tying it back rather than hauling it off and back onto the property.
  

The final estimate is around $24,000 for the wall itself, plus another $5,000 to install the drainage and pump, plus the cost of the pump itself (anywhere from $2-5,000).

Permitting

The permit for the work is "over the counter" meaning it can be turned around almost immediately and is fairly inexpensive. We have the detailed plans from the engineer and are taking the permit to the SF Building and Inspection Department ourselves (rather than paying the architect's office to do so). San Francisco also requires that the contractor have an OSHA license for any excavation deeper than 5', which is very strict compared to neighboring counties.

Construction is imminent, and we're very excited about an actual, tangible improvement happening to our home sometime in the near future.

Asbestos Fallout

First of all, the asbestos abatement company botched the job, in the sense that they (a) did not actually clean off all of the popcorn material from the ceilings, and (b) ruined most of our walls by tearing gaping chunks out of the paint and even the plaster (exposing the sheetrock) and leaving streaky residue running from picture rail to floorboard. Oops.

The remaining asbestos is inexcusable. But the damage is apparently "normal," it's just that the company wasn't up front about it. The abatement process is to use a strong adhesive tape to put up very thick plastic sheeting to protect the wall surfaces from getting asbestos particles on them. Then they spray the hazardous material with an "encapsulant" to wet it, and scrape it off, while running a high-powered vacuum. Or something. Unfortunately the tape tends to tear off paint underneath when removed, and the wet encapsulant can soak through the tape and run down the walls. It's harmless, but unsightly.

As a result, usually clients repaint after such an abatement. We did not know this and were hoping to get through the first phase without a repaint. We obviously contacted the supervisor and he agreed to "make things right," and there were workmen at our place today supposedly doing just that. We'll probably end up repainting now, but hopefully we get a bit of a discount for our troubles.

Second, the removal of the popcorn ceilings revealed another fun surprise - there appears to be water damage from a leaky roof near the bay windows at the front of the house! The black spotting in the picture is from the wet tar running from the roofing and soaking through. But the roof was replaced last year (likely because the owners knew it was in bad shape), so this damage is probably fairly old.

Our contractor has informed us this should be no big deal to take care of; it's likely the wood above is still in fine condition and just the damaged piece of ceiling needs replacing.

Given the facts, we now have an interesting theory about the house: what if the popcorn ceilings were applied very recently (like, a year ago when the owners made various touch-ups to prepare the home for sale), specifically to cover up the condition of the old ceilings? If that were true, they would have contained no asbestos! We'll never know (because we didn't pay for the expensive extra-accurate testing), but at least we have the peace of mind our new home won't give us mesothelioma.

Asbestos

We haven't posted on the blog recently, but there is much to tell. Mostly, we've been planning, going back and forth with the architect, structural engineer, and contractor. This installment will cover our experience to-date dealing with the asbestos.

Plans have started to firm up, such that we decided it made sense to proceed with the asbestos abatement and remove all of the dangerous material from our home.

In general, there are two ways to deal with, or "abate" asbestos: encapsulate it or remove it. Encapsulation is usually cheaper, but essentially just a deferment of cost. And sometimes that's not an option, such as for our ceilings. There was so much of it and it covered parts of the walls, so there wasn't a sensible design where it could just be covered up. Removal must be done by a specialist, following specific procedures to ensure no hazardous particles are left behind.

We first had to test parts of the home for areas of asbestos, which cost $360. It could have been done more cheaply, but that would have meant collecting the samples ourselves and mailing it to a lab.

The tests took a few days and came back that the popcorn ceiling as well as ceiling tiles in the bathroom contained <1%. This was "good news" as a result of >1% would have meant more costly disposal. We got a quote from the removal company (of course, separate from the testing company) of $3171. That's actually much better than we expected; apparently a job this size two years ago would have cost northward of $6k, but abatement companies are hurting for jobs now.

We could have paid several hundred dollars more for further, more accurate testing to see if the asbestos content was <0.1%. This could theoretically save money because such a low toxicity level would mean it could be removed like any other material. But the abatement quote was actually lower than what our contractor said it would cost to remove it all "unsafely," so we decided to do things "right" and hire the abatement company.

Finally, after the asbestos was removed we needed to get the air quality tested to ensure there were no dangerous particles remaining. The abatement company guaranteed that if the tests didn't pass when they were done, they'd pay for and do whatever was necessary until the tests did pass. We appreciated that, though we still had to pay for the first post-abatement test, estimated at $640.

Pictured here are the ceilings of the bathroom and living room, respectively, after the asbestos-y materials were removed. So far, total cost of the asbestos in our home: $4171. But the story doesn't end here.

Latest Plans

The first phase of construction will include most of the upper level, minus the powder room and several finishes in the kitchen (such as cabinets and our major appliance upgrades). It will also include some structural work on the lower level, including two strong shear walls that span both levels.

We officially closed today!

Initial Drawings

We've proceeded far enough along in the process that we have some pretty good plans to show. Pursuant with our "measure twice, cut once" philosophy, we're getting the entire renovation planned out as much as possible, and doing the construction in phases as we can afford it.

As-Purchased Photos: Lower Level

The lower level of the house is completely unfinished, providing a blank slate for us to realize our vision for the home. The character of this space was among the top reasons we purchased the property, and there are many notable points here.

First of all, nearly the entire square footage is available to work with on this level, which contrasts with many homes where the grade, masonry, or critical parts of the structure interfered with potential development. The old shed-like interior structures here are easily torn out. The rearmost ten feet of the upper level are actually cantilevered over the back, and we intend on enclosing that space and claiming more square footage for the interior.

Also unusual for the lower level is that the ceilings are eleven-and-a-half feet high. This means we don't need to excavate the floor, and after finishing we're likely to have around ten-foot ceilings on the lower level. Such high ceilings on the ground floor will provide a great sense of space and match the airiness of the upper level nicely.

The massive asbestos hydra seen in the first photo is an old gravity furnace; we'll be removing it almost as soon as we take possession of the home, eventually replacing the heating system with hydronic radiant floors.

The quality of construction evident in the lower level is good, but some structural work is required to bring it up to code. In particular, we need to bolt the frame to the foundation, add plywood shear walls over the studs, and add brackets where the posts meet the beams.

When remodeled, this level will house the master suite, a sitting room, laundry room, garage/workshop, and wine cellar.

As-Purchased Photos: Backyard

Directly off the back of the kitchen is a laundry room. As mentioned earlier, that's going to be assimilated into a great room. The laundry room has a door that opens out onto a small deck, with steps down to the backyard. The deck is rotting something fierce, and although it's still safe to use we're going to demolish it at some point soon, to be eventually replaced with something considerably more attractive.

The backyard is also in a somewhat sorry state of affairs. It's a compartmentalized garden that's gone untended for quite a while. The retaining wall preventing it from spilling into the neighbors' property is crumbling and bulging, so at some point in the next several years we'll need to reinforce or rebuild it.

We have roughed some landscaping plans and ideas, but the interior living space is our priority for now so we'll be focusing on that for the near future.

As-Purchased Photos: Living, Dining, and Views

The view from the rear of the house is amazing, and looks north and east over downtown and the Bay Bridge. There is currently a living room, bedroom, and laundry room off the kitchen, but we're going to transform them into an open, indoor/outdoor living and dining space that exploits the sun and views to maximum potential.

To join all of the rooms into a single great room, we will likely need to use a steel moment frame to provide structural integrity and protection from shearing in an earthquake. This could be very expensive, but we're open to it for many reasons. First and foremost, it enables a much more open floor plan. Steel frames also provide unparalleled strength to the structure, especially during shaking from an earthquake. Finally, an exposed moment frame can be a dramatic architectural detail.

Exposing the bones of the house in places creates tension, as the structural elements protrude from the skin and hint at what lies beneath. To me, visible building reinforcement is a reminder that I live in San Francisco, a highly seismically active place. Simultaneously reassuring and ominous, a moment frame will be an emotional addition to the house.

As-Purchased Photos: The Kitchen

The hallway opens up into the kitchen. Right now it's a throwback to a simpler time when preparing food didn't require counter space, and people didn't mind how awkward it is to have knobs in the center of doors. The stove is a 60s Wedgewood, complete with built-in salt and pepper shakers.

Our plans are to remodel this completely; new floors, cabinetry, appliances, etc. We'll also be changing the floor plan drastically, knocking out all of these walls and making the kitchen totally open to the living and dining rooms.

As-Purchased Photos: Hallway and Bathroom

The first photo is taken from just outside the two front bedrooms. On the left is the third bedroom, just down the hall to the right is the existing bathroom, and at the end of the hall is the kitchen and living area.

We intend to open up the whole kitchen-living-dining area, removing the wall and doorway at the end of the hall so it won't seem quite as far away.

The ceilings have a popcorn texture which we've been told frequently contains asbestos - we'll provide more details on our travails with asbestos soon.

The bathroom is horribly dated, and we're going to remodel it completely. We will leave the layout the same, but give it new everything, including making the windows more modern and uniform. The house has two big light wells; one serves the bathroom and entry stairway, and we intend to take full advantage of it.

As-Purchased Photos: The Front "Bedrooms"

The front of the house contains three bedrooms. The first has a decorative fireplace and a view out the window all the way across the city to the Golden Gate Bridge and the Marin Headlands beyond. This bedroom will become our studio, for music and capoeira.

The second bedroom is slightly smaller in size but has a closet. We intend to make it into an office.

There is a parlor doorway separating the two front bedrooms at the moment, and we aim to leave it that way and install glass-paned French doors to separate the two spaces.

There is a third bedroom, adjacent to the first but not pictured, which will ultimately become the guest bedroom. We will most likely use that as the master bedroom until the master suite downstairs is completed - but more on that later.

As-Purchased Photos: The Entrance

While we're waiting to close on the house, we took some photos of the place to start our records and to share with others. In order to keep the posts manageable I'll be limiting the scope to just particular aspects of the house. This first post is all about entering the place.

The facade is, let's face it, not great. New windows, re-detailing the eaves, some new paint and a nice palm tree will give the place the welcoming appearance we're after. But that's down the road; we want to focus on the inside living space first.

The front door opens into a small foyer. To the left is the unfinished basement (pics later on), and straight ahead are stairs up to the main level. We'll be removing the carpeting, and want to expand and modernize the window in the stairwell to maximize the amount of natural light that comes into the entryway. The vent, along with all of its brethren scattered throughout the house, will be removed when we say goodbye to the gravity furnace, to be replaced with radiant floor heating.

We're in contract on our first home!

After six months of serious searching and four offers, we are finally in contract on an Edwardian single-family home in the sunny Potrero Hill neighborhood of San Francisco. We have been looking for a fixer-upper with more than 1500 square feet for under a million dollars. Our preferred neighborhoods were Potrero Hill, Mission Dolores, Glen Park, and perhaps Noe Valley. Eventually, we want the house to be a 4 BR / 3 BA home, accessible to public transportation, and with lots of light (high ceilings, space, maybe views).

We'd been outbid on three properties, mostly by buyers coming in with all cash, so we decided to change our bidding strategy. One thing that made our offer competitive was removing as many contingencies as possible... but not to the detriment of our security.

For example, we had a general inspection of the place before the seller was to accept offers, so we could write a contract without any inspection contingencies. Of course, this means we had to put up $550 even if we didn't end up getting the place, but considering the value this added to the offer and that at most we'd probably only do this a few times, it was well worth it.

We also removed the financing contingency, because rates were fairly stable and we weren't concerned about our ability to get a loan. This was a bit of a risky move, but we were prepared to handle the consequences. We did include the appraisal contingency, because the new HVAC regulations surrounding FHA loans have made the appraisal process a lot less dependable.

So, here are the stats:

• the property was listed way below-market, at $800,000;
• after much debate, we offered $925,000 with the above contingencies removed;
• there were six other offers, and we still feel like we got a good deal;
• we're expecting to put in around $300,000-400,000 of renovations over time to make it our dream home.
  

A new blog for a new home.

My husband and I are starting a blog on buying and renovating our first home! We're doing this for a few reasons:

• to keep friends and family informed about the status of the renovation is going;
• to provide a reference for others who are interested in buying and renovating their first home;
• and to journal and track the process and resources required, for ourselves.