A couple of weeks ago, and ad appeared in the local paper, offering a free house to be moved off someone's land. This is what my mother and I have been on the lookout for, although previous such offers have turned out to be for houses so far gone that they would have disintegrated on transport. One such house was in great structural condition, but was filled with bats. And bat guano. When we saw this house, however, we thought that we must simply be in the wrong place. It looked to be in too good of condition to be offered for free... but nope, it was the one. The owned warned us of "really bad water damage" - and after seeing some of the other houses that have been offered for free, we were prepared for disastrous conditions inside - but it turned out that the water damage was minimal and easily repairable. The house itself was huge: 3 bedrooms, a huge kitchen/dining area (bigger than mine, for those of you who've seen my house), a huge living room, two bathrooms, laundry room, and a screened in front porch. The owners told us they were going to wait until the following Tuesday, and that they would be in their business at 9am on that day... and that the house would go to the first person to make a commitment. This gave those of us interested enough time to track down a house mover and to make an estimate. We found a house mover and got a reasonable sounding rate, and waited for Tuesday at 9am. I called them at 8:50am that Tuesday... only to find that someone had just beaten me to it. My mom and I were second in line for the house. We expected that meant that there was no chance whatsoever that we'd be getting it. Then, this afternoon, the phone rang while I was napping. It was my mother, calling to tell me that we'd gotten the house. The people who had beaten us to making the offer had apparently fallen through on how they were going to finance the move. I was really excited, although promptly fell back asleep. I awoke an hour later and had to actually call my mom to confirm whether or not it had been a dream, or if we were actually getting the house - and we are! (Well, it's not 100% definite; the house mover has seen the house, but still needs to check out our land and our "road" - but it seems as though we'll be getting it!
8 comments:
How exactly does one go about moving a house?
Wow... snazzy!
Awesome! Guess this is your birthday present?
How much does it cost to move a house?
Melissa
Yay! Congrats, although I would have opted for the one full of bats, myself. Think of all the great stories!
Laurie - like W. Shedd said, you pick it up and put it on a truck :-) or in this case, you pay someone to do that. Also, they'll probably have to cut it in half, and put each half on a separate truck.
W. Shedd - Sadly, I don't think any of the fireplaces are functional. And I don't know if any of the chimneys will survive the move.
Diana - Thanks!
Gwen - That's what my mom said... although if all goes as planned *she* would be the one living in it...
Melissa - The guy we found charges $1500/day... so I guess it will depend on how many days. I kind of figured he'd charge by house size and/or condition, but apparently not.
Jen - The bat house is still available if you'd like it. It's cute from the outside, but boy does it stink inside. Ten times worse than sticking your face in a litterbox that's overdue to be changed! Blech. And apparently the bats are protected, so you'd be stuck with them!
Wow, how exciting!!!!
My husband's mom wants us to buy her house from her when she gets married.
We have land (Tyre Bridge Rd in Offerman) about ten miles from where her house is located (Trudie Rd in Patterson).
I have been wondering if it would be too costly to move it. Do you mind sharing the contact info for the man/company you are using?
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