Our First Home: Operation Renovation

We’d been married all of four months when we bought our first house. Given the white hot real estate market at the time, we should’ve taken the hint that this house and the 45 days it had sat on the market was not a good sign. But in true Caleb & Jordan fashion, it was our mission to make it better than how we found it.

A very short list of the renovations:

Exterior paint
Interior and exterior doors
Foundation + plumbing (* more on this below)
New HVAC
Removed 13 trees in the backyard (yes, 13!)
Master bathroom gut
Sheetrock throughout
Popcorn ceiling removal
Kitchen cabinet paint refresh
Recessed lighting & new light fixtures
Trim & paint throughout
Landscaping, sod, the whole 9 yards
Whew, I hope that’s everything.

* May 2015, Dallas had a record of 17” of rain in less than 30 days. Combination of poor drainage, plumbing issues, etc we wound up having a 6.5” variance from the front of the house to the back of the house, and cracks in the sheetrock because of the shifting. We basically lived in one of those carnival fun houses, but nothing about it was fun or inexpensive. Caleb took this video as they were repairing foundation in the kitchen - is this not the craziest thing you’ve ever seen?

I won’t bore you with the minutia, but I will let the pictures speak for themselves. Here are the pictures from the listing when we bought the house. Looking back, I’m not sure what we were thinking other than “wow this living room!” Woof.

Here’s what it looked like when we put it on the market. Multiple offers, under contract in less than 12 hours, and we closed in less than 30 days! What a whirlwind! I am so proud of this little 3 bed/2 bath gem, belief in our vision, and ability to bring it back to life.