RFI Updated 1920's Farm House

[TexasSiegfried]

One thing I didn't, but should have realized, is that the order of the work also makes a difference.

We currently lease a house built in 1940, and the landlord has, very generously in my opinion, begun to replace the original lovely, but now problematic, case windows. There was quite a bit of reverse engineering required to get even fits thanks to the settling of the original pier and beam foundation. When I was talking to the contractor and mentioned that if we purchased the house the foundation would be our first concern, he said, "here, take my card because I'll just have to come back and redo All of this."

I am little embarrassed that it hadn't occurred to me, but certainly crossed this house off our potentials list.

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[Jim Watson]

Jim, I'm curious if old wiring caused the fire?

No, a drunk driver ran off the road and hit my gas meter which was next to the outdoor package unit furnace so I had a nice fuel-air explosion which ignited the house. I was asleep upstairs, so by the time I figured out what had happened, my only exit was out an upstairs window onto the porch roof. Which was icy so I slid off and landed on concrete. I did not bounce high enough to notice.
With all of that, I call it The Incident, not just a house fire.

[Grey]

No, a drunk driver ran off the road and hit my gas meter which was next to the outdoor package unit furnace so I had a nice fuel-air explosion which ignited the house. I was asleep upstairs, so by the time I figured out what had happened, my only exit was out an upstairs window onto the porch roof. Which was icy so I slid off and landed on concrete. I did not bounce high enough to notice.
With all of that, I call it The Incident, not just a house fire.

Damn...

[Poconnor]

I would make sure I had the budget to fix or replace everything possible. My house is only 15 years old and I had to replace the air conditioning system because the original was fucked up from initial installation ($ 10k Harley fund- poof- gone) just replaced the well pump ($ 5k ammo fund - gone) and the master bath was all replaced because the original was shitty ($35K home equity loan)
I grew up in old houses and have been looking at old houses for decades. I would be very hesitant to buy one that somebody else re built. It’s like buying and old car. Just 10x more expensive
I think it might actually be cheaper to build a new house that looks old than redoing a 100 year old house.

[Lex Luthier]

I have routinely rebuilt 50-100 year old guitars for 15 years now, and live in a duplex built in 1901.
(no, don't own it.)

Building anything new is cheaper than rebuilding anything old. Getting as satisfactory a result with a new build? Budget 3x your highest estimate.