Living Next Door to a Gut Renovation
We finally appear to have found a house we like which is renovated to a good standard / style. The house next door has recently gone into contract and needs a complete gut renovation. Ultimately it is better to have a nicer house next door but one of the reasons we only looked at renovated…
We finally appear to have found a house we like which is renovated to a good standard / style. The house next door has recently gone into contract and needs a complete gut renovation. Ultimately it is better to have a nicer house next door but one of the reasons we only looked at renovated was because we wanted a hassle free first few years with our young family. I appreciate it largely depends on how the owners / contractors conduct the work but any thoughts / advice would be much appreciated.
I would keep thinking long term. A renovation next door will occasionally be a drag, but those neighbors could be yours for quite some time. Having a good attitude and focusing on how nice it will be when it’s done is a good strategy. Both of my neighbors were very patient with us when we renovated, and when they did this they were making it easy for us to consider their feelings and keep creating goodwill by hosing down their stoops, knocking off at a reasonable hour and so on.
Only thing that you should be concerned about is if they plan on digging down the basement as that could structurally affect your home. Other than that not much you can do other than play nice and hope the neighbor hired a reputable contractor.
My next door neighbor did a large renovation and it was pretty hellish, honestly. The contractors were in there every morning, including saturdays, at 7:30AM, banging away. Drove me nuts. Also, when they were doing the facade they played music and sang all day when I was trying to study (I was in grad school). That said, it’s a noisy city.
Try and get an idea of the scope of the work. If it looks like they are digging out the basement, that’s when you need to start being concerned, especially if it is not part of what you see permitted on the DOB website.
Introduce yourself to them and their contractors and start off on the right path for this project.
Keep us posted.
Well, you said it…”Ultimately it is better to have a nicer house next door”. Just try to have a positive attitude about it and wait for trouble to start before getting upset. This is a good thing, really!!
I don’t recall any issues that would have given my neighbors hassle when I was doing mine, except dumpster day, when it gets a bit dusty. A responsible renovator would hose down the sidewalk after.
The only concern I would have is if there is going to be any channeling done into your shared brick wall. If so I would try to find out when they plan on doing this. This way you can see if the work causes any cracks in your plaster. Also the vibrations may cause items to fall of the wall. If you have any fragile items hung on the shared wall I would remove them.
But be realistic, I dont think you are going find hassle free living anywhere in this city.
house next to ours went though the gut renovation for a year. I am away from home during business hours and did not notice a thing. No dust or smell or sound. My wife mentioned construction noise during business hours a few times, but nothing serious.
So if you compare houses, I would put the gut reno next door at less then ~0.5% of my house price.