I have owned four homes in my life, and I can tell you: The list of surprise expenses never seems to stop. Yes, I have always favored older homes, so I probably get more fix-its than someone with a brand-new house. But, I think that if your home is even just 10 years old, you are going to have to keep that savings account stocked with emergency funds, and keep that checkbook handy. Not to be a Debbie Downer, but I think it can be really helpful to prospective and recent homebuyers to know about the kinds of expenses — surprises, as well as costs that can easily escalate — that they may expect. So, I’m throwing this story open to readers to share their experiences.
Readers:
What problems have you needed to throw money at,
when it comes to repairing or maintaining your home —
things you never really expected, or
which ended up costing much more than you planned?
.
I’ll start our list by explaining my photo above: Tree damage. A tree on my neighbor’s lot fell half-way out of the ground and onto our fence. We were responsible for all damage, can you believe it. Had to pay to have the tree completely removed (from the point at which it crossed our property line), and I have yet to have the fence repaired. Yes: Insurance paid for some of it. But overall, less than 1/4 of the expense, I’d say. We have spent A LOT of money trimming, cabling, removing and repairing damage — all due to trees on our mature lot. Pain in the a** and definitely, an unexpected pain in the wallet.
Valerie E says
We have a 20’s bungalow, and getting a cute place in our town for under $200K is a bargain, so we jumped on it. I love the house, but it needed and still needs many expensive renovations, including a new water heater, heating and cooling system (old asbestos pipes had to go!) some historically appropriate replacement windows for the ones too rotted to restore, but the worst problem was the backyard, which we finally had graded after 11 years in the home. Not only was the lawn lumpy and hard to walk over, before it could be plowed we had to hire someone to break up the tons and tons of concrete that was buried in the yard. I have been pulling concrete up out of the yard every year since we bought the house. The previous owners built a deck over buried sidewalks, there was foundation at the end of the driveway that needed to be jack hammered apart, there were long 10 foot rectangles of concrete, there were pipes covered in tar and concrete, and under the soil level we found old glass bottles mixed with concrete. I have NO idea why the long-dead previous owners of the house had that much cement, but almost all of it is gone now. I still find a chunk now and then walking around the yard. It cost many hours of manpower from me and my family, It cost 1500 dollars to have the yard graded and seeded after it all was over, about 300 dollars to rent the large dumpster to haul it away, and I honestly cannot remember how much we spent on labor and jackhammer rental. Finally, though we have a yard. No shed, garage, deck or patio yet, but there is an honest to goodness backyard out there.
pam kueber says
Was all that stuff used as cheap fill. “Cheap” at the time — not now!
Valerie E. says
I’m not sure! Some of it was obviously old sidewalks and foundations, but the asphalt+cement yard art will always remain a mystery. I forgot to mention that the whole mess had three large and dying trees growing over it that needed to be removed before we could start digging. It was located next to the property line and the neighbor’s garage.
I’m just relieved that it’s gone.
I much prefer the backyard chickens that are there now. <3
Melanie says
Wow, I could probably write a whole book on this subject just on this house alone to say nothing of my previous three mobile homes!
Everything I touch in this house ends up costing me four times what I thought it was going to. I had old panelling in the laundry room that had gotten wet (damaged before I ever moved in) and warped. Thought I’d pull it out and replace it with drywall. 🙁 I ended up replacing a four foot by four foot section of floor clear down to the floor joists, I ended up replacing most of the four foot wide section of wall, studs, insulation, sill, EVERYTHING!
Early on, I discovered that when indoor plumbing was added to this house, they just cut a floor joist to install the toilet. My bathroom has a decided slope to it that I have not fixed yet. That involves working in a tiny crawl space with the spiders and mice…….
Eileen Gill says
I have a foundation crew under my house right this second. They are checking to see if the piers that were poured by the architect/house flipper/ previous owner were actually poured with the correct footings.
We just bought this place–1920’s mission and so far we have had to replace the previous owner’s 2 year old roof. (13k) We love it but thankful we do not have kids to put through college. This home was very clearly “remuddled” but we love it anyway.
I sell real estate and I see it all the time. That’s why I always tell me clients that it’s fun to pick out tile but it’s not fun to pour concrete under your house. Buy the old lady house with the expensive HVAC and the high end roof–not the house with the cute “new kitchen” and the 20 year old HVAC….a new roof and a new HVAC costs more than a new kitchen!
pam kueber says
Sounds like you are giving your customers the right advice — good on you, Eileen!
Wendy M. says
We’ve been fortunate not to have any really expensive/dangerous problems so far (knock on wood) unless you count the fir tree leaning toward our daughter’s bedroom window that had to be removed. (Yea for great neighbors that were willing to split the cost!)
That said, we did just get a quote to replace our medium-size side deck, which is rotting. It is a really interesting design, with a glass wind screen on one end and privacy screening on the other (all original from 1964, as far as we can tell.) The quote came in at $7,500-$10,000! We are having a hard time considering paying that much for an area that will sit in the Oregon rain year after year, deteriorating all over again. We’ve tabled the idea for now and are hoping to come up with a less expensive option in the spring.
pam kueber says
Sounds like permeable pavers — as opposed to a wood deck — might be in your future….
Marion R says
That’s actually not that bad a quote. To rebuild can cost +$25K!
Uncle Atom says
Oh Pam, a painful topic. We settled on a 1950s rancher in 2000, and three weeks later the sewer backed up in the basement. Plumber’s verdict – tree roots grown into the clay pipe. Not only did it set us back about $10k, but we lost a whole row of beautiful 40 year old azaleas in the process. Someone had planted a cedar tree about 8 feet from the front of the house and its roots thrived on sewage for years before we got there. We sold that place six years later and made money on it, but that experience really hurt at the time.
Nocoretro says
Exactly what we are going through now. Minus taking down the trees. We have to replace the pipes all through our backyard and through the neighbors yard and driveway.
Mary says
We are on borrowed time with our pipes as well. Also old clay pipes. Every time I see a crew digging up the street somewhere in the neighborhood, I wonder if we should just act pre-emptively and get it done.
pam kueber says
This was the very first thing that went wrong in my very first house! Don’t we LOVE to pay for TV colonoscopies for our sewer pipes!
Tami says
We moved into our present home and FIVE DAYS LATER the septic system spectacularly backed up on us (I will never get that sight out of my head). Long story short, the inlet to the septic tank was 3″ HIGHER than the outlets (yes, there are four) from our home. In other words, it had never worked and the inspector did a crappy job of testing it. $10,000 to fix it.
Abigail Grotke says
Painting the exterior! I had my house painted in 2004 for quite a hefty sum (15K), and I thought it would last a heck of a lot longer. Now need to get parts of it where the paint is peeling off again (where they hand’t taken it down to the bare wood last time), and contemplating either a quicker fix ($2500) or a more thorough paint job ($3900). I’d much rather be spending the money on renovating my bathroom! Sigh. I guess this is why people go for siding, though I’m not quite ready for that yet.
pam kueber says
We need to get this message to the reader who wanted to paint her brick!
Elizabeth Mary says
Whatever you decide to do, I hope it works and corrects the underlying problem. I live in an area with many wonderful old houses with owners who love them and have stayed away from siding. BUT, any number of them need to be painted frequently. I have lived her 26 years now and over those years I have seen any number of newly painted homes begin to peel in only a few years always at the same place, or on the same side. Yet, other homes stay clean looking for a long time. It always made me happy that I had a stucco house that still had its original pumpkin color. When I moved 8 years ago I was happy the house I wanted had vinyl already because there is no way I could have put it on, and by having it I managed to avoid that expensive re-painting so many seem to go through. Hate the vinyl and if I could afford to I would re-do it with some of the newer surfaces, but I can’t afford that — until and if ever it becomes a necessity.
kathyhora says
You all should do what my 84 year old Dad does (100+ year old 5 bedroom, 3 bath, farm house) – he paints a side a year. The house always looks beautiful.
Leslie says
My friend’s father did the same thing, genius…
Ann-Marie Meyers says
I hate my vinyl siding. It looks too 1990’s for my 1962 house. If I had the money I would rip it off and replace it with something like Hardyboard that looks more like real siding. I would also use the kind that looks like cedar shake on my upper level.
Anne-Marie Cottone says
A friend of mine went away for the holidays, and returned to learn that a large sinkhole had collapsed part of her backyard! Apparently it was due to an old septic tank that had been removed when the area was sewered, and the fill had decided to settle many years later.
pam kueber says
Woah, this one is going to be hard to beat!
Valerie E says
My neighbor has one of those right now! I’ve been told I can throw concrete in it! lol
Trina Bobrowski says
We just bought a 1974 ranch in Feb. 2010, in June we started have plumbing problems, then the master shower backed up. Found out we needed a whole new septic field and of course we had to have the more expensive one, it was just finished 3 weeks ago and 13K later. The crummy thing is the house we just sold in Michigan after 2 years of waiting was an old farm house that we personally spent 5 years remodeling and 100k later wound up selling it for 5k more than we bought if for! I guess we are just destined to lose tons of money on our homes.
pam kueber says
Trina, don’t feel so bad — I have the same curse! Someday I will publish my post about how we really NEVER make any money on our houses.
Gwen says
My family and I just bought a little brick colonial house (1940) in a historic neighborhood almost a year ago. The home inspector told us that the cracked and worn slates on our original roof had to be replaced. He told us we were looking at $2K in repair and then to maintain, about $500-$1000/year. About 3 months after our move in, we decided to have the roof fixed, as we were having our attic finished. Long story short, roofer came in and said the entire roof had to be replaced. Irritated by that answer, I had two other companies come in who told me exactly the same thing. A $2K problem quickly turned into one that cost us $45K! Because we are in a historic district, we had to replace the roof with the original material – no synthetic slate. Ouch! Moral to this story – make sure your home inspector knows what to look for when inspecting a slate roof. Glad we replaced the whole thing (even though I can never retire :)) because with all the rain in Baltimore this year, my neighbors have dealt with leaking roofs and massive flooding! Cheers!
AmyEbbertHill says
State Farm came over & surveyed my property after I had been here a year, took pictures, and sent me a letter advising me that if I didn’t have the limbs overhanging my house trimmed by a certain date, they would cancel my homeowners insurance. I hired a tree guy who took care of that issue. I had him come back the next year to do more pruning. It’s easier to deal with in the summer than during an ice storm in February.
Does having a 15 year old furnace go out on a cold winter day count? I have had that happen to me. It’s an immediate repair that isn’t covered by insurance and was an unexpected expense. I am smarter that I used to be because I had the means available to write the guy a check, thank goodness. No heat can be very bad in the winter!
Tami says
Amy, that’s a common bullying tactic used by many insurers that you don’t necessarily need to accommodate. It happened to my mom, who lives on a wooded lot in Connecticut. In her case, they practically demanded she take down all of her (healthy) trees. There really is no need to ‘top’ or cut back healthy limbs on trees UNLESS it’s called for by a certified arborist. In fact, ‘topping’ causes more problems than it solves and easily cuts a tree’s life in half.
kathy.hora says
oh that is good to know Tami! We have some beautiful trees on our lot – they’ve probably been there much longer than the house – and a friend of ours just went thru this with her insurance company so we were worried that we were next….forewarned is forearmed! If they try this i will insist upon a certified arborist – and i’m going to tell my friend this too! thanks!
Elizabeth Mary says
You could also look into changing insurance companies. For years I had all my insurance with Travelers and then the agency I used was dropped by the company and they put me with another insurance company I had never heard of. They came ot my house — a 1926 stucco bungalow and told me they would drop me if I did not put railings on the back and front steps. The back did not bother me, but the front steps were, for a bungalow, grand and wide and had a “buttress” on the side. They were a strong and important achitectural feature and a railing would ruin that. My neighbor had similar front steps, without any side buttress and also had travelers from a different agent. So, I switched agency and go back with Travelers and that was the end of being told I had to ruin my house by the insurance company.
Similarly, I am still with Travelers in my new 1946 Cape Cod ranch and I have many very tall trees on my quarter of an acre. The big ice store of a few years ago resulted in one of them falling over and damaging my fence. It took me a while to realize that because the fence was damaged I could probably get some coverage, but once I did, Travelers showed up in a day or so and gave me generous settlement that covered having the tree removed and getting the fence replaced. And, they have never come back to tell me I have to take down or do anything to the remaining very tall trees.
pam kueber says
Yup: Insurance can cover tree damage — even basic “clean up” when nothing is damaged, I learned the last time the big wind blew through our place two months ago. Be sure to check.
Amy Butler says
I have to disagree about this being a “bullying tactic”.
We just experienced this with our next door neighbor. we live in Mobile, AL (hurricane central FYI) in a 1924 craftsman in one of the many historic districts within the city limits. Also, our city has many laws protecting the trees (many thousands of 300+ year old live oaks) that it is famous for.
(Side note– we get our Historic Plaque from the city at a ceremony tomorrow!!)
Our next door neighbor is a sweet and shy man, but a dead pecan tree was dropping limbs in his back yard (and on his home…punching holes in his roof even) and it was very scary.
State Farm told him that they would cancel his homeowner’s insurance. The city came after a complaint by Alabama Power (the tree had downed lines and he didn’t deal with it) and another complaint by our family— we JUST had a hand-nailed roof put on—and have toddlers who i wouldn’t let play in the backyard.
Finally the tree has been taken down. Thank God.
State Farm doesn’t do the “remove these trees” usually. Unless it is a “clear and imminent danger” to the home or neighbors/residents. It’s a risk vs. reality thing.
trimming trees is one of those “basic home ownership” line items that people need to take care of and many don’t. often, even just a major limb can weigh many tons — the equivalent of a train car (or two) falling from the air.
PDX says
We totally had a bully agency (Allstate) do this. We bought a house in Nov 2012, all the underwriting came through just fine and we were insured, no problem. We actually HAD the trees pro-trimmed that next spring. Then in July, a letter of cancellation came from Allstate, due to “untrimmed trees” and “uneven patio” (there is a crack in it, not a huge deal). But here’s the thing: the underwriter was able to sign off at the time of sale, no problem. And they notified us that we needed nothing repaired, at the time of sale. Honestly, if the patio was that much of a problem to the insurance agency, we could’ve probably made the case to have it repaired before closing. But they said everything was FINE, then cancelled us. I raised holy heck and a corporate supervisor reversed the decision. Our local agent never returned our calls.
So I called PemCo. Not only did their underwriter see no problems, I got our rate lowered by 1/3.
AmyEbbertHill says
Thank you for the informaiton, Tammy. My trees are as old or older than my 1945 cottage, and they have not been taken care of thru the years. We have had several years of drought, and then the rains came back. Lots of trees have weakened root systems because of this. I really do not want a tree falling on the house or the garage and if I could afford it, I would have done even more.
Tony P says
Luckily I’m a handy boy who was also gifted with the green thumb and the ability to cook.
So a broken heating system, I can probably fix it. Part of it is being fearless. I’ve never met a mechanical system that I couldn’t find my way around.