• Welcome to the Contour Enthusiasts Group, the best resource for the Ford Contour and Mercury Mystique.

    You can register to join the community.

One of the best feelings in the world

F

FFE

Veteran CEG'er
Joined
Sep 3, 2000
Messages
753
Location
North Mankato MN
Sent in a check to payoff the rest of the debt on the pudmobile. Feels good to have 1 less debt to pay off :).
 
Grats on the payoff!

My Cougar was paid off back in ~2002 (you don't want to know what I paid for it...). I'm working on paying off my S4. Hopefully I'll be done this year so I can put more into savings. My 2 year old is growing up fast and college/marriage will be a killer assuming we are pitching in somewhat.
 
Yeah, our principle went down about $10k over the last 6 years :/. Damn interest.
 
Redlineracer12 said:
That's why you gotta pay extra principle each month :) It's fairly easy to "double" your payment when only $100 is going to principle.
Click to expand...

Oh, I do. I generally try to pay an extra $600/month. I'm going to get this thing paid off as fast as I can. Too bad the recession screwed all of us home owners dropping our values (sure they were inflated but it still kicked us in the ass).

Anyone been home modding lately?
 
I use a propane heater in the garage when I need it but a dedicated heater setup to run off the gas line would be nice. We have a tuck under garage so it stays fairly warm in there anyway (never gets below 40). I may need to re-epoxy the floor as that Rustoeum garage epoxy crap is wearing off in the heavy traffic areas.

Last month I tiled our kitchen floor, had some new counter tops put in, tiled a backsplash, and scrubbed our cupboards down to clean them up. I haven't done much tile previously but I figured it out after lots of research. The kitchen looks way better now. I was sick of the linoleum floor and baby blue laminate counter tops.
 
Blackcoog said:
Anyone been home modding lately?
Click to expand...

I was going to make a thread about the re-model we having going on.....

-removed plaster in 2 bedrooms on 2nd floor
-combined 2 bedrooms on the second floor to make one with 2 walk in closets (350 sq ft total)
-insulated
-drywall, tape, texture
-built a staircase to axcess the 3rd floor attic space
-finished attic space of over 500sq ft master suite with 1/2 bath
-new solid core prehung oak doors (10 total)
-new base and casing
-new carpet
-tore out chimney to put in 8" heat duct to branch off on 2nd floor for new bedroom and main feed for attic
-ran 6/3 from main panel to attic for subpanel to power attic and bedrooms on 2nd floor
-pulled out all knob and tube and ran new 12/2 romex for outlets and 14/2 for lights


That's been the last 4 months :eek:.

So basically adding over 800 sq ft of space to our house that we havn't even used since we moved in over 6 years ago.......
 
That sounds like a lot of work. I used to drywall tape for my dad throughout high school and college so that's one of my main trade skills. Sounds like you did a little bit of that. How did that turn out? If you've never done it before it can be a huge pain in the ass. Not to mention plaster is just plain evil. lol

I've thought about installing new doors/knobs in our home. What did it cost per door?

We really wanted a little more space so we were looking at new homes for a bit but I love the area we are in and we have settled for remodeling to keep us interested in it. Also it's nearly impossible to sell a home now for a decent price.
 
I worked in the trades for years and was a partner in my friends construction company. I have framed/sidded/roofed/tape/mudded/textured/electrical/trimmed complete houses already so it wasn't too bad, it's getting motivated to work on it that was the hard part.


Menards had pre-hung 6 panel oak unfinished doors for $99 each on sale with brass hinges. Door handles are going for at least $20 each for mediocre brands. So we have about $1200+ tax just in doors and hardware and I still have to stain them in the spring.

I called a contractor I use to work for because I knew they saved all the extra trim from jobs. She said come to the shop and make me an offer. I paid $100 for over 1,800 lineal feet of pre-finished colonial wide casing and base! Should have costed about $2k for all of that :eek:. That was the best deal yet.

The carpet was the next best deal, I shoveled 3 weeks worth of snow for my neighbor while he was on vacation in exchange for the carpet install on the 2nd floor bedroom. I just had to buy the carpet. Saved me $500 and he is installing the 500+ sq ft of carpet in the attic too.

Rough electrical was about $700

Another $2,500 for insulation, drywall, etc.


Should be into it for about $8k total when done :eek:.
 
My house hasn't gone down in price. In fact it has gone up up up. Bought for a whopping $43K 5 years ago so....had a realtor come during the summer and said we could easily ask $69K for it....would sell for $60K easy. Not too bad for profit if you ask me

Things I have done to the house:
New electrical mass and moved breaker box
New Laundry tubs
Gutted kitchen and redid it--floors, cabinets, countertops, appliances
Mostly gutted bathroom (ceder shower installed, but going to remove it and put in a whirlpool tub in the next year or so)
New Carpeting in two bedrooms and soon to be in the living room
Bamboo flooring in the dining room
Windows
Deck
Fencing all around the back yard
Pine up stairs bedroom to cover ugly plaster
Installed sump pump
Half of the house rewired


Wifes sister has been going gang busters with the house they bought this last year.
Fencing for their yard (roughly a half acre)
put carpeting in the basement.....month later took up carpeting to install tile
spending $30K on their kitchen remodel
paid cash for all of this....bastards.....lol
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top