Revisiting the Bradford Street House

This weekend my husband and I bought some of the ugliest closet doors!

I am sure that is exactly what the employee at Habitat was thinking as well when we paid for them.

But these ugly doors will serve two purposes. Our rental house will finally get closet doors again, and these ugly doors will save us money on having custom doors made.

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I can’t believe it has been nearly six years since we were fortunate to purchase and renovate our small rental house on Bradford Street.

Originally built in 1945 and at only 800 square feet, this little house was able to bless my son and daughter-in-law with a place to live, very inexpensively, after they both finished college. A year later, my son moved temporarily to Indiana to finish his master’s degree in seminary studies while my daughter-in-law stayed behind to fulfil her requirements to the state for her scholarship to the University of Tennessee.

Even though we were unable to financially help with his next phase of school, we were able to make sure our daughter-in-law, and our daughter who lived with her for that year, had a home to stay in without worrying about the extra cost of double rent payments.

Three years ago, when our son accepted a job in Missouri, this little house continued to bless a close friend of ours by providing affordable housing for her while she finished school and eventually got married. Her and her new husband were able to get established in their careers and save for a home of their own. We got the comfort of knowing that someone we knew and trusted was taking care of our little rental house.

Now it is 2023, and our little rental house is empty and ready for more updates and the next phase of it’s life.

What that purpose will be is still in the discussion phase. Rent or sale? We have pros and cons for each option.

For the next few weeks, we will be making some much needed small renovations, on a budget, so that either our next renters will feel more at home in the house, or a new buyer will take it over.

As a recap, this what we renovated or updated on the house when we purchased it back in 2017.

New energy efficient windows were installed.

The kitchen was completely gutted and renovated to be more efficient, and useable for today’s busy lifestyle.

This included making sure a small dishwasher could fit in a tiny 9′ x 13′ kitchen. Phase 1 of the kitchen renovation and the full reveal of the renovated house are some great posts to see how far that small little kitchen has come.

The electricity for the kitchen was upgraded to be able to move the refrigerator and stove to a different location.

All of the ceiling lights were replaced with energy efficient LED fixtures.

The entire house was repainted on the inside. The shutters were given a new color for the outside.

The overgrown trees and bushes on the outside were trimmed back and some small landscaping was done.

A new sump pump was installed in the root cellar.

A new closet organizer system was installed in the only closet in the house. The old doors just didn’t allow for you to use the large closet efficiently, so they were rehung.

Which leads us back to those ugly closet doors we just purchased.

The reason we bought these doors is because they could be retrofitted to fit the opening of the closet space, without having doors custom made, and when opened they shouldn’t impede on the available floor space in the bedroom.

I think these doors are going to be a challenge for me and a stretch in creativity to make them pretty. I will definitely share where and how that journey turns out.

The next renovation phase for the house.

Our plans for the house will include a new bathroom floor. The pink floor really needs to go!

A new bath vanity with counter space is also planned for the bathroom. This too will be a challenge as the layout in the bathroom is very tight and our budget won’t allow a complete gut job of the bathroom. I will work with what I have on this one and make it better.

The inside of the house will once again get a new coat of paint throughout the house.

And yes, the landscaping needs some attention and updates again.

We are giving ourselves a six week timeframe to get it done.

By the end of that time, a meeting with a close friend and realtor will help us determine if selling the Bradford Street house is indeed the right thing for us.

Wish us luck and I will share more when we are done.

Hugs,