Cap’n Ken’s Homespun Wisdom

editor”s note: this is the second in an irregular series of blogs related to the recent house hunt of Cap”n Ken and his First Mate

The House Hunt
Tonight”s Episode: Image in a Cracked Mirror

Spurned by the owner of our dream home, we set out with our Realtor to find an even better house - HA!, we”ll show you, Mr. Don”t Want To Sell Me a House!

The Realtor dutifully dragged us into many homes in Grant Park, Ormewood Park, East Atlanta, East Lake, Kirkwood and Oakhurst during the two weeks after our offer was rejected. We went in some old homes, but because a big bath and big kitchen are high on our priority list, we mostly stayed with new and almost-new places.

[A note on Realtors in the Modern Age: Historically, the biggest benefit of having a real estate agent is to find houses you might want to buy. But in this Modern Age, home finding is more aptly handled by the Internet. There was not a single house our Realtor showed us that we did not already know about (www.jennypruitt.com is the best site to find houses, by the way). A savvy residence consumer can handle about 90% of a Realtor"s traditional functions his own self. When a home is listed by an agent, however, there"s no real incentive for a buyer to not get his own Realtor. Somebody"s gonna get that 3% one way or the other.]

In my estimation, the wife and I got inside about 30 homes during our search and made drive-by decisions (”no”) on probably 50 more.

Some observations on the art of homebuilding in the “hood:

• People will apparently pay top-dollar for a house that has absolutely no covered parking (not even a carport) and off-street parking for only one car.

• A crack house next door is not a deterrent to building an expensive home.

• A “lot” is any piece of land you can build a house on and not have it slide down into the creek.

• There is a certain style of Craftsman bungalow that has become the Jim Walters home of our neighborhood. The first time I saw this design, I thought “cool house.” The 100th time I saw it, I thought “jesus, build a different house, why don”t you?”

• Builders will do anything it takes to get a jetted tub into a house, up to and including making said tub the size of a Diet Coke FridgePack.

• A “bedroom” is defined as a room with a closet, even if it is, in fact, a study off the living room with stairs to the second floor in the corner of it.

• Berber carpet is the only floor covering suitable to put upstairs in a house.

Highlights of our whirlwind home tour included:

• The Skinny House: This is a place on Clifton Road between Memorial and Hosea. The inside was actually quite nice, but it”s on a really narrow lot and from the street looks about 12 feet wide. It had a side-entry garage that I”d imagine takes about 30 minutes to negotiate into and out of.

• The Amazingly-Poorly-Built House: On Oakview Drive, it looked decent enough from the outside. But the floors were visibly slanted, the crown molding didn”t come within an inch of the ceiling in most places and the homeowners had ruined the back porch by turning it into a screened porch that reminded me of a fishing camp in Louisiana.

• The Dutch Pimp House: On Stokeswood south of Ormewood Avenue. No words I could write would do this place justice; you should drive by it yourself. Chalet-designed tall, skinny house with odd stained glass windows inside, garish gold fixtures and an 80-foot oak tree crashed across the fence and backyard. There”s an Under Contract sign in front, but I think that deal fell through. Smart buyers.

• The House With Everything We Want - And Absolutely Nothing Else: On Delmar in Ormewood Park, this is a really cool-looking Charleston-style house. Great kitchen, awesome master suite, big basement, two-car garage - and that”s about it. Supposed to be a three-bedroom, but was really about 2.5. Downstairs was the kitchen and living room, and nothing else. The current owner has a dining room table plopped down in the space between. And a special bonus is the sewer line (complete with manhole) running through the backyard.

Out of the 80+ homes we gave at least a look-see to, there were about a half-dozen we thought about seriously. The Skinny House was one (Dutch Pimp was not). But nothing really rose to the level of “gotta have it”.

It was then I hatched my brilliant plan. We told the Realtor we were gonna sit tight and let her know if we saw any more houses come on the market we wanted to look at. Officially, we were out of the house market when our buyer”s contract expired May 5 …

editor”s note: this is the first in an irregular series of blogs related to the recent house hunt of Cap”n Ken and his First Mate

The House Hunt
Tonight”s Episode: Venus as in Fly Trap

The wife and I knew we would not be in our current house forever. I bought the place three years ago before we were married, and it”s small and mostly unspectacular.

From time to time we”d see open house signs in the neighborhood and swing by places that looked interesting. One Sunday back in March, I saw an open house sign on this place at the corner of our current street and the avenue running past. It was one of the 20 or so new homes built as part of a subdivision back in 2001.

I”d always kind of hated these particular houses, because the architecture was Alpharetta, not East Atlanta. But I had wanted to see what these places looked like inside (they appeared to be nicely-built homes), so we decided to swing by after brunch.

We were blown away. This house was amazing. Top of the line detailing, a great kitchen, huge master suite, hardwoods throughout, 2-car garage and all that stuff. The lot was fenced and mostly level (a must for the dogs). It was part of a new subdivision, but was on the avenue, not in the cul-de-sac. Close to the Village. Perfect.

After much discussion, we decided this place was worth making a run at. I got in touch with the Realtor I had used to buy the current place and set up an appointment. Turns out she knew the owners and all the history on them and their house.

Turns out the couple used to live in Atlanta, got transferred out of town, and were now back here. The wife, however, had a hard time finding a job and had moved again to get work. The husband stayed behind to sell the place before moving back to his wife.

I had already gone down to the courthouse to look up the original sales price, so I had a good idea of what a reasonable offer would be. The Realtor showed us a few other properties on the market, but nothing came close to this place.

We prepared an offer.

The first offer was a real lowball, but came fast and furious enough for the sellers to know we were serious. They countered with an offer that was $5K less than their listing price. Unacceptable.

We retooled and pitched them the “serious” offer, a really good deal they”d be foolish not to take. By the end of the day, we”d still not heard back from their agent.

I drive by this house every day on my way to and from work. The morning after we put in our second offer, I noticed something. The big wooden post that had the For Sale sign was still up, but there was no longer a sign hanging from it. I frantically called my Realtor, who had still heard nothing from the seller”s side. All day long, nothing.

On the way home from work, I noticed that even the big wooden post had been taken up. Our Realtor confirmed that the sellers had pulled the home off the market.

Wow. Our offer was so impressive, they took the place off the block.

That”s not the way these things are supposed to go. A seller lists his house, a buyer wants it, and they work out a deal. The place had only been on the market for a week or so before we went to the open house, and less than a month before our offer was made.

Our Realtor was at a loss, as was the seller”s. It had been a very good offer.

Why, then, did the seller cut off negotiations? His wife has already moved away, and he”s got to sell the place to follow her. Why, indeed ….

to be continued …

Over the past couple of weeks, I”ve been watching buildings crumble at the corner of Ormewood and Moreland. First the Simpson”s Food Store building went down (I shared a moment with Coffeeshop Dude that morning. I was driving west, he was pedaling east and our lives intersected in front of the rubble pile. We both paused for a curious gaze at the pile), then the edges of the Peaula”s Restaurant space fell.

This morning I saw only broken bricks and wood where Peaula”s once was.

Now, this is not going to be some days-gone-by rant about the neighborhood losing Peaula”s. Fact is, I never went there. My question is what”s going to be built there now.

When the wife and I were touring the neighborhood with our then-Realtor, she mentioned something about the Peaula”s building becoming a mixed-use thing with storefronts on the ground floor and condos above. That would be pretty cool. The Peaula”s building was situated right up on the corner, giving it that neighborhood store appeal you just don”t get when buildings are set back with parking in front.

I had assumed that the new development would incorporate the existing building and grow up and around it. Obviously that”s not the case.

So now I”m concerned. I have a gut feeling our neighborhood may be in for commercial development”s favorite way to fill a vacant corner lot - the free-standing drug store.

I don”t have anything against drug stores. Both CVS and Walgreen”s rank high among the places the wife and I spend money. And East Atlanta needs a drug store. Currently I tend to hit the CVS in Grant Park. Otherwise there”s CVS on North Highland; CVS on North Ave; Walgreen”s at North & Piedmont and an Eckerd down Glenwood at Candler Road.

None are particularly convenient to our hood.

But there”s plenty of places to drop down one of those wedge-shaped druggists without closing the door on what could be a great spot for a restaurant and condos. Ormewood & Moreland has the potential to be a pretty cool little corner. There”s a small strip of old commercial buildings that could be a great mini-village on the edge of Ormewood Park.

I may be getting way ahead of myself. There”s no evidence that what”s going to go up is a CVS. But, given that demolition moved along quickly, there”s money behind this project. And SOMETHING new is going to be built there.

We shall see.

My friend Edward laughed when I told him I”d been down to Atlanta City Hall to look up permit records for the house the wife and I are buying (note: the era of Cap”n Ken”s house-buying blogs starts now).

He laughed not at the amazing anal-ness I was displaying in wanting to see what documents related to the house”s construction were filed away at City Hall, but because I believed what I was told by the folks in the permits office - that they”d call me in a few days after they retrieved the records from off-site storage.

“Months” was Edward”s prediction on when I”d hear back; if I heard back at all.

This thought had, of course, crossed my mind as I walked out of the marble palace on Trinity Ave. But the folks in the permit office seemed very professional and looked like they had their shit together. The permits office, after all, is where all the city”s property tax money originates - you can”t tax if people don”t build, and people can”t build without permits; therefore the city should run a professional and efficient permits department.

Sound logic, indeed. But this is Atlanta, not Alpharetta. When - and if - they called back would be a good test of this logic (and no doubt blog fodder either way).

The permit office promise was that the records would be retrieved in three business days and I”d get a call when they were received back at Trinity. I was there on a Friday afternoon. The next Thursday (the 4th business day after), I came home to an answering machine message saying the plans were available for my review.

So there, Ed. The city actually came through.

I trotted back down to City Hall to check out the plans. Again, professionalism was the rule as the receptionist was able to find the person who had called me; that person was able to find the file and I was escorted back into a room to view the plans.

I took a bunch of notes - exact lot size, square footage, amount of dirt disturbed for construction, etc. and hoped to make a copy of the floorplans. But, alas, it was a copyrighted design and city officials aren”t into the whole file-sharing vibe, so no duplicates were allowed.

But a good use of my time, nonetheless.

In addition to my stated task, the City Hall trip also included free admission to a very amusing homeless people demonstration on the front steps. Under banners reading “hospitality not hostility” - which I thought was a very clever slogan for people who lived under bridges - the speakers talked about the pride of people who live on the street and ticked off a kind of Bum Census - overpass-by-overpass tallies of how many people live where.

One of the bridges mentioned, by the way, was the old Bankhead Highway bridge behind my former office on Means Street. One time there was stuff stolen from our lobby, and the cop who showed up said it was probably the people who lived on the bridge. He advised us to never, under any circumstances, go up there and, in fact, declined to do so himself. Hospitality, indeed.

I watched the demonstration for a few minutes, declined a leaflet offered by the guilt-ridden, home-having white man who was part of the group then headed back toward my car. Not 50 feet away from the demonstration I was approached by a man - not part of the event - who asked me for change so he could buy lunch.

For about two seconds I thought about grabbing the guy, marching him back over to the demonstrators and explaining to them that the “hostility” they are protesting is a result of people like this. I also thought - ever so briefly - of offering him the “hospitality” of the change in my pocket.

In the end, I gave him what I give all street people (except for the legless guy who hangs out near the cars on Georgia Avenue when I park on the street for Braves games - I give him $3 as incentive to watch the car) - nothing. I didn”t harass, and I didn”t reward.

I came across the demonstrators one final time as I was driving home through Downtown. Seems they had gone mobile; apparently heading toward Underground Atlanta. They”d formed a small Bum Parade, with the homeless folks up front looking pretty-well ready for lunch and the guilty white folks bringing up the rear, still shoving leaflets at people.

I was really bothered today looking at the second round of “death photos” of Qusay and Uday. Not because I think they shouldn”t have been killed or that we shouldn”t parade them around to prove they are gone.

What bothered me so much was their post-mortem makeovers. Fuckin” freaky, man. When did the goverment have the time to take them over to Fisher & Sons, anyway?

The goal, apparently, is to really make the Iraqis believe the two are dead. But do we really think giving them a shave and slapping on funeral home makeup is going to accomplish this? The boys looked like a couple of Kansas City faggots, to paraphrase Slim Pickens.

They even went so far as to give Uday his trademark Miami Vice stubble beard. This is what they think will sway Iraqi opinion? Honestly, they could have done enough mortuary work on any dead Iraqis they wanted and made them look like Quasy and Uday.

And are funeral-home makeovers even part of the Iraqi culture? Only Arab funeral I remember seeing was the Ayatollah Khomeini”s, and I don”t remember him looking all that pretty when they pulled him out of his wooden box.

Says your average Iraqi:”Heavy makeup and nicely-trimmed facial hair? That”s them alright.

The wife and I are early in what for us is a multi-stage process of buying a new house (more on that to come in days ahead). The part we”re in right now involves refinancing the current house to a super-low 3-year ARM rate to provide some financial cushion in case we end up carrying two mortgages for an extended period of time.

It”s interesting how the financials of pulling a refi on a house you plan to sell in a couple of months can actually work out well. The costs we”ll pay to close the new loan are actually slightly less than our current monthly payment; and when you get a new loan you don”t make a payment until the month following the first month after you close, so it”s really a wash there.

Anyway, I”ve got an appraisal scheduled for the current house on Saturday. Back when I refinanced for the first time just over a year ago, I used the lower rates (7% — yippee!) to get some cash out of the house to pay off all my other debt while keeping the same basic monthly payment.

And that was a good deal. Bye-bye credit card debt and all that.

But now, with that debt riding on top of the cost of the house (and with real estate prices no longer skyrocketing), it”s doubtful that the house will appraise high enough for me to have 20% “equity” and avoid the best thing to ever happen to mortgage lenders - PMI.

It”s not a huge deal; even with PMI we”ll save more than $300 per month. But it raises a question in my mind:

Could I pay off the appraiser to set my home”s value where I need it to be?

For the purposes of the refi, Mr. Appraiser is the sole determiner of my home”s value. He”ll come out on Saturday, armed with his tape measure, digital camera and note pad, and what he ends up writing down as my home”s “value” will determine if I pay PMI of about $100 a month.

He”ll make $250 to do this.

Could he be bought for another $100? $200?

I did a Google on “+bribe +house +appraiser”, but that was inconclusive. The first result was some message board where somebody asked “Can anyone tell me how I can get an appraiser to appraise a house for the value that I want?”

One reply was “Typically a substantial under the table bribe might work. Assuming that the appraiser will not report you. While this is highly illegal, it is the only way I know of.”

That”s promising, I guess. Some other guy wrote that appraisers are going to jail in Chicago and Baltimore for taking payoffs.

The rest of the results were state laws governing appraisers and whatnot.

I don”t think I”d make a good briber, anyway. I don”t know how to go about it the proper way.

Is it the “Florida State Handshake” where I slap a C-Note in the guy”s palm when he”s leaving? Do I leave bills on the kitchen counter hoping he understands what I”m doing and takes it? The direct approach of “What”ll it take to get my house to appraise for $X?” Having the wife wash his car while he”s doing the appraisal? I just don”t know.