51. Drywall mudding never ends.

Note to self: never ever touch the drywall ever again. I really regret ever learning this skill. Because now I have to keep doing it myself. I really wasn’t planning on taping and mudding the drywall I hung in the remaining 2 condos all alone, but I had no choice. Plan was to quickly hang it up and hire a contractor to finish the taping, sanding, possibly even priming and painting. But things went terribly wrong with the contractor I hired back in January. I wanted to hire a contractor to save some time. To speed up the process and have the remaining 2 condos up for sale in reasonable timeframe. But instead I actually ended up repairing all their work losing more time and money. I re-done the condo #2 completely and currently I’m finishing condo #3 all by myself. Not ideal scenario. I feel like the drywall work will never end. Infinite dust. Infinite mudding. Infinite tape. I just keep working and working. Back and forth. Up and down the ladder. Up and down the stairs. 7 days a week. Taping, sanding, painting. Final electrical installations too. Switches, receptacles, breaker box. Cleaning. Always cleaning something. Moving stuff back and forth. Always moving tools, trash and materials. Managing. Organising. 

I Never have time and/or energy to finally edit some video update or put up a blog post. But it’s summer now. Ozone’s getting hot. Who wants to work in this hot and humid weather all the time? Not me. So I’m allowing myself some weekends off to get much needed rest. Telling myself I could at least write something here to bring my recent history up to date while I’m resting. So allow me to dig up some details from my last update and bring better perspective to the events and current progress timeline.

January 26th, 5 PM.

I’m inspecting the drywall taping progress again. After multiple complaints I’m realizing that this is not gonna work. These guys didn’t have the skill to apply corner paper tapes. Even though I showed them how to properly do it the other day. I showed them guys how to apply even coat of mud to lay the tape in and how to run the corner trowel over it. Should have I done it? When I think back about it, I shouldn’t have. Once I realized they’ve never done it before I should have just called them off right then and there and find someone else before they cause too much damage to the point of no return.

But I was weak. I honestly thought they will get a hang of it and learn it quickly since that’s what they do for living. I honestly thought it’s not gonna take much for them to learn the skill. So I gave them a tutorial and let them work for another few days. Following up with them and pin pointing the issues. But my inputs were not getting through. They just ignored my requests on using the corner trowel to apply the mud evenly on both sides.

Their work resulted in uneven thickness of mud full of missed spots causing the tape to bubble up and peel off everywhere. I kept asking for repairing all these spots by tearing the tape down, scrape the mud off and re-do the whole corners or sections. But when I came back I realized they didn’t do as I requested and just applied thick layer of finish coat over it to mask all the bubbles. But I still could see all them bubbles! I attached pictures of some of the botched work. Just look at the crap in the following gallery.

Botched taping by contractor.

I got so angry when I saw this shit again that evening of January 26th. I just couldn’t believe my eyes! I knew immediately what’s this going to mean for me. I knew what was gonna follow. Very uncomfortable dealing with the contractor. I knew I must end them. But after I end them I’m also gonna have to find a solution for fixing this. That’s gonna add delays. Time and money. Frustration. Stress. My fucking nerves! I’m pretty sure that I’m gonna end up repairing all this myself anyway, because finding a contractor for this kind of fuckup is gonna be impossible. I’m gonna end up ruining my carpals again on this shit. But I must deal with this now otherwise this project will never get done.

So I emailed the supervisor that evening that I’m suspending them effective immediately and started planning a strategy on how to get out of this clusterfuck.

January 27th 7AM.

Workers arrived for work as usual and started pulling their gear out the trunk, as I observed live on my security cameras. At that moment I realized that my email from yesterday didn’t get through and they were not notified. I knew this was not gonna be a pleasant encounter and I tried to mentally prepare for what’s gonna follow. I hate these sort of interactions. Firing somebody. Explaining the reasons. Listening for all the excuses and shit. 

Long story short: I asked them if they were notified, but they weren’t aware of anything. I asked them politely to collect their tools and leave. That I can no longer accept their performance. They had a problem with it, stating that they’re gonna fix all the issues. I said: “No you’re not gonna fix it. I’ve been telling you to fix it for the past several days and you have not fixed it.” They kept arguing and called the supervisor. Supervisor didn’t read my email and was caught off guard. Told me to hang on, he’s coming over to inspect the work and take care of it.

He came over and we walked through. I showed him all that crappy work and he started with all the excuses and promises. I told him it’s too late now. It’s a waste of everyones time, that I already made my mind and I need them to leave my property. I gave them their chance and they fucking blew it.

This verbal arguing went back and forth for a while. Very uncomfortable. I started getting afraid that they’re gonna cause me harm. Either material to the property or physical. I couldn’t handle this arguing anymore. I’ve had enough! And I freaked out. Adrenalin way up. The imaginary switch in my brain flipped and I started yelling at them like crazy. “Get the fuck out of my house now! Get your fucking shit and get out! I’m tired of your bullshit. Why do you keep talking?! Just get the fuck out!”

Slowly. Very slowly thy finally started to understand that I’m not joking. Eventually they gathered all their stuff and I locked them out. It was 3 of them versus 1 of me. They accused me that I was the fraud and crook here. They kept demanding the remaining labor charge balance. But if I’m supposed to pay top money I also expect top results. If I hire professionals I shouldn’t have to train them or babysit them. I told them I will calculate the remaining balance till I figure out how I’m gonna fix this. Then I watched them on my cameras for next 20-30 minutes sneaking around my house till they finally got in their cars and left. 

It wasn’t until just recently, when I re-watched these security cameras videos and listened closely to the audio. During that time they’ve been actually plotting a revenge. Because my house sits just by the road, they’ve been plotting on driving by and throwing rocks at my house with an intent to break my windows or damage my facade. They observed my cameras but little they knew my cameras also record an audio. I have 8 security cameras around the house. So If anything happens to my property I would send the police right after them.

February

They kept harassing me for following few weeks. They kept calling me and emailing me. Even the company owner called me and came by to see me couple of times, demanding the money. This was making me really nervous and afraid. I remember really stressed out not being able to focus on my work. Being all paranoid constantly checking my cameras for suspicious activity. And I kept repeating them that “I” will decide on what the balance is gonna be after I’ll have better idea on what the repair expenses are gonna be. But they wouldn’t stop harassing me so I eventually sit down and did the numbers and wired them at least partial reimbursement for their work. Shortly after that they probably realised they’re not getting the rest oof it, so they let me be.

Unfortunately secondary repercussion of this situation was that it completely threw off my plans for finishing the 2 condos in timely matter. Original plan was to have the condo #2 taped and sanded while the condo #3 had the sheetrock hanged. Then they would moved over to condo #3 to do the taping there and I’d have both condos primed and ready for finishing the floors by the end of February. By the end of March I’d have the floor heating and floating concrete slab done in both condos simultaneously. Then during April I’d have all the electrical done and realistically I should have both condos finished in May.

But that didn’t pan out. It’s mid July and I’m still working on mudding the condo #3. At least the condo #2 is finished in a”shell stage” and is listed for sale by now. Already had couple of showings but no interested buyer yet. So theoretically I’m not losing much time. But realistically I’m fucking late. I’m tired. Pissed off. 

So because of this unfortunate event I needed to re-plan the work sequences. I had no idea what I’m gonna do with the botched taping yet in condo #2 so let’s focus on condo #3 for now. Lets finish hanging the sheetrock in there first so I can also apply the moisture asphalt liner, EPS (styrofoam)floor insulation, roll out the floor heating PEX piping and have the floating concrete slab poured. And I needed to do it fast. 

After all this work I’m gonna move over to condo #2 and try to figure out some effective repair solution for those corner tapes. Then I’m gonna order wood for dressing up the staircases and then finish the painting and electrical.

I’m not hiring anymore help! I’ll finish all of the work myself. I’m a fucking warrior!

Acoustic separation walls between units.

During the drywall crew working next door I realized one disturbing fact. The walls separating the condo units are not sufficiently reducing the protruding noises. Even though I previously installed 160cm thick (about 6 1/4 inch) acoustic insulation inside the walls, then covered it with OSB boards, additional 10mm neoprene insulation and acoustic drywall over separate metal framed offset wall creating additional about 2 inch air gap, I could still clearly hear the men talking, playing radio, even all sorts of ambient sounds were getting through. It was not good. 

So on top of all that extra work I also needed to come up with an additional solution to improve the acoustic comfort for future residents. That will also not break my bank. I thought I had that part of my project covered, but I was wrong. So I needed to fix this as efficiently and economically as possible.

I had a pile of acoustic sheetrock stacked ready for the last condo. So I figured, what if I use those as additional layers on top of the existing sheetrock. And for covering the last condo I would use just regular sheetrock instead that’s just about half the price. I conducted some calculations and the stack I had would be enough for 2 additional layers on each side of those 2 separating walls. I would even need to add 2 layers to that already finished and sold condo #1. I really needed to improve the acoustic comfort for everyone. As soon as I got that figured out I notified the new owners that sometimes in couple of months I will have to come back to their place and do some extra work. Carefully remove the trim from around the staircase, build a scaffolding in the lobby and install 2 layers of sheetrock. Thankfully they have not opposed and allowed me to get it done later on.

So I ordered additional load of sheetrock but it didn’t go smooth. I had 2 pallets – 120 sheets – of sheetrock delivered early in a cold morning on Feb 6th at the front door. But when I started carrying them sheets inside they started instantly cracking and breaking apart in my hands or upon setting it down. At first I thought I was doing something wrong or the sheets been stepped on or damaged during transport. But upon closer look I realized that all the sheets are cracked at the tapered edges. Both sides. I carried inside about 20 pieces when I stopped and started investigating. I checked the remaining pieces outside and they were all the same bad quality. 

I thought to myself, man I certainly wont be able to work around it. I definitely don’t wanna hang these in my beautifully renovated house. This must be some bad manufacturing or something. So I called the supplier and explained my issue with this Knauf drywall. Lady asked me to check the manufacturing date printed on the sheets so she can check on it with the warehouse, possibly even with the manufacturer. It had a November 2022 stamp on it. Relatively fresh. It turned out that during that time they had some manufacturing issues and portion of the bad batch still made it out to distribution before they caught it. I was one of the unlucky ones. So I carried those 20 pieces back outside and they came to swap it. I even drove to the supplier to make sure that the new load is good.

Alright so during February I hauled ass 7 days a week to cover the walls ASAP. It took me about 16 days to hang the entire condo of 120m2 (about 1,300 sqft). Including those 2 extra layers of acoustic sheetrock. 1 layer was screwed, second layer was just adhered using low expansion polyurethane foam. Which should also contribute to better acoustics by creating additional 1/4 inch air gap between layers. 

Then, in order to be able to finish the floors, I needed to dismantle the scaffolding in the lobby. But in order to be able to do that, I needed to finish the walls and ceilings first. Taping, mudding, sanding, detailing, priming, caulking, painting…. Lots of fun. I erected that temporary structure in the lobby probably like 2 years prior. It’s been standing in there for a very long time. And now, after another 3 weeks or so, it finally came down. I also finished one of the rooms upstairs and re-located my dungeon in it so I can also finish sheetrock in the room I have been occupying till then. I’ve reached a milestone.

March

March 6th – scaffold down in condo #3. March 7th I initiated the flooring install. First the asphalt penetrating primer been rolled onto the concrete. Then asphalt liner been welded on top of it. Taking care of the moisture issues was a top priority. When I purchased this 130 year old house, I realised that the basement is full of standing water and the rock/brick foundation walls are soaking wet like a sponge. So after the demo and before I did anything else on the house I needed to physically separate the basement from the floor above. Stainless steel plates been jacked inside the old wet brick perimeter walls at the floor level, and asphalt liner applied on top of new leveled concrete slab in two stages. At first stage only strips of that liner been welded only in places where the wood framing structure would be erected. Second stage covering the rest of the area after all the work is done so it doesn’t get damaged. After all this treatment, all the newly renovated living space should be completely dry. So this was being done now. 

It took me 3 days to finish this part. This is one of the worst jobs. Back breaking hard work, lifting heavy rolls of asphalt liner, working with open flame while trying not to inhale too much of the toxic smoke of the melting asphalt bitumen. Trying to eliminate the risk of fire working around the wooden framing. It wouldn’t take much and the whole place could turn to ashes. Thankfully nothing burned down so we’re good. The floor is ready for styrofoam thermal insulation now.

I had a load of EPS styrofoam blocks of different thicknesses delivered. The styrofoam can be cut few ways. It can be cut by a handsaw, knife or a hot-wire saw. Which is the easiest and fastest way. For that purpose I needed to purchase a new hot-wire saw off of the Amazon. The one I previously used for finishing the facade, I was forced to sell back in 2021 because I needed money for food.

For smoothing the uneven surfaceI I used very fine and dry sand (sand silica). Bags and bags of sand. Not only the concrete slab (initially poured back in January 2020) had some low and high points, but also the asphalt liner gets higher at the overlapping seams. This needs to get evened out so the styrofoam blocks have solid support to avoid future cracking of the 2.5″ floating slab that gets poured over it. The styrofoam not only serves as thermal insulation but also creates leveled surface for the slab that needs to have even thickness across the area. This was the first time I tried this technique. Previously in condo #1 I tried something else. I evened out the seams and high points by just shaving off bottom sections of the styrofoam blocks using a handheld planer and some poly foam for filling the gaps. I mean it worked just fine but I also wanted to try the sand thing, if I can achieve better results and get it done faster. I figured it should be lot easier and faster.

At first I had some difficulties with it. It took me eternity to level up the first row of styrofoam blocks. I couldn’t figure out this goddamn thing. I wasn’t able to come up with a sustainable system for a while. I thought I can level the whole row at once but I couldn’t get it to fucking work. Sand been just misbehaving. I been moving it back and forth but I couldn’t get it leveled. It was getting on my nerves. So frustrating. It took me half day to just realize that I’ll have to level each block separately. One by one till I get it done. Very painstaking work. Eventually I got my system working and installed the EPS over the entire ground floor in 4 days. I used self leveling laser to determine the correct height of the surface.

I continued working longer hours than usual. I’ve been getting up at 5AM and worked till 5-6PM. Pulling 10-12 hour shifts. Immediately after finishing the EPS I jumped right into prepping for underfloor heating. First attaching the expansion liner around perimeter and then covering the styrofoam with heat reflective foil. Taped over all the seams, all the holes, corners and imperfections to minimize seepage of the future pour. 

On March 14th I started rolling out the underfloor heating PEX pipes. Ground floor area is divided into 5 separated circuits all connected at a manifold fitted with a pump that feeds the warm water coming from the gas heater. This installation took another 4 days.

Then I ordered the pour scheduled on March 29th. After previous experience from condo #1 where the floating concrete cracked a lot after curing i opted for different mixture called Anhydrite. I wanted to see if it’s gonna make any difference. Same price, just different – gypsum like – mixture.

In the meantime, on March 18th, i started working in the neighboring 2 condos. In condo #1 I started preparing for the acoustic drywall install by removing the wall stringer trim around staircase, cutting out sections of drywall with it and re-installing new drywall. In condo #2 I started repairing the botched taping and mudding.

Alright, here comes the moment I started dealing with the botched taping from January. Well at least the entrance foyer for now. Because I needed to first finish this area to be able to take the scaffolding down too. Time seems to just fly by. It’s been nearly 2 months now since the crew was here, and I have no idea, how long it’s gonna take me to correct this shit. First I tried removing the plaster by wetting it first and then scrapping it off to uncover the tape for better removal. Reason I wanted to do it this way instead of sanding it off was to avoid being exposed to the dust. But this option been creating even worse mess. Water dripping all over the floors even when I tried to cover it with plastic. Dissolved gypsum getting on my shoes spreading everywhere. So I went back to the dry way by sanding it off.

I shaved off my beard to make sure my face mask seals properly and I just started sanding and sanding using my new 18V Milwaukee random elliptical sander. Sanding square foot by square foot, cutting out the bubbles one by one, stripping of the tape inch by inch.

April

It took me nearly 3 weeks to have that foyer ready. I sanded, re-taped corners, re-mudded, sanded again, detailed, caulked around the skylight. During this time I also discovered that not only the inside corners are fucked but also the outside corner beads are installed wrong around the skylight. But I kept them in place. Didn’t feel like I have time for ripping them out and re-doing. It won’t be that noticeable from down below. I primed the ceiling and walls and installed recessed light where it would be too difficult and dangerous doing it later from ladder. I also installed those additional 2 layers of acoustic drywall in all rooms both sides of the condo. 

This procedure is a chapter of its own, because installing the second layer was not as straight forward as i thought. I was adhering the second layer using polyurethane low expansion foam. According to the instructions I only had 60 seconds to apply the foam and set the sheet in place. Then I had 2 minutes to play with it to make sure the sheet sits in place all straight and plumb till it completely cured. Very stressful 2 minutes when I had to rush to set the piece in place, making sure all the pieces are flush with one another. However, as I previously learned in the condo #3, when I came back the following day and double checked the results, I noticed that some pieces are higher then others anyway and I’m gonna have to even out the differences with gypsum. The reason was that the foam been still expanding unevenly for prolonged time in places where I didn’t apply it in consistent thickness. Oh lord. So now in condo #2 I started securing the sheets with temporary drywall screws after I set them in place so they don’t keep moving. 

Long hours, long hours. 7 days a week this.

April 6th the scaffolding was down and I started the flooring again. Asphalt primer, asphalt moisture liner, sand leveling, styrofoam blocks, expansion liner, reflective foil, taping, pipes and manifold. Connecting everything again and Pressure testing for leaks. I only had 7 days to complete all this because the Anhydrite contractor only had 1 available date for me to pour the slab on April 13th, that I scheduled earlier. So I was rushing to have it all ready by the 12th. And I made it. It was close, but I made it.

In the meantime I ordered the wood slab for the stair treads and had it delivered on 13th. The very next day I started putting the stairs together in condo #3 while the Anhydrite slab cures in condo #2. Slab in condo #3 been curing for little over 2 weeks now so it’s good enough for foot traffic even though it still emits lots of moisture in the air. I keep the forced ventilation running at 100% to keep the humidity level down to prevent my new wood from absorbing it and minimize the warping and bowing. Which was not entirely successful. The wood still bowed. Thing is with this Anhydrite mixture that it retains moisture for very long time. It takes for ever to completely dry up. It still felt like I was working at indoor swimming pool.

So I needed to prepare all the wood pieces ASAP before they get all crooked from humidity. Treads, risers, stringers. Measure it, cut it, rout the edges with my new 12V Milwaukee router, sand it. Prime the risers and stringers 1 coat, re-sand it, paint it 2 coats. Stain the treads to bring the texture out, seal it 1 coat, re-sand it and seal 2nd coat. And then install all the pieces to the staircase frame. This procedure took total of 5 days. April 18th staircase is done. I even done some work next door in condo #1. I erected the scaffold and started installing the drywall in foyer in between the coats. Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures to support this progress and my gopro cameras keep resetting the date So I can’t precisely specify what exactly I accomplished at certain days but I kept working in condo #1 in stages room by room simultaneously.

After completing the stairs  in condo #3I moved back to condo #2 to continue working on repairing the botched taping downstairs. It was all about logistics. Moving materials and tools between the units. I needed to move the remaining pile of sheetrock back to condo #3 so I can work in there freely. Proceeded with sanding off the excess mud, cutting out sections of the corner paper tapes or stripping it off along the entire corner. I had another shipment of wood slab for stairs coming in on May 4th and I wanted to have the downstairs all done by then. So I continued hauling ass. Putting in long hours again. Sanding, mudding, taping, sanding again. I repaired every single corner in all rooms.  Re-mudded using the corner trowel as I needed to have done originally. Killing my body. My shoulders, trapezoids, carpals. Everything aches. But I had to keep going. I worked with incredible persistence. Amazing speed and performance. 

On April 27th I had everything corrected and re-mudded downstairs, ready for sanding. I had to let it dry up thoroughly for couple of days so I took advantage of it and went out for a few beers with my workout buddy to celebrate my 48th birthday.

Oh and there is one more thing. Also while working next door in condo #1 another complication arose. The new owners had their new interior doors install scheduled around the same time. And I noticed that the owner – he did some hight adjustments to all the headers upstairs prior the scheduled door installation. I asked what’s up with that and he said that the openings are too high for the doors. They were 2” higher than the openings downstairs. I said OK and wasn’t paying attention to it at first. Just totally dismissed it. But then it just hit me. Why are the openings different heights? Why the downstairs openings are good and upstairs are too high? So I dug deep in my memory and photos to investigate. Took me a while to conclude this. Turned out that during measuring the upstairs openings in all condo units I made a crucial mistake. I actually measured the top of the openings from the bottom of the top plate, because I didn’t have the finished floor height determined yet and I was to lazy to pull out my laser level. But I forgot to take in account that downstairs I had 3 top plates and upstairs I had just 2. So that’s where the 2 inches got lost.

But the owner didn’t asked me to fix it. He decided to fix it by himself instead. He built up the 2 missing inches with several layers of sheetrock. He’s done that when I was not working in their place for several days. Not a visually pleasing solution. It was too late for me to repair it properly by adding a 2×4, because I found out just 1 day before door installation. I was like: why didn’t he tell me about it? I could have just fix it properly while I was working on the acoustic additions. Anyway, he patched some mud over it and it looked very DIY. So after they installed the doors I also repaired this. Sanded the uneven mud off, re-taped and re-mudded it. Sanded again and primed to make sure it blends in with the rest of the walls without transitions and nobody can notice it. It was my mistake after all. I also needed to repair these openings in remaining 2 condos. 8 more doors.

On April 30th I started sanding in condo #2 downstairs. I needed to have it sanded and primed before the wood for stairs gets delivered on May 4th. So I needed to really keep pushing to get it done. This sanding is very nasty activity. It generates so much toxic dust and it’s very labor intensive. It really wears me out. I kept my beard short for the mask to seal properly again. I even wrapped scarf around my neck and over the mask’s filter for double filtration. I also wore a hoodie with long sleeves, because I hate it when the dust gets everywhere. And I went for it. I kept telling myself that one day this project will get finished and all of these nasty jobs will be history. After this project I’m never gonna touch a sander or a trowel ever again. I must manage my future projects better, smarter. I must spend more time managing the people and zero time working on it myself. I must achieve this one way or another. It’s been my goal since the beginning of my house flipping endeavor back in 2010. But I’ve been able to sustain this practice only partially since then. Hiring the right people is crucial for success.

May.

Before I continue covering the house work progress I also need to mention my lawn and problems with my new lawnmower. By this time the spring is in full swing and I already cut my lawn couple times. I also fertilized it with weed killing fertilizer and the lawn now looked 100%.  The weed’s been gradually dying out. I was pleased with the results mostly because it’s gonna look good in pictures for the listing. Very thick, rich in deeper green color lawn. The only problem was, that when it was time for another cut, my battery powered lawnmower broke down. I bough it brand new last September for roughly 1,000 bucks and basically used it only few times before it broke down. It’s the Ego brand, 52cm single blade mower. Before I bought it I’ve conducted a research online to compare different brands. I watched Youtube reviews and such. This brand came on top over DeWalt or Milwaukee with price/performance ration. But now I couldn’t get it to work. Even if the battery was fully charged, the mower had no juice. I guess the mower had its own Ego.  Literarily.  I had no other choice than to take it back to the store to have it repaired under warranty. 

This was an authorized dealer/repair center for Ego and Honda mowers. Battery powered and gas powered. The technician said that I’m the first to bring in a broken Ego mower. Of course I must be the first at everything. After initial inspection they diagnosed a bad motor and that it needs to be replaced. They also tested my battery and charger and found out  that charger is not working properly either and offered to replace both. So on top of repairing the mower I was also getting new charger and battery. The mower was supposed to be fixed and ready in a week. But my lawn needed cutting immediately because it was growing fast thanks to that fertilizing and rain.  I asked for a loaner mower but they said they don’t offer one. So I ended up borrowing a mower from one of my neighbors for this one cut. At least that’s what I thought.

One week passed but no call from repair shop, so I called them. They have not received that new motor yet. It was supposed to get shipped from warehouse in Netherlands. But because that company there was moving their facility to another warehouse, their shipments been delayed. But they assured me it should be here within few days. Few days passed but still no call from them and my lawn needed cutting again. I started getting nervous, because I didn’t wanna keep borrowing mowers from my neighbors and at the same time I didn’t want the grass grow too tall, making it more difficult to cut and risking it might die off. So I went ahead and drove back over to the store to try to ask for a loaner mower again. And I was successful. They provided me with one of their demo mowers saying I can keep using it till the new motor arrives, because they actually didn’t have any updates on the motor availability or estimated shipment date. They lied to me before.

At least I could relax and focus on working on the house and not worry about who I’m gonna borrow a mower from every week. I used the loaner mower for 2 or 3 times till they finally called me they have my mower repaired. Upon pick up I was informed they actually still have not received the now motor and they decided to pull it from another mower they had on stock. Unbelievable. Well at least they found a solution after a month. And I appreciated that.

Now back to the house renovation progress.

It took me 5 days to sand the downstairs walls, hand-sand plus detail all the corners and prime everything. Dirty nasty work. I dusted off everything, cleaned up, vacuumed up. On May 4th I had the wood delivered and the very next day I started cutting the pieces for the staircase again. The last stairs out of 3. Finally. Measured it, cut it precisely, routed the edges, sanded it, painted it stained it and installed it. It took me again just 5 days to do all these tasks including cleaning all the boards cut offs and sawdust. And again I continued simultaneously working next door in condo #1 on that acoustic improvement. I sustained amazing pace and quality craftsmanship throughout.

May 9th the staircase is all dressed up. Only 3 pieces of trim are missing, but I’m gonna coordinate those later on during painting. I still need to fill all the screw holes, sand it and re-paint it.  Primarily I need to start repairing the rest of the botched corner taping upstairs now. Nooo! Not the taping again! But somebody’s gotta do it. Unfortunately that somebody is me. I need to get it done ASAP so I can paint the ceilings and start working on the electrical. Install all the recessed spot lights, switches and receptacles. I need to put this condo up for sale because I’m rapidly running out of cash too.

So I started sanding off the excess mud to get to all the tapes that needs getting tearing out. During working I also double checked the corner beads if they’re installed straight. I found out that all them beads around skylight openings are installed incorrectly as well. They’re either bowing outward or inward or they’re sunken in. Several of them were so bad that I decided to rip them out and re-install. Extra work on top of work that I already paid for. I just couldn’t leave it like this since I’m trying to do everything correctly. And again I’m hauling my tired ass to get this squared off ASAP. Sanding, taping, mudding 2 coats, sanding again, then sanding by hand all the corners and details and priming. Always dirty nasty work. I cleaned up everything again, dusted it off, vacuumed. Finally the worst part is all behind me. It felt like this drywalling stage will never end. It’s like you keep doing the same things over and over and it still looks like shit. Where is the freaking progress at?

On May 28th I cleaned up the rest of the condo and moved all the tools, trash materials next door so my agent can have the pictures taken for the virtual staging for my listing. I was pushing for having the ad live online ASAP. 

May 29th I put the “For sale” sign at front of the house. I kept the Remax sign in the garage since the first condo sold. My realtor didn’t need it because she mostly sells apartments. This was the moment that marks the end of an era. From now on the virtual wheels are starting spinning. Eventually the listing’s gonna be live online and my future’s gonna start taking shape. But for now I still have work to do.

June.

Warmer weather is coming so since I reached a certain level of completion inside I now needed  to finish the outside before it gets too hot. I still needed to build the front steps and paths from the road to the front terraces. I’ve been thinking for a long time how I’m actually going to built those quickly and economically. And the most feasible solution seemed to make those out of concrete. So I measured it all out and determined the locations and steps hights. Each steps were different because the ground is sloping a bit. First condo have 2 full hight steps, middle condo has 1 short step and 1 regular step, the third condo has just 1 half step. I dug up the holes and built up the forms out of scrap wood I kept for this purpose.  

Then at 7:30AM on June 2nd I had a load of wet pre-mixed concrete delivered.  That concrete still needed to get mixed with water to achieve required consistency. This amount of concrete was too small for the big mixer truck plus it would be too runny for building the steps. So I rather opted for the wet mixture and mixing it myself on the spot. When I saw the pile of concrete I wasn’t quite sure if I can actually pull this off. If I’ll be actually able to physically handle this kind of workload. But it was too late now for screwing around. There is no way back. So I grabbed my wheelbarrow and shovels and got right to it. I knew I needed to run like speedy Gonzalez because the concrete needs to get mixed within certain time otherwise it dries up and the cement loses its properties. The driver that brought me the mixture said jokingly: hey you got 90 minutes to work it. I was like oh shit I ain’t gonna make it. I’m fucked. I need help. Somebody please! I though he was serious! So I started running around like crazy with the wheelbarrow back and forth, mixing concrete by hand, getting all sweaty. I had the driver to set the dumpster in a shade under trees so it’s not exposed to direct sun to prolong the workability. Then my neighbor was walking by and said to not worry, that he was probably just joking that it stays wet for the whole shift.  Thank god.

It took me 6 hours to pour all three front steps and paths. I was dead. My arms grew few inches longer  too. My back was killing me. I haven’t even eaten till about 3 PM. But I got it done. I rounded the edges with that concrete specific trowel for radius edges. I ordered that one on Amazon because tools like these are not commonly used in this part of the World and you can’t buy these at a supply store. People here don’t do driveways and sidewalks out of concrete but out of pavers. And that trowel arrived right on time during that actual day I was working the concrete. Perfect timing. After finishing the steps I still had little bit of concrete left so I also finished the little area around the basement access shaft. It’s been on my to do list for ever so I finally got that one taken care of too.  The next day I removed the forms and cleaned up everything. Ok so now the steps are ready for finishing it with decorative concrete wood-like appearance treads and decorative faux stone risers. I ordered those treads in Brno city which is about 2 hr drive from where I’m at. I drove down there to the manufacturer’s  showroom to take a look at it to see if that’s what I can use here. 

Right after the concrete job I continued working inside condo #2. I painted the ceilings white  and started the electrical installations. I didn’t paint the walls at this point just yet because I didn’t want the new paint get accidentally scuffed during installing the electrical boxes, switches etc. June 6th I started with installing the electrical boxes, receptacles and switches. Plus some little repairs here and there. Locating some of the wires along stairs for the night lights was little challenging but eventually I was able to find them all and pull them out.  

June 10th in the morning I drove too Brno to pick up the treads for front steps and then I put together the breaker box after I came back.  Originally I wanted to have an electrician to do it, but the one I had arranged kept postponing the install so I decided to do this myself too, because I needed it fast so I can start installing and testing all the lights. It took me just 1 full shift to wire all the circuit breakers and residual current protectors (RSDs or GFCIs). All nicely labeled. 

I temporarily connected the power through the outside outlet from condo #3 for testing. But my set up didn’t work.  What a disappointment. The main RSD kept tripping and I didn’t know why. I inspected all my wiring and everything checked out. Everything appeared connected properly so the only reason the main RSD been tripping was that it was faulty. So the next day I disconnected bunch of wires, pulled it out and replaced it with another identical one I had ready for condo #3. And suddenly everything worked. I was relieved that it was just a device’s fault and not mine. So I took the faulty RSD back to the store for replacement and started working on lighting.

By June 15th I had all the electrical finished. I even installed the electric LED fireplace with remote control, nice LED dimming light with remote control in the kitchen. I tidy up the wires in multimedia box as well and connected the door bell. And as a cherry on top I hanged nice pendant light in the foyer. I also installed the folding attic ladder and finished electrical in there too. Connected the ventilation unit properly and installed attic light.

Following days I finished the front steps. I bough few bags of thinset and attached the treads and finished the stone work. Everything now looks completed. Ready to activate the listing and start showing the place already. Because I need to get paid for all this back breaking work. It took another week or so too finish the painting, install all the receptacle and switches faceplates, remove the protective covers from windows and wash them up. Removed the glue residue etc. Detailed everything, removed all the trash, materials and tools again. Swept and vacuumed.

Oh yeah and I also need to mention finishing the acoustic treatment in condo #1. In the meantime I finished installing the 2 layers of acoustic drywall in all rooms there, taped and mudded, sanded, caulked, primed and painted, reinstalled the receptacles I needed to remove, reinstalled the night lights along stairs and dismantled the scaffolding. All back in order in there except the trims, which I’ll be finishing later.

And just like that the condo #2 is finished and ready to show and sell. Listing is live now for both remaining condos. It’s good I have this condo finished sit can be shown while I’ll be finishing the last one. All I need to do now is to just repeat the procedure I done in condo #2 in condo #3. Since the wheels are now spinning yet it doesn’t really matter how long it will take me to finish the last condo. I don’t need to rush anymore. I can take it easy. The first condo took 9 months from listing to cash. So I have plenty of time. I started working on this project in November 2019. So in just few months, in November 2023, it’s going to be 4 years of ownership. Hopefully it’ll get sold by then and I will be finally able to move on to do better and bigger things.

To be continued.

Peace