Farmhouse Fixer Year 1 Review & Video

Welcome to the year one progress on our 100-year old farmhouse fixer!

Wondering what we’ve accomplished in our first year after moving to our farmhouse property? Read on (and watch the video) to hear about the progress we’ve made in the last 12 months on our century-old farmhouse fixer.

We also discuss things we’ve learned and if there is anything that we’d do differently in the video.

Plus, we share more on how our family pitched in to get the farmhouse ready for a small December evening wedding. 

One Year Progress 1900 Farmhouse Video

Farmhouse Fixer One Year Review

1. Deciding to buy the house – November-December 2017

Here are a few things we mentioned in the video that we had to think about before purchasing:

• no foundation
• crumbling vinyl siding
• few original features left
• rough interior
• too small master on main
• bathrooms and kitchen need updating

But we LOVED the view, the location (and you know what they say about that…), and the fact that it was an cute old farmhouse that needed some love.

2. Move to property – January 2018

Here’s the link to the interior tour video where you’ll see all the nitty-gritty of what we need to do.

(Spoiler- it’s not as cute as the outside.)

And here’s the link to the exterior tour video where you can see and hear some of our plans.

(Spoiler-there actually weren’t ever windows over the porch and the windows on the lower floor were always one large window – I was wrong…)

During this six months, we concentrated on finding someone to build a new foundation (harder than you’d think to find), drawing up plans for the interior renovation that require permits, getting permits, and gathering supplies.

All this groundwork took so much more time than we had originally thought.

3. Starting on foundation & garden – June 2018

We were SO happy to find a mason who could build a solid foundation without raising the house, which helped so much with minimizing damage that raising a house incurs.

He was a one-man show, and a LOT cheaper, but the trade-off was the 4-month process. Totally worth it.

Here’s the link to the yard & garden tour – we didn’t get the deer fence completed, sadly, and there is NO planting of anything until we do, so hopefully that will happen in the next few months for spring planting.

4. Working on Siding – July 2018- September

While we couldn’t do any interior things while the foundation was being installed, we did rip off the old vinyl siding, exposing the mostly-intact original wood siding of the two story portion.

Here’s a link to the short video Brian made of his great vinyl siding removal tip.

Our builder started restoring the original siding where we could keep it – the front two-story section and the two dormer sections (the rest will be board-and-batten). He also added back the window moldings in the original widths.

We LOVED the difference!

5. Extension foundation, electrical, heat ducting & new door – September – October

With the help of friends, we DIY’s the centering and installation of our new door.

We love it – it transformed the curb appeal. It also lets in a ton of natural light into the living room (scroll a bit more to see it all finished!).

Our foundation builder also finished the back wall extension for the bigger bedroom.

We did more work on electrical and the heat ducts – all that underpinning stuff that’s not lovely but absolutely has to be done.

6. Extension demo & framed & wedding prep- November- December

We were happy to finally find someone to start on the bedroom extension by framing it in for us.

it doesn’t look like much, as far as size, here does it? But just that 8 feet made all the difference to the bathroom and bedroom – and allowed us to have a big walk-in closet(where the men are working above).

We worked hard to finish the entry door and siding around it in time to host a December wedding for my nephew.

Here are some of the wedding photos I posted on Instagram. You can see how the lights in the evening made it sort of a magical night!

We have a long way to go before we can move in, but we actually met all the goals we had for the first year – yeah! (See these and more in my 2019 Goals & 2018 Recap).

Obviously, we are very grateful to have a manufactured home we can live in that’s only about 100 feet away.

For 2019, our goals are:

• finish the newly extended master bedroom (and pass permit inspections!)
• gut and redo the main floor/master bath
• make a storage area into a laundry room
• start on the kitchen
• get all the new windows installed.

And there’s so much more involved in all of this (think doors, floors, finishes, moldings – yikes!). We’re so glad to have you along for the ride!

For more you can follow us on Instagram @AnOregonCottage, Facebook, and Pinterest, and subscribe to the newsletter.

(NOTE: This was originally episode 49 in our former podcast. It’s been rewritten as an update with the video content.)