Truck dumping, part the fourth
“Want to go exploring?” I asked. And almost immediately had misgivings, because the little voice in my head started asking questions, like if you owned that house, would you want strangers poking around it?.
“Hell yes!” Robyn said.
“Maybe we shouldn’t. Technically, it’s trespassing.”
Her face fell. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”
“I dunno, Bessie. We probably shouldn’t be going on someone else’s property without asking.” Then, joking. “We might get shot!”
She rolled her eyes. “Let’s at least walk over to the strip mall parking lot and look from there.”
Down the road just a bit, next to the abandoned house, there’s a tiny strip mall with a church, a clothing store, and a salon. The old house sat just behind and to the side of that, and it looked like we could get a much better look at the house from the back corner of the lot. We walked over, cameras in hand.
It was one mighty creepy-looking house, yet it was strangely appealing. The parking lot, maybe 100 feet from the house, just wasn’t close enough.
Beautiful, no?
Such great lines. Another American classic.
“I don’t see any signs about trespassing,” I said. “C’mon.”
We crossed the yard to the house. I kept an eye out for property owners bearing shotguns. No one was around, anywhere.
Here’s your sign!
The sign warned us to keep out of the house, which we did (despite the fact that it caused me near-physical pain to not go inside once we were right there). Fortunately, all the windows were busted out so we could look in without disobeying the trespassing admonition.
One half of the living room (I think). I’m pretty sure there’s a staircase in that area
to the left. Unless that’s not a stringer going up the wall.
The house looked to be from the same time as ours (the 30’s), if not a little earlier. Like our house, everything is wood: floors, walls, ceilings. It’s been empty a long time, and doesn’t appear to have had many updates done. Check out that wallpaper.
I’ll bet the house would clean up real nice.
The other half of the same room.
Looking from the back of the house. Now that’s some space.
The house seemed fairly structurally solid for its age and state of disrepair. There was one place where a pier seems to have collapsed, but other than that, good and solid. We saw little rot (unless that peeling paint is covering rot) and no evidence of termite damage. The floors look like all they need is a good sanding and refinishing. Underneath (the crawlspace was open), all the beams and supports looked good.
Yep, I’ll bet this house could be fixed up with a little TLC.
At the back side.
Welcome to Amityville.
The part poking out (on the bottom floor) is the kitchen.
And in the kitchen is where the settling / collapsing has taken place.
The other side of the kitchen.
Another room, another staircase. Words can’t express how much I wanted to
go up it and see what sort of landing was behind those white balusters.
Look at that gorgeous arch.
We were fascinated by the old house, and a little enamored with it, truth be told. It seems like it would be wicked fun to try to restore it slowly, as a project for weekends, once we’re done with the house we’re working on. You know, because we won’t have enough to do already. Seriously, though, I’m afraid it may be too far gone. The more I look at the pictures, the more I think there may be too much water damage, which is sad.
We’ve had some semi-serious discussions about trying to buy some of the property across the street, once we’ve sold our suburb house and aren’t bleeding money for two house payments. If we owned some of that property across from where we live, we’d be able to control what was there and not have to worry about what might be built on it in the future. Getting the house with the property would just be a bonus, even if we didn’t do anything but let it continue degrading.
But letting something like that degrade would be cruel, if it could be saved without a huge amount of money.
I’ve gone so far as to find out who owns it and get his number, but I haven’t called him yet and may not until we’ve moved. The property is 31 acres, which is more than we’re willing to buy. I’m tempted to try and get 5 or 10 acres, though, and maybe just mention the house in passing. How cool would it be to get the house for little or no money?
Obviously, we’ve swum to the deep end of the crazy pool.
And, because I know some of you are as fascinated by the thought of ghosts as I am, here are the obligatory screwy pictures that managed to work their way into the good ones. None have been modified in any way other than resizing.
