Never buy a house at a fire sale.

With the previous tenants moving out at the end of May, graduating, job moves, etc, my old home near USF was empty for the first time since I moved there in almost 12 years. I decided to take the time to remodel it a but and update things before getting new tenants for the Fall semester. Since this was before I got my full-time job in June, I had a little time. After the job, I had to come over early in the morning or on weekends. The first order of business was to get rid of all the old carpet upstairs. Putting down new carpet would be cheaper, but then I'd have to do the same thing again in another few years of constant use, so I decided to just replace it all with tile. Once I got the carpet off the stairs to replace with wood laminate flooring, I saw how bad a condition they were. So at that point the project got even more complicated when I decided to completely replace the stairs and just stain them. This was a major PITA and I had to hire a carpenter friend for some of the finer points or measuring, cutting, and placement, but I think the end result came out well. I repainted all the bedrooms, fixed holes in the wall, replaced all the old windows with new energy efficient ones, cut up and removed the old hot tub (I needed the parts for the hot tub at my current home and honestly didn't want to deal with the liability and maintenance any more), landscaped the yard, replaced the toilet with an efficient dual-flush model, and numerous other little fixes. I was finally able to get everything finished and cleaned up the morning the first new tenant came it. Though it sucked to not have the income for the summer, I think the place looks a lot better and can be a good home environment (and rental producer) for many more years.

Before Pics

After Pics