wood frame house

We have a circa 1800’s brick foundation, wood frame house that has vinyl siding on front and back. It is attached on both sides.

There are some newer windows which seem to do a very good job in keeping out the drafts. The older windows (aluminum) seem to let more air in. We’ve been using the heat sparingly – only to 65 degrees and certainly not on all the time. (We still don’t have a tenant yet…)

The upper stairs creak a lot (some day we’ll have to address that), but as an Architect friend said, “I love the creaks – part of the amazing character you guys with old houses have!”

The floors are a bit slanted toward the center of the rooms…For an old house, not bad. I plan on adding steel lolly columns to the existing tree trunk posts in the cellar (not kidding!).

We hate the aluminum cornice over the top front stoop step and have been looking at wooden ones some houses have around us…

There were original pocket doors, but they were gone by the time we moved in. I plan on buying pocket doors from someone and then getting them installed (there have been fellow posters who have done this on this site).

The amount and variety of trim around all the doors and between main rooms is amazing.

The plaster moldings and ceiling medalion (one was falling down and we had to remove it…might still buy a replacement one…Plaster highlights and plaster walls. We only replace plaster walls if it was loose and in really bad shape.

All the doors are the original: solid wood with panels and lovely to look at. Most of the knobs are either crystal or ceramic. The ones that are not I will replace someday.

Original old and big cast iron kitchen sinks.

We added some brass/crystal chandeliers and all I can say is Wow! They add an amazing dimmension.

We loved the plain wide plank floors – not parquet. After removing on average 8 layers of linoleum and carpet (not kidding), we had them sanded, stained them dark brown and then poly-U’d them. They look great and no splinters at all.

We find that the sound proofing in the house is very good…except you can hear things from the first floor when you are in the cellar, and that is because the 1st floor’s floor is bare. So, who cares?

We have a small yard (aka urban courtyard) and we planted many trees and shrubs to complement what was in there already and can’t wait for Spring. We’ve already begun to attract mourning doves, cardinals, grackles and a mocking bird. Noticed that we got Monarch butterflies during late Summer of ’06 (our first summer there). We can only access it through a small window from the cellar, so we will be replacing a window on the first floor with a door and steps – nothing too fancy.

We plan on replacing the vinyl siding with real wooden shingles, maybe even restore the missing roof cornice (the 1940’s tax photo we got shows one!).

Don’t like the front door’s color and it is chipped anyway so that and the fence will all be repainted by me soon.

There is a circular dome at the top floor staircase landing’s ceiling with a stained glass covering. We will eventually clean it and really get to enjoy the sunlight and colors.

Fireplaces with marble mantles….stone hearthstones. Our kitched has a brick/stone mantle: really neat.

There is some brick crumbling in the basement walls…so there needs to be some patching, pointing and painting.

I’ve been waiting to address other things, but I’d love to get the Silent Paint Remover and get all the original built in drawers and closet doors etc. to close more smoothly. Who knows, maybe the wood is nice underneath all those paint layers?

Sure, it isn’t a brownstone or all brick house, but never judge a book (or house) by its cover). We are doing needed restoration/renovation, but no gutting please. We could never replace all the original craftmanship.

So: I vote that if you love what you see, if you can see the possibilities, if you think about gently restoring and bringing it up to code/back to life…go for it!!

Greenpoint Proud

We have a 100+ yr. old frame house w/ siding and the main problem we have observed is shoddy original construction. I think frame houses were cheaper to begin with and the people who built our house clearly took A LOT of shortcuts.

We have started gutting the place and discovered that the joists are over 36″ apart in places. The brick in-fill in the walls is totally haphazard and mostly crumbling and there is absolutely no insulation. We knew when we bought it that the house needed a lot of work, but the scope of the problem is greater than we imagined.

We had our house inspected by a very good engineer, but until you open the walls, who knows what you’re dealing with…

Most housing in the US in essentially wood frame with a cement and brick foundation. There’s nothing wrong with it. Brick is a safer fire retardent, I suppose, but wood is more flexible in the event of an earthquake. Old brick needs to be monitored for defects just as old wood does.

I’d be more concerned with price, size, condition, and location, if I were you, and not worry too much about wood vs. brick. Obviously, you should get the place thoroughly inspected before you buy it.