First time home buyer - Anything could go wrong did go wrong

[Thao Kieu]

Buying Our First Home Was Like Playing With Fire

We are young and naïve, but we are also risk takers. That’s why decided to buy a colonial built in the late 1930’s for $310,000 in Totowa, NJ with 10% down payment. It had a lot of charm, but it also had almost everything we wanted in our first home. It needed updates everywhere but it was 100% move in ready.

Home improvement

The first few months in our new home weren’t too bad. We came across issues, fixed things, updated certain areas and did our best to make it our own. Our biggest improvement to date was updating our little 33x55 powder room that was off our kitchen to something more comfortable by a Contractorwe found on Craiglist. It had a nearly full size sink and vanity and bi-fold doors. We installed a normal door, a small marble floating vanity, and floor to ceiling white wainscoting with new lighting to brighten it up. The result was a room that normal people could now comfortably fit in and use. It looks very elegant & beautiful from distance but when I get closer, it looks like cockroach eating my powder room with a lot of tiny hole everywhere, I realize how hard it is to find a good contractor to give you what you want.

Of course, we continued to paint, and fix up little things in the house. Some things that weren’t up to code like our stairs going to the second floor, or going down to the basement were areas we couldn’t really fix at the moment but they were things we were okay living with.

The Roof – anything can go wrong did go wrong

It was a couple months ago that we noticed something: A small discoloration where the addition the house had met with the original structure. Thinking nothing of it, we patched it up with some compound but it wasn’t long before it came back even worse.

The day came when we got some contractors to come and diagnose the issue, by the way, only 1 of them contractor came with tool & ladder to go up to the roof & check.

The culprit was a poorly designed roof that allowed water, snow, and debris to collect in a hidden alcove and just fester. It had caused a hole in the roof. With a quote of $2000 to fix the wall, patch the roof and extend the roof so the problem would not return, we felt okay, until more of the wall was opened up.

Seller failed to disclose

The previous owner had known about the issue, as new treated wood was placed on top of all old rotting wood in our walls, then new sheetrock and paint put up to hide the evidence. We were victims of the previous owner failing to disclose material damage. We were now looking at $6000 in repairs.

After the initial anger subsided, we moved on and decided it wasn’t that bad, that is until our contractors really examined the roof, which we knew was in poor shape before we bought the house, but we weren’t ready for the news we got next: Our roof had 3-4 layers.

Now, you must be thinking, how did our home inspector miss that? Well in the state of New Jersey, inspectors are not required to walk roofs or required to tell you if anything is illegal or not up to code. In other words, NJ home inspectors are useless.

Our roof had multiple flat tab shingles, on top of the original cedar shake shingles which you could imagine at this point were pretty old and rotted. We were now looking at $18,000.

The bad news had to be over at this point. What else could possibly be wrong with house? Well after roofing the addition the house had, the contractors found that the rest of the roof, which was extensive, had no ply wood. Under the cedar shingles were just open beams with some tongue and groove on the perimeter. Yep, the price just skyrocketed again.

At this point, we were worried and stressed, this project was edging close to $30,000, and our funds were limited, but we sucked it up and decided we would get through it. With a brand new modern roof, our house would be vaulted into the 21st century and we would never have to worry about it again and that gave us comfort.

Well over 3 weeks into this project and I wish I could give you all good news, but alas, I cannot. Our first home has now burned away.

The Fire

On April 18th, the dumpster the contractors were using had caught fire in our driveway and destroyed our house and a good portion of our neighbor’s house. No injuries occurred.

This is me in front of the house before going to in to salvage anything I can

The cause of the fire is still under investigation so I cannot comment further on that at this time. But this is all an extremely harsh learning experience for us. Trial by fire and baptized by fire never rang truer in my book.

Learn from our mistakes

My advice to new home buyers in the NJ area is while we are required to pay hundreds of dollars for a useless home inspection, go find someone extra who will inspect certain aspects properly, or instruct the inspector that you want him to go on the roof. Get a roofer to get up on the roof and look for multiple layers (more than 2 in NJ is illegal).

Have them bring moisture readers and test all the walls, especially if the house is older. Sellers are shady, and they will hide whatever they can even if they know it is illegal.

We don’t want what happened to us to happen to anyone else. We lost our home to a fire all stemming from the previous owner failing to disclose material damage. These things happen but they don’t have to.

Now we are displaced for over a year while we await the demo and reconstruction of our home. Yes, we get a new home, but the stress that comes along with it is heavy.

Matt & Thao