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Hello, I'm MikeyTsi. I usually keep myself confined to the AI and D&D forums, but this doesn't appear to fit either political discussion or working on my car, so here goes. My mother died of cancer on May 23rd. She left me her house, and expressed that she'd REALLY like me to try to live there. Given that it was her residence for around 20 years, this means I need to make some,... changes in order to make it "different" enough that I could live there. Let's start with some pictures: Front of house:  Back yard (with a partial shot of the outbuilding):  Outbuilding(s):  Outbuilding 1 (eventually shop, storage, and server room):  Outbuilding 2 (tool shed):  Back yard:  Back yard:  Side of yard (that raised area used to be pretty much entirely blackberry bushes that had taken over):  Back patio (with shot of  Close up of  Here's some interior stuff. This is an additional room that was added to the house, making one of the rooms a "double room". I'm planning on making this a library/collectibles room:  Other "half" of the double room. Planning on making this in to an office:  Guest room:   Bathroom:  Living room:  Bonus/game room:  Utility room:  Sewing room:  Master bedroom:  Walk-in closet:  Master bath:  I somehow missed taking another few pictures of the exterior of the house, the kitchen, the bathroom, or a good picture of the guest room, I'll go snap some of those and edit them in to this post soon. MikeyTsi fucked around with this message at 04:17 on Aug 7, 2015 |
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Jul 28, 2015 06:39
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List of things I want/need to do (in no particular order): Previous owners had installed loving carpet over the hardwood EVERYWHERE. I'm going to remove all the carpeting and reclaim the wood. Since they installed carpet, they raised the floor in the kitchen by about half an inch or so and put another thing of linoleum over the top. Need to get that pulled up and then the first layer of linoleum to get to the hardwood. New linoleum in the bathrooms (might just do hardwood in the one if it's still in good shape). Replace kitchen sink and install a new hot water dispenser and a garbage disposal (already has hookups). Replace refrigerator with a unit that has an ice and water dispenser (already has hookups). Kitchen has a modular gas range. Want to buy another set of burners (has a dual burner and a grill right now) for it. No hardwood in the library, but it looks like they at least built the subfloor right, so I can pull of a layer and lay flooring. Fix and clean the hot tub. Thinking about converting it to a saltwater system so I don't have to use chlorine. Repair and stain back fence. Due to its height I should install a third rail as well. Double the pickets in the front fence and paint. Paint house exterior. Replace the sheeting above the front and back patios. Need to remove a few trees from the back yard. One has split, with the split now going over the roof, and another's going to look weird being the only one there. The border of the uncovered portion of the back patio is old railroad ties, and they're totally rotted. Need to come up with another solution. Thinking about just slabbing the area in concrete after I remove the trees. Previous owners LOVED loving wallpaper. I hate wallpaper. Remove wallpaper, texture/fix holes and paint. When the previous owners did some of the addition work, it looks like they removed some roof beams. Need to fix that. Replace some flooring that separates the bonus/gaming room and the master bedroom, looks like it has pet damage. Replace carpet in sewing room and master bedroom. Run new telco/network/RG58 to every room. Not gonna do this until fall/winter, it's WAY too loving hot in the attic space. Replace exterior doors, key all doors to the same keys. Install electronic pet door(s). Put a loving door on the master bath. Looks like some dipshit roof guys just put shingles on top of shingles, and it's caused a leak. Going to have to pull that section up and re-lay. Replace fixtures. Home automation stuff. "Finish" the outbuildings (insulation, interior walls, etc). Remove the rocks from that raised area in the backyard and convert it back in to a vegetable/fruit garden. New HVAC? I really want AC in the house. Solar panels? Extend the master bathroom to the wall. Add a walk in shower on one side and a soaking tub on the other. And the bad news. It turns out I'm getting about 1/3rd that I was expecting from my mother's life insurance, and I may not be able to transfer the house to my name without going through probate, which might open up the property as an asset that creditors can go after. This means I need to pare back the stuff I was going to do pretty heavily, and I'll either need to do a home improvement loan to take up the slack and/or save up and do projects as I get the money together.
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Jul 28, 2015 07:15
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Okay, how about some WTF? I already mentioned in the previous post that some dipshits did a lovely job with part of the roof. I'll post pictures of that once I have the bravery to climb back up there. I'll also post some pics of what I'm talking about with the roof beams. Before my mother purchased the house, there was a couple that lived there. Why the hell didn't they have a door on the drat master bathroom? I'm seriously uncomfortable with the idea of pooping while someone's trying to sleep in the same airspace. They loved wallpaper. LOVED it. Loved it to the point that the office had no less than THREE layers, above the original paint (blue). But it doesn't stop there.  Not a portal to hell (I think). When they turned the room in to a double room, they walled up this closet and knocked the wall out in the guest room to have a double closet over there. THEN they put in a new closet along one wall. They of course pulled out off the wallpaper so they could set up a proper wall, right?   Nope. Well, when they knocked out the wall to create the entryway for the new room, they at least dewallpapered the area around there to give a good surface for that, right?   Yeah, that's a big loving "negatory" there too. I think I'm just going to take a blade to the wall for the closet to cut the wallpaper back, then spackle to give it a proper corner, I really don't want to rip that loving wall out just to fix that. I'll probably also just spackle the edges of the other "improvements" that were done to get rid of the edges, and it shouldn't be noticeable once I get texture and a coat of paint on it. More developments as I make discoveries. MikeyTsi fucked around with this message at 07:35 on Jul 28, 2015 |
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Jul 28, 2015 07:18
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First off, I'm sorry you lost your mother. Ideally we all outlive our parents, but it's hard. My father passed away last December, and I'm managing the probate process, which should close up some time in October if we're lucky. Luckily (I guess) he didn't own any real estate, and never had any debt. Godspeed on making it through that whole process, and remember that you get what you pay for with lawyers. I'm paying a little extra but it's worth it in peace of mind that they won't let me miss any important dates. What kind of experience do you have with home renovation? And do you have some kind of idea of what you need to tackle first, and what is optional for when you have more cash? That wallpaper situation is absolutely hilarious! It actually reminds me of the half-finished look of the house my father was in last. The landlord told me upfront that he was surprised anyone would rent such a ramshackle thing, but I guess it was good enough for an old alcoholic mechanic. How's the stuff-sorting going? Looks like you're only partway through, things are a bit disorganized. That part was a grind for us. How many loving broken lathes does a man need? And as we were emptying the house, my sister and I both kept stopping and saying things like "well if we just got this part it would work again, this is worth good money!" and then get weirded out about how much like him we had become, and toss it into the dump truck to go to the city landfill because honestly those lathes were never gonna work again. And he took the well pump from his last house in a fit of pique over getting evicted because he had lived there 30 years. It just sat in his shed because the place he moved into was on city water. Is this the state the house was in while your mom was living there? Did she do any major renovations? There are a lot of weird half-finished things I'm seeing in these photos and I'm curious about the stories behind them. Sorry, this kind of turned into weird venting.
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Jul 28, 2015 13:00
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Sorry to hear about your mom. Hopefully you can get the nitty gritty (estate/probate/etc) sorted out fairly quickly so you can move on. That said, it looks like it will be a pretty rad project with a lot of potential. The outbuildings are nice, now for storage and later for workshops and whatnot. I'm guessing that you're single or at least without kids, that will help things immensely. I have so much I'd like to do on my house but lack of time (and money) is the killer.
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Jul 28, 2015 15:16
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I love how there are already camshafts and cylinder heads in the workshop. Ai indeed. Good luck!
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Jul 28, 2015 18:39
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That looks like a shitton of work, but for everyone else, get your family to get wills/estates in place with transfer on death for many things like houses/cars and save yourselves the pain of probate.
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Jul 28, 2015 21:31
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Pile of Kittens posted:First off, I'm sorry you lost your mother. Ideally we all outlive our parents, but it's hard. My father passed away last December, and I'm managing the probate process, which should close up some time in October if we're lucky. Luckily (I guess) he didn't own any real estate, and never had any debt. Godspeed on making it through that whole process, and remember that you get what you pay for with lawyers. I'm paying a little extra but it's worth it in peace of mind that they won't let me miss any important dates. I'm actually setting up a consult with a family law attorney now. I can take care of most of it myself, I just need advice on what to do with the property transfer and asses what liabilities I may have to creditors if I have to take the property through probate. Most of my experience has been "I/we hate how this looks, I'm gonna get rid of it and see what happens". The living room area specifically originally had wood paneling on it and was carpeted, I pulled up the carpet, removed the tacks and such, removed some wood crap they'd installed in the entryway, pulled off all the lovely wood paneling then filled the holes, textured, and painted. The things holding up the sorting right now is that I have people that are "totally going to come and pick stuff up any day now". Once they do that or I get tired of waiting most of it is going to an estate sale and/or Goodwill, that which doesn't end up going to the dump. For the most part no, I started on stripping wallpaper and stuff before I started taking pictures. It's amazing what you'll discover when you start peeling wallpaper (as my next post will show). As far as the list: Trees Roof Beams Kitchen floor Hot Tub flooring Paint interior Paint exterior Sink/disposal/hot water That'll probably end up burning what funds I have unless I re-fi or get a home improvement loan. If I have any extra the next thing will be getting a new refrigerator. The pie-in-the-sky stuff is HVAC, renovating the master bath, and getting solar installed, so those will most likely come last. MikeyTsi fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Jul 28, 2015 |
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Jul 28, 2015 22:55
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Slung Blade posted:I love how there are already camshafts and cylinder heads in the workshop. Now ask how long that's been sitting in there. 
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Jul 28, 2015 22:55
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Sylink posted:That looks like a shitton of work, but for everyone else, get your family to get wills/estates in place with transfer on death for many things like houses/cars and save yourselves the pain of probate. My father is married, so I don't really need to worry about that for a while if ever, and my other "immediate" relatives have children and/or spouses that will get the joy of dealing with their estates.
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Jul 28, 2015 22:57
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I'll make fun posts until I get caught up, but to get up to date I've fully stripped the library, the office is mostly done (just need to clean up that gap area and strip the closets), three of four walls in the guest room are stripped, and most of the actual "wallpaper" has been pulled off most of the other areas, I'll be going back through with the paper tiger, DIF, and scraper to clear off the backing paper in the other areas. Carpet has been pulled up everywhere I plan on keeping wood except the guest room, and I'll be doing that shortly. I'm not too worried about getting paint and stuff on the wood, as I plan on doing a sanding job and then doing a nice swedish treatment or something to really seal it and protect it (I have 6
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Jul 28, 2015 23:05
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Floorplan! Note that this is "planned", the master bathroom is actually smaller than in the picture at present.
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Jul 29, 2015 01:57
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What did you use to draw up that plan and measurements?
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Jul 29, 2015 03:00
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IOwnCalculus posted:What did you use to draw up that plan and measurements?
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Jul 29, 2015 06:04
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Three of four walls cleaned in the guest room. WHAT A LOVELY YELLOW  And this wall, a totally different color. Is that some,... writing there?  TOM MOOREMAN WAS HERE 12-7-90 THE END IS NOT YET HERE PRAISE THE LORD ..... Ooookay then.
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Jul 29, 2015 07:44
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Got a response from a family law attorney re: consult, will meet with her on Thursday or early next week.
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Jul 29, 2015 07:45
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MikeyTsi posted:Three of four walls cleaned in the guest room. Amazing. PRAISE THE LORD indeed.
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Jul 30, 2015 08:48
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Pile of Kittens posted:Amazing. Thank you, almighty lord, for deciding to not annihilate us this week. Amen.
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Jul 31, 2015 04:57
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First, added some guest room and bathroom pics to the OP. Yay edits! Second, I bought some new toys for the house:  Kenmore Elite fridge. Pretty much exactly what I was looking for (except it's not black or metal, but whatever), and it came with a spare filter, $795.  InSinkErator Evolution Compact-P. It's a pretty bad-rear end garbage disposal, if that's your thing. $65. Someone's selling a Whirlpool front-load washer/dryer for $550. Thinking about snapping them up. Okay, on to the work. I'm currently working on removing wallpaper from the guest room, and I've gotten the walls done. So I've started stripping the closets so I can remove the drat wallpaper from there too. First, I took pictures before removing the shelving and stuff so I can hopefully get it put back sort of the same way when I'm done:   And I started on the right hand one. Got the shelving removed and started on the wallpaper.  Well, I at least don't need to strip this paint off, right?  OH, GODDAMNIT.
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Aug 7, 2015 04:28
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Yikes. That is about the point where I lose patience, gut the place to the studs, and put up fresh sheetrock (and new insulation, and wiring, and plumbing, while I'm in there) because it is less frustrating. Cleaning up layers from POs just sucks. Of course, I also said I would be done by Christmas 2010. This way lies madness, and 40 yard rolloffs, so choose carefully. 
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Aug 7, 2015 09:40
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We have a Whirlpool gallery dishwasher and it's been really good. Get a Manual some are really fussy about how you load it.
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Aug 8, 2015 04:09
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Can I ask why RG-58 cabling? It's very outdated at this point; all it's really used for today is antennas (mostly CB). I don't think it was really used in home wiring beyond amatuer radio and 10Base2. If you meant RG-59, it's also outdated, though you'll still find it in plenty of houses. My house is full of it; I've replaced everything in the attic with RG-6, but I don't see any reason to replace the 59 that's buried in the walls, especially when the cable modem has its own new RG-6 run to a dedicated network area. You can still buy RG-59, but it's mostly used for security cameras now. If you ever plan to have cable internet, you want at least RG-6.
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Aug 9, 2015 01:37
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some texas redneck posted:Can I ask why RG-58 cabling? It's very outdated at this point; all it's really used for today is antennas (mostly CB). I don't think it was really used in home wiring beyond amatuer radio and 10Base2. RG6, whatever. It would be if I ever decide I want Satellite/Cable TV again. Network connectivity is what the CAT6 is for.
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Aug 9, 2015 04:19
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Welp. Sometimes I just loving hate people. Doesn't look like they really took anything of value, other than some jewelry. I've already contacted the police and they'll likely have a detective come out at some point tomorrow to take the statement/inventory and hopefully try for some fingerprinting. And I'll need to contact insurance on Monday to report the damage and get a new door/frame, probably going to try for one that's reinforced a bit better. MikeyTsi fucked around with this message at 06:44 on Aug 9, 2015 |
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Aug 9, 2015 06:39
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Oh, I had my consult, looks like I'm going to have to go through probate to clear the title, which sucks because not only is it a pain in the rear end as far as time (and some expense), it means the property is going to become a probate asset which means I'm going to have to pay any of the creditors that forwards a valid claim if I'm going to keep the house. So, that sucks a bit. The Life Insurance was considerably less than I'd thought it was going to be, so I may have to refinance or do a home equity loan to get the debts paid. We'll see.
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Aug 9, 2015 06:42
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Maybe this will encourage miserable fuckers to keep the gently caress out of where they don't belong.  On a potentially interesting note, I found a phone in the house that I didn't recognize and didn't belong to any of my friends. Good chance it's just a burner, but I turned it in to the police just in case they can find something useful on it.
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Aug 10, 2015 03:41
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MikeyTsi posted:On a potentially interesting note, I found a phone in the house that I didn't recognize and didn't belong to any of my friends. Good chance it's just a burner, but I turned it in to the police just in case they can find something useful on it. A guy broke into my dad's house the same way a few years back, while I was sleeping off a hangover. He screwed himself by stumbling into me, and then trying to lie to me, saying he was looking for my brother, calling him by name. Instead of just running. Afterwards I asked my brother if he knew anyone who talked and looked like this guy, called up the cop who'd originally responded with his name and they picked him up the next day.
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Aug 10, 2015 06:05
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Ugh, that loving sucks. Someone raided my father's house after he got taken by ambulance, which the landlord helpfully left unlocked for several days. We never found his firearms. The police were uninterested in taking my statement or filing any kind of report. I'm glad you're getting a better response from your local PD.
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Aug 13, 2015 10:26
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Pile of Kittens posted:Ugh, that loving sucks. Someone raided my father's house after he got taken by ambulance, which the landlord helpfully left unlocked for several days. We never found his firearms. The police were uninterested in taking my statement or filing any kind of report. I'm glad you're getting a better response from your local PD. Same thing here. Several years ago my grandmother had a stroke when visiting the rest of our family, then came to live with us while she recuperated. People noticed the house was unoccupied, so they broke in multiple times, stole a bunch of money and stuff, and then needlessly destroyed a lot of things, including a hutch that my grandfather hand-made for her as a wedding gift. Basically, gently caress all goddamn thieves.
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Aug 13, 2015 11:31
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I can post pictures later, but I got the guest room mostly done (need to figure out how to remove some shelves in one of the closets to finish removing wallpaper in there), and I've started in on the bathroom. The contractor I was going to use to pull up the flooring in the kitchen is apparently booked for another loving month because his previous commitment can't stick with a loving plan, so I'm trying to decide if I should just find someone else. People have claimed and actually picked up a good portion of the furniture, so I'm getting down to the smaller stuff that's going to be easier to get rid of. MY GIRLFRIEND is working on texturing tests so she can find the "look" she's wanting. Looks like I need to buy a texture gun. I'll probably pick up another paint sprayer too.
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Aug 13, 2015 20:40
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Got some things done yesterday: Got the shelves removed finally from the other closet in the guest room, and wallpaper is mostly removed.  loving wallpaper on the ceiling, man.   One of the sheds is cleaned and organized. The sewing room got cleaned out, cabinetry removed, loving wood paneling removed, and the carpet pulled up.  Before.  After.  Found this while removing paneling, looks like another case of the "gently caress its". I'll just need to do a bunch of patching, I guess. Also got most of the exterior pressure-washed to prep for painting in a few weeks, but it's not really all that exciting to look at so I didn't take any pictures. Oh, and my friend decided to do this to himself while he was at my place:   He managed to roll his ankle walking down a step and broke it. Having to take a friend to Urgent Care and find out he's going to need orthopedic surgery wasn't exactly the best end to my day. I'll finish pressure washing the rear tonight once I get home (couldn't finish yesterday due to the above), and then I'll finish that closet ceiling crap in the guest room, then I'll be on to working on the bathroom.
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Aug 24, 2015 21:30
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It's time for another episode of "WTF?". I am your host, MikeyTsi. This weekend's work started out well (except for starting late on Saturday because I wasn't feeling well, and spending way too much time driving around getting supplies). I acquired a power painter and started painting a section of the house to see how the color scheme is going to work:  Started with this to basically test out how the sprayer works. I ultimately decided to spray the whole section so I could get a good look (and give the neighbors a chance to  Well, it's certainly going to be distinctive.  This spider had a few pretty bad days but is looking FABULOUS.  Started painting the library. Needs another coat but it's looking good. With that, I decided I wanted to pull up some of the linoleum in the kitchen so I can get an idea of how big a job that's going to be to get to the hardwood.  Pulled up some. Not too bad, it's 2'x4' pressboard with a bunch of nails. It's going to be a pain in the rear end to take up (I have to work from the edge and break the pressboard up and then remove the nails), but it should be doable.  Wait, what's this?  SONOVABITCH. What is it with these fuckers and multiple layers of poo poo? Well, I'll just pull that up and get to the hardwood, it's just more work,....  ...... gently caress. I may just try to get someone out to pull this up, it's going to be an enormous pain in the rear end to try to do myself since I'd basically have to pull up the floor twice and I just have hand tools to try to do it with. Once I have the floor up and see what everything looks like I'll decide if I want to try laying oak in here or just put down some linoleum.
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Sep 14, 2015 10:12
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MikeyTsi posted:It's time for another episode of "WTF?". I am your host, MikeyTsi. If you don't have a four-foot pry-bar, get one. It'll make the difference between having to kneel on the floor all the time as opposed to standing, and you'll thank God for that.
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Sep 14, 2015 10:28
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In addition to the longer pry bar, when I was taking up the linoleum in my parents' basement, I used one of these with a sharpened edge. It worked pretty well to peel it up and I just had to use a small steel scraper for a few stubborn patches.
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Sep 14, 2015 17:27
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Magnus Praeda posted:In addition to the longer pry bar, when I was taking up the linoleum in my parents' basement, I used one of these with a sharpened edge. It worked pretty well to peel it up and I just had to use a small steel scraper for a few stubborn patches. Amen to that. It is a loving lifesaver when some PO decides they will use all the glue! All of it! to secure their baby poo poo yellow linoleum down.
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Sep 14, 2015 18:46
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Awesome. Any suggestions on an easy way to get the wood up? Right now I'm basically having to use a chisel to get in there and that's taking forever to slowly hammer in, then break small sections apart, then pull out the one or two nails that get exposed.
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Sep 14, 2015 19:53
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MikeyTsi posted:Awesome. One of these is probably your best bet. You position the points in front of the nail and drive it under with a blow from a mini-sledge, then ratchet back. Takes about 3-5 seconds per nail once you get a rhythm down. The other option is a set of these, but I think they're more work and better suited to small jobs like de-nailing pallets & such.
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Sep 14, 2015 21:27
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Maybe a deck wrecker? http://www.amazon.com/Angel-Deck-Demon-DD-201-Demolition/dp/B00DODX6R4/ref=sr_1_10?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1442263755&sr=1-10&keywords=deck+wrecker Depending on how tightly it's all nailed together a smaller width shingle shovel might work too: http://www.amazon.com/Shingle-Eater-6126/dp/B0019VEDAW/ref=pd_cp_469_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=0CP1CNGQTQSCJE6KX569
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Sep 14, 2015 21:57
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I've got one of these FatMax bars and while I've never had to use it to demo anything constructed (I actually use it more in the yard than I expected), it seems like you might be able to wedge the 90 degree end under and pry poo poo up fairly easily. Is there anything in between "oscilatting multitool" and "jackhammer"? If it's really coming up in chunks that small I'd want to rent a power tool, but the tricky bit would be not demolishing the whole loving thing then. Edit: maybe this? 
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Sep 14, 2015 22:14
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This is all too much work. Just lay down another layer of linoleum.
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Sep 16, 2015 09:23
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