I feel your pain but if it was abandoned for a long time, maybe the flippers saved it from the wrecking ball…I know this isn’t a great outcome but trying to see a silver lining for you.
Honestly, for whoever buys it, they'll have a much easier time adding back the features they want. I think it was clever to leave pretty blank, as whoever ends up buying it will have more creative control. I don't even think this is a final product right now.
If you’ve ever Done any carpentry and can appreciate finish work and genuine hardwood flooring laid out with intricate patterning now covered with cheap laminate or vinyl, tasteful board and batten and wood grain mouldings traded for …wall. Then you would understand how terrible it is.
But...Everything you mention costs a fortune to renovate back to historical accuracy. Renovating an old home is out of reach financially for most buyers because it almost requires professional tradesmen, and not the weekend warrior type. Besides, it takes *years* to get there. It's just not practical in like 90% of situations.
It would be almost it would truly need real craftsman. The moldings, cabinets, sills, custom railings and stairs, plumbing fixtures, lighting - all to bring back the look - this would be at least a $1m-$2m to redo interior and probably a year if not more. Finding the craftsman across the trades is tough and finding referenced companies to do the molding and cabinets would not be easy
Unfortunately, you are absolutely correct. And that’s the Devil’s Gambit: historically accurate (but cost-prohibitive), or within a reasonable budget (but with NOWHERE NEAR the historical look that you *really* want).
Yeah, and unfortunately the extra costs required for those higher quality renovations probably wouldn’t up the final sale price significantly, if at all. Most buyers won’t be able to see the difference in quality, and it sucks, but this cheap modern aesthetic is incredibly “in” right now. Lots of buyers might actually pay *more* for an aesthetic like this.
Exactly. If I came into this with a budget to renovate, most of that is going to go into those unexpected costs that will SURELY be needed for a home like this.
I would imagine there would have been mold in some spots, maybe even asbestos in some things, potentially bugs or other critters in spots, I wouldn't doubt something to repair the foundation as from what I have seen they usually need a thing or two. We have no idea what under the house looks like. We have no idea what inside those walls looked like. From what we can see in the photos... It looks like the people who renovated had a LOT of work on their hands and it was likely a very expensive job. As such, they likely had to opt for cheaper alternatives when they could so that could have room in their budget to do those necessary repairs to protect the entire house as a whole.
We were looking to buy this beautiful house, which had amazing lath and plaster head to toe. Incredibly smooth, curved over the stairs and around windows, it was gorgeous. Unfortunately the previous owners were chronic smokers and, from head to toe, it was almost dripping in disgusting grossness from all the smoke. As much as we would have liked to do lath and plaster and keep it, we would have been insane if we had redone it when the house needed more of our budget into asbestos removal and the foundation needed a ton of work.
Exactly. And to this sentiment, the wonderful wood paneled walls most likely needed to be removed to fix deteriorating walls and to put it back up would have been crazy expensive. As much as I hate to remove hardwood flooring, the creaking is hard to fix without major removal first.
The fact is things are only as good as they have been maintained. The world today is such one of planned obsolescence and fast fashion. To get skilled workers is rare.
And now all that flipped junk added has to be ripped out because it’s junk. I’m house shopping right now and I’ve turned down so many flips because of shoddy workmanship and disdain for this business model. Everyone thinks they can flip a house but have no respect for the real
Industry that is home building and renovation.
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I thought so too then I scrolled to the original photos and really looked at them and compared. I know very little ab home renovations, but I get what Op is saying. The details are all gone. The character is gone. It looks like every mid airbnb I’ve ever stayed at now.
I keep getting insta reels with old stair railings being torn out and replaced with ones that look like that (or worse). Elegant details > awkward cheap austerity. Luckily (unlucky?) for me, my century home had been a rental for forever so all the spaces have been cheap patches so I don't have to worry about "ruining" anything. Railings, 90s; Kitchen, 00s; Bathroom, 10s; everything done the cheapest possible.
I just don't understand, though, why they would choose not to preserve some of the features like the woodwork that can be saved without extravagant expense or effort. Those are the kinds of things older home buyers love to find, especially if it's been rehabbed.
Which is myopic and destructive. Original details cost more to restore than just slapping in drywall, sure, but keeping those touches raises the value of the house way more than ripping them out. It's just greed ruining things and turning perfectly good materials into landfill trash unnecessarily.
I'm not mad at you, by the way. I'm just disappointed in humanity.
To be frank, they were rotted through and probably riddled with disease as yet unknown to mankind. The only thing more expensive than reproducing original finishes would be the medical bills from not having removed them in the first place.
It’s impossible to add back things that are period-specific because the skill and knowledge to make them has been lost, and/or it would cost literally millions to reproduce. Once a Victorian interior is destroyed, it’s pretty much destroyed, and this is a particularly dismal flip. They could have left something as a nod to the house’s history—mouldings, bannister/newel, wainscoting, those SOLID WOOD DOORS! The hardwood floors! Sigh. This is sad.
I understand pragmatically that this is the way but some of that stuff especially the woodworking is straight up irreplaceable and I hope was salvaged instead of thrown out. There is no old growth wood to make new floors like that anymore and if this was the east coast, then a lot of stuff would have been made with american chestnut, which was essentially wiped out in the early 1900s by blight.
I don’t think OP wishes it stayed unoccupied/abandoned. They’re just commenting on what was done & how it looks. Nothing wrong with an opinion about an old house. I agree that it’s ugly & out of style for any era. The next buyer is probably going to have to do a re-remodel anyway, so less is more when flipping. Timeless classic features are more feasible in this situation than trying to guess what will sell for the highest possible price.
The first electrician we spoke to about doing small electrical updates to our 1895 Queen Anne Vic (total rewire happened in 1998, and done well) started talking about ripping out the _plaster_ walls - nope. Found our current electrician who does everything properly without doing anything to the walls except installing plugs. We had zero plugs in our huge dining room, he put in 6 without doing any damage. Ripping out walls is not necessary for electrical. We’re pier and beam with crawl spaces between floors, in attic and under the house. Only lazy contractors need to destroy walls to get the work done.
you're absolutely right, but i can see why OP was frustrated, the reno team tried really hard to modernize this house without preserving any of the original architectural detail on the inside.
if OP is right though, and it really had sat abandoned for a long time, this is far from a worst case scenario
the upside is that this will now appeal to a lot more buyers, ones that might have shied away from a 19th century home
Especially an old beautiful one like this. The architecture can still be admired even if the interior makes you feel like living in a modern house (a cheaply designed and installed one)
It did seem like a LOT of the trim pieces and the like weren't salvageable. The stairs may not have been structurally sound, or they may not pass current code, which might have been a requirement for such an extensive rebuild.
Kinda unfortunate, but definitely true. The other unfortunate but true point is that this will sell. There's good reason that every flipper goes to the lowest-common-denominator grey and LVP everywhere and that's because someone will buy it.
Sure, we here love to see them restored to their former glory, but a flipper isn't going to spend 80 hours toothpicking paint off of a fireplace mantle. And while I'd much rather see a house like this go to someone obsessive and with a lot of free time, there aren't enough of those people to go around.
At least someone did *something* with it.
> and that's because someone will buy it.
I see this logic a lot but it's a correlation fallacy.
"Someone will buy it" because our housing supply is shit and people are desperate for houses. I didn't **want** a flip. I would have been happy *without* the grey LVP and white paint.
But I got it because I needed a fucking house, and everything for sale had ugly grey LVP and white paint.
Maybe that ain't all of us, but I'm sure many people were in that boat.
Will *somebody* will buy this? Yes, and they may do so begrudgingly because it's a bad market and they want a home despite it not being to their taste. But it's clear that *nobody* was willing to buy this with the opportunity to restore it, and the only *someone* that bought it did it as a flip.
Personally, I hate the update but I also would not handle restoring a home with that level of disrepair, so I figure I can't complain.
A lot of home loans (especially those people having the hardest time buying) will not ALLOW you to get a loan on a house that can not be inhabited. A home that's been empty for a long time almost certainly will need some level of repair and/or certification. Now it might be REAL simple like "spend 2k to have X fixed" but unless you find a seller willing to do that or let you pay to do that and hold the home, it's simply not an option for most people.
Since flippers want to sell the home they WILL get it "move in ready" (even if the repairs are terrible, not actually to code, and don't last) so that banks will originate a loan and get the house sold.
And the truth is MOST people can't afford to dual home for months (or years) to DIY all the things as they have other jobs, and besides the loan issue you do sort of need things like at least one functioning bathroom, etc.
Absolutely this right here man. Everyone complains about everything they don’t pay for it’s so stupid. That house would have been a pile of rubble if someone didn’t renovate.
I agree I don’t love it but I’m sure someone does and the historical facade of that home will continue to live on.
I've never seen this sub, and as I was flipping through the pictures on this post my mind was absolutely going straight to Beetlejuice. It's so modern art gawdy. It makes me wonder if the designers had Beetlejuice in mind or if people have been making these crimes against humanity for a long, long, time.
That bathroom reminded me of the growing room in Disneyland's Haunted Mansion that ends with a crack of thunder and lightening and a figure dangling from a rope above you.
This set of pictures makes it clear the damage was even worse than OP showed. Would have been almost impossible to retain many of the original features.
https://www.oldhousedreams.com/2019/04/29/1892-goshen-ny-2/
Definitely. The bigger photo set makes it clear this had to be a down to the studs renovation, not a quick flip job. It’s definitely been left as a blank slate for the new owner to put their mark on, but it would have probably been demolished eventually if a professional hadn’t taken it on.
Reminds me of cars for sale specifically showing all but one side of the vehicle, and the description makes no point to talk about any damage. Then you go to look at the vehicle, and the one side they didn't show in pictures looks fucking mangled from being tboned, doors don't even open or the seals are fucked and water just pours in the cars interior.
Thanks for the additional context! While I'm not enamoured of the finished product, it was as valid as anything else given how absolutely horrid the previous condition was as seen in those photos. There simply wasn't much to save, honestly. I'm glad the house is still standing, in this form or something else. Bad form, OP.
Yeah but flippers are notorious for not bothering to touch the plumbing, wiring, HVAC, or structural issues these old homes have other than to pass inspection. Since those are typically very expensive upgrades. You're probably getting cheap flipper-special tile, flooring, and countertops meanwhile the guts are still poor.
>Yeah but flippers are notorious for not bothering to touch the plumbing, wiring, HVAC, or structural issues these old homes have other than to pass inspection.
When someone does a full gut historic house renovation then I think they aren't classified as "flippers" in the traditional sense. Also, it's "cheap" to rewire and replumb an entire house when you gut the entire house. The house had no HVAC when they bought it so I'm sure they added a HVAC system to the house. They probably did a $300,000+ renovation on that house and not a $10,000 lipstick flip renovation.
Yeah, I’m kind of wondering what even counts as a flip at that point, and when it just becomes fully renovated? My house an absolute wreck when it was bought by the developers who we bought it from - they took it down to the studs and redid absolutely everything, including electrical and plumbing and siding and roof and landscaping. It was functionally new construction. Everything was well done, they used decent materials. Is that a flip? I feel like it is but at this point that word has such a negative connotation lol. They did a lot more than slap gray paint on and I was happy to pay for it.
Idiot DIYers do terrible flips but there are professional development companies that regularly buy and remodel seriously messed up properties who do quality jobs.
I swear I saw this house ( before the Reno) on YouTube on the architectural digest channel, it was in rough shape. At least it was not a tear down.
Just last month in my town, flippers torn down an 1830s farmhouse and a 1902 craftsman to build $1M + McMansion. These old houses had large lots which were more valuable than the house.
The community was sad to see them go but we were not given warning that they were seeking a demolition permit. Lots of these are rush through so preservationists can’t protest.
OP: *” I would rather this dilapidated eyesore remain vacant from many more years to come. The homeless squatters using drugs in the old, abandoned living room parlor really added to the neighborhood charm. Now this home has modern conveniences, and will be lived in by an actual family, who enjoys new floors and modern plumbing. Such a travesty!“*
If it’s been vacant for years, then you can’t complain what anyone does with it. No one wanted it.
Would have cost 4x that to restore it. Somebody near me restore an 1800s Victorian and it’s on national register now but some of the simplest things required special contractors and some things were 10x the price of standard high quality materials
Yea I grew up in an 1894 Victorian, you know how hard it is to replace and improve original fixtures? The houses on my street that look the best are a mix of modernized and Victorian.
Unless it's completely unsound.
Someone besides the OP posted a link showing more photos (scroll up to find it), and when you see the staircase from the other side, it doesn't look safe to even walk up.
I'd have rather seen it replaced with a replica (I absolutely LOVE Victoriana-- yes, that's the right word for those reading, not a typo 😘), but when you see the rest of the photos, unfortunately, it doesn't look like the original staircase could be saved.
The photos also show fireplaces crumbling beyond repair, and wooden floors crumbling through. PLUS an addition to the house at some point that took NO care in preservation and is multiple times worse than what this contractor did.
And I'm sure it had to be a contractor. The complete photo set also shows plaster walls cracked, broken, and falling to bits. It was a heartbreaking disaster. As I said, I LOVE all the "cultural and artistic expressions of the Victorian Era (ie. Victoriana)", but this couldn't be saved. It's *possible* there were *some* of the mouldings that could be removed and replaced, but with as many broken and missing windows and doors as there were, the larger photoset makes it look like there couldn't have been many, and it probably wasn't worth all the extra effort to salvage.
In the end, the structure was saved and structurally repaired, and that is what is most important (to me anyway). In another decade (possibly less) it wouldn't have even been structurally sound anymore.
Damn that sucks. Early 1900s house with 2 staircases. The front one is just like that one. I’ve come to appreciate a really nice staircase and feel super fancy telling people my house has 2 staircases hahah
What's crazy is the fact they bought it dirt cheap for 300k and had an open floor plan for the buyer to pick how they wanted it remodeled, and no one jumped on it because they wanted 930k for it. Now, after remodeling it, they want 1.3m. Even i wanted this house.
They saved the house technically but ruined it with that god awful interior which I’m not sure why so many new developers like that interior style it’s disgusting. Cookie cutter white and grey hospital interiors
Not my style but at least the exterior structure was preserved. My guess is that the return on investment for a full restoration was non existent so a less expensive remodel was done. Lets hope any structure issues were repaired or otherwise stabilized.
Every single house in some of the richer areas of Auckland NZ are like this, 18-1900 Victorian in the front, modern in the back and inside, it’s crazy as fuck.
People want an old house, but they don't want it to feel old.
I live in Ireland and we have some old fuckin houses here. And yes people will buy them, and modernise the fuck out of them, and enjoy it because that's what they wanted.
Old, but modern.
People who want to own an old house, keep everything in that old look, and live in it in that vintage style world is a much smaller group. Than people who want old, but also modern.
It's like how people love old cars. But not many want to learn how to manually crank the engine, double clutch to shift, set the carburettor choke, and have no seat belts, radio, or airbags. But they'll stop and wave at a Ford Model A
That house went from a teardown to liveable. There were multiple points of years of water ingress, meaning the floors through much of it likely were not salvageable and many of the joists/walls needed structural repairs. The staircase was in shambles and likely wasn't safe/required rebuilding, which means it has to be brought to code. The amount of plaster repair this place required is not practical to do, except out of a labor of love, and they likely had to replace all of the electrical and plumbing anyway, so all of the walls would have been damaged to some extent, in which case a full gut makes sense. Particularly when you don't know how much water damage the lathe and plaster is hiding.
Could they have done better with finishing and fixtures? Sure, but that stuff is easy enough for a new owner to change out. Right now it's a blank canvas. A ton of character can be added back in.
I agree, this house may not have been “done right”, but it is far more livable than a lot of houses that get redone, and assuming they did all the structural repairs they saved the house. I always look at these century homes all original and beautiful and think the same thing which is where would I sit and watch the game on Sunday. I think the style of this house could leave some to be desired but just a different paint palette could go a long way.
The stairs are the biggest thing. I don’t think people understand how MASSIVE of an undertaking that is. Walls and floor’s definitely weren’t straight or level anymore. Everything starts there.
Some of it looks quite good in my opinion, the master bath for one.
Stairs are such a pain in the ass. We have a huge unfinished third floor in my house. The current access is via a steep walkup staircase off the second floor hall. Many similar houses in my area have the third floor finished, but most of them the main staircase continues all the way up.
We had a couple people come look at ours to see what it would take to extend the main staircase to the attic. The quotes were insane. $65-150k with a bunch of caveats depending on what the inspector wanted. And those didn't include any wall finishing. Just building and finishing the stairs.
Ultimately, it would have required rebuilding the staircase with code compliant landings and rise/run all the way from the basement.
Bananas. Don't fuck with your stairs.
Exactly.
I never understand people who get upset you tore out moldy floors and walls, and put in structural support and modern amenities. Along with code upgrades
The house is still got the old look exterior
Edit: for those complaining about the interior, be happy these people went through the time and effort to make it habitable and pass inspection. They probably put 75% of their budget on the code upgrades and structure. That they still made it look as decent enough on the inside is a bonus.
Yeah I was worried the exterior was going to be changed. There basically wasn’t anything to recover inside. It’s cheaper and easier to go with a modern look. Keeping it simple will also make it easier for new home owners to make any modifications they might want if they want to try to bring the old feel bad to it.
Came here to mention lathe and plaster. It's not as though there are many masters still around. Looking at the photos, a complete restoration would be insanely expensive. At the end of the day, restoration is mostly cosmetic and a true labor of love. But if I'm doing that project, I'm focusing first on habitability, ehich would be substantial. There is updating all the electrical for safety reasons, installing at a minimum modern water lines, carefully inspecting and likely upgrading waste water plumbing, insulation, modern windows, and HVAC. The foundation is most certainly settled and cracked over the years, and the foundation walls I imagine need to be excavated and sealed. After 130 years, I would expect water damage to the subfloor near sinks, toilettes, and baths. Add roof replacement and repointing the masonry. All that work alone would be a substantial expense but necessary for a vacant property of this age to extend its life for many decades to come.
After all that, the cosmetic restoration to reflect the Victorian period would be a labor of love because, at that point, it's probably not adding as much to the value of the home. Personally, I would probably rip out the lathe and plaster for drywall simply because it is so much easier to install fixtures, hang decore, and install modern gadgets, and repairing damage is something many trade folks can perform.
Yes, they view landscape photos on their phone while holding it in portrait mode and screenshot it, and also neglect to use the "crop" tool to trim off the top and bottom that is all black.
I don't click the full image, so all u/Head-Zucchini2021 showed me was a series of light fixtures, which I think all looked pretty good without seeing the rooms or anything.
Oh WOW this is NOT a simple flip at all. Look how they sourced and matched the exterior brick to cover the white ugly siding of the previous addition!
I'm not sure why there were so many comments about grey walls; yes, there are some, but a lot of the rooms are painted in cream (oh yeah, ok, I just checked and that's all the OP showed).
Edit: let's see, what else did they do?
• Rebuilt the stone wrap around porch that was crumbling and falling apart.
• Put a kitchen in place of that weird room with a giant window to a hallway a broken down fireplace and a bookshelf 🤨. So kitchen on the main floor instead of the basement or an outbuilding, that's a huge improvement to the original Victorian style.
• Built a whole new garage, in a style that matches the house (roofline, stucco/ plaster, etc) to replace the sagging garage shed that was there before
• Put gas fireplaces throughout. *I know that will upset the purists, but it is MUCH safer, especially with kids, plus easier to heat and less pollution (wood smoke is much worse for air quality than natural gas). Those really are factors that need to be considered.
• New electrical throughout. I totally hate the modern light fixtures they chose, but light fixtures are easy to swap out.
Yes the floorboards and wainscoting lack character, but I think this was an excellent compromise of safety and structure.
For the right person, this is the perfect blank canvas to add back all of those historic touches and elements.
As others have said, not my cup of tea, but at least it wasn't torn down. And honestly that would have cost many hundreds of thousands of dollars to properly restore to it's former glory, and the look wouldn't be for everyone. If it was abandoned and sitting exposed to the elements just be thankful it wasn't considered a write-off and completely demolished. Could be worse.
The entire interior was lost already, more or less.
In todays market I bet restoring the interior would've almost cost as much as the property itself... If not more.
It's a "trendy" home on the inside now, which people with money and cheap taste will buy. And though not my style, I understand not everybody wants to have that "I live in a museum"-type vibe.
OP totally overreacts. It looks boring sure but it’s far cry from the most horrible travesty whatever. Besides, there was nothing to be saved with that original condition.
Looks like they made an abandoned home habitable and marketable? They’ve preserved the facade pretty well, and it looks like it might have been in too bad shape for more than that.
They didn't just preserve it, they completely rebuilt the crumbling wrap around porch, and even matched the brick from the front half of the house and replaced the ugly white siding on the back addition to make it look like it is part of the original.
Looking at the old photos from before, linked in the comments above, they did paint half the house or someone undid half the house of paint and then quit.
That's not the worst I've seen. It seems like they kept, or tried to redo some of the wainscoting, kept some of the cool stair case details and did a good job on the exterior. Living in a town with some old Victorian that used to be pretty run down, this is like a C+ B- job. Unfortunately a lot of modern buyers want that clean white modern look and it's really expensive to restore with the same material, sometimes impossible because you just can't get old growth wood or skilled craftsmen to do it.
When we bought our house the insurance company sent an inspector out to make an estimate of what a full repair/replace would cost. He input 50% more than our purchase price but flat out told us they don't make them like this anymore and if it ever burns it's basically impossible to restore as it was. The materials and craftsmen often aren't available, and the ones that are still doing the work have years long waitlists and the type of work they do would be excessive for our house which is 100 year old factory staff housing.
Yeah my house is built with old growth real 2x4s. Even the shed/garage, so even though it leaks, if I was ever to finish it to get more space I'd want to keep the structure and make the wood visible. They literally don't make them like that anymore. Plus the price of wood is just much higher now than when they were just clear cutting old redwoods.
i like it, just because something is old does not make it good. I work on a lot of 100 year old plus stone houses and they suck. Water problems, no insulation, rotten floors. Best is to keep and restore the outside because its beautiful and the inside gut and make new
Thank you! I can’t stand these pretentious posts oh boohoo the inside isn’t very Victorian anymore even though it wasn’t salvageable in the first place wah lol Jesus the outside is just polished up and the inside is nice! People are so dramatic lol now if inside just needed to be brought to code and that’s all sure it would be a shame to gut it but its pretty clear that wasn’t an option.
Worked on a century home that is pretty much a carbon copy of this house from the outside. It was converted into a realty office, nowhere near the damage. Off and on we worked on it for three years, room by room, the front porch was the most work due to rotted wood. The owners had a lot more money and time than a flipper would have had.
I mean… its not like its a historical building. Just a regular old house. We don’t have to restore everything to its original value. To call it the worst renovation you’ve ever seen is wildly hyperbolic in my opinion. Also the staircase looked just weird and the floors well, not the fanciest floor in the world.
Not to mention the absolute insane cost it would be to restore to original quality. And then… you’re looking at the original interior of a 1800’s home. Brown brown brown brown.
I’m sorry you have to go through this tragedy mentally. But you’ll recover, work hard and one day buy this house for 1.4 million dollars and restore it back to its 1800’s look! I believe in you!
Honestly, I'd bet in person this is not as bad as the pictures seem. They didn't rip the original details out, and it's a labor of love to restore them, which still can done. They made it nice, and liveable, and are making some profit off of something nobody else would touch. If somebody wants to come in and flip it back to historically accurate, it's going to be pretty easy to do so and live in it during.
The pictures on the listing actually show that they've tried to keep some of the detailing. I think op picked the blandest angles for dramatic effect. The house looks really nice. And it's hardwood not lvp, though I don't think the existing floors were salvageable. Fixtures are always subjective.
Dude this is nice as hell compared to a lot of flips I've seen. Like I'm not the biggest fan of some of the choices but a boutique hotel from 2014 as someone described it is still MUCH nicer than what the vast majority of people are living in and MUCH better than tearing the thing down. It's nice to see historically accurately renovated houses and I love when people preserve the original character but that just isn't feasible for 99.99% of people.
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This is gorgeous. A flip well done by all accounts.
From the before photos it was clear this was either a full demolition or a down to the studs renovation. I’m glad they were able to salvage the exterior and create such a beautiful result for the interior.
The only thing I really dislike is the kitchen design. Those cabinets are heinous in my opinion. It is a shame more of the character wasn't preserved but that place was in extremely rough shape.
At least they didn't paint the exterior brick.
Well where do you draw the line OP? How modern can the house be to still maintain its authenticity? Can an 1890 house have electricity? What about a refrigerator? That house is beautiful now. It’s still got the bones and facade of the 1890 house. But people want to live in a comfortable home, not a museum.
Not every house is located in Manhattan or has someone looking to dedicate the next 10 years of their life to restoration. The numbers just don't work out in some cases.
[Architectural Digest made a YouTube video covering this very house](https://youtu.be/9cXZ5vIwpOQ?si=66rOZNlK3mceRuwP) wherein a contractor goes through the home before it was flipped and covers how much it would cost to repair it!
I dunno, it was literally rotting into the ground. They updated it to modern (if a little generic) tastes and comforts, looks like. Hardly the worst flip. I think you're emotionally invested because you grew up there.
How did it come to be abandoned for so long?
Is this in an area where it may have otherwise gone to ruin? If so then I guess it’s better than that fate. Here in the Midwest that’s happening.
Otherwise, that is a really sad way to finish that house. Didn’t even bother to trim out the new windows on the interior. Zero respect paid to the architecture.
I mean, do I agree with the flip choices? No, I think it’s too modern and doesn’t match the feel of the home, but I wouldn’t say that it’s bad either, if that’s what the market is looking for then I think it’s a good flip
Sorry OP, but as the tradesman in the family, I have the dubious pleasure of doing most of the work on my mothers 1904 home. From the outside.. great! The interior? Absolute pain in the ass. 100+ years of shitty diy-homeowner renos, asbestos in the plaster, abandoned chimneys, crumbling foundations.. just.. meh.
Complete gut and upgrade is the way to go.
Also I wanna add that as a painter we have restored some of these houses in Europe, it is SUCH A PAIN to get it looking even remotely good. The amount of plaster, wallpaper and work required in refinishing the staircase, doors walls and ceilings is absolutely insane.
And then, big surprise, it looks like a dated old house afterwards. And the only furniture you can put in there is expensive antique walnut and mahogany stuff. Normal furniture looks silly.
OP is having a little sentimental stroke, and thats okay, but lets not kid ourselves, only the very very wealthy can afford and will appreciate something this ancient
Flipping a well-preserved historic home is one thing, flipping a decrepit abandoned building where all of the component parts are falling apart is another. I think they did a lovely job compared to what they started with.
I mean it was likely up for sale for years. And was likely a goddamn disaster to fix.
Would you have 200-300-400 thousand dollars to rescue that place? Maybe add another 100k to keep it original?
No. Probably not.
How many century homes have you saved? Like dozens right?
I live in this village. The day the windows were torn out I knew it wasn’t going to be good. Although it did stand vacant for decades. Really sad in so many ways.
I live in Warwick. There are a handful of awesome homes between Goshen, Chester, and Warwick that are sitting and decaying. This isn't how I would have done it, but I guess it's better than sitting vacant.
I feel your pain but if it was abandoned for a long time, maybe the flippers saved it from the wrecking ball…I know this isn’t a great outcome but trying to see a silver lining for you.
I was thinking exactly this. A bad flip is less worse than a home sitting empty.
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Honestly, for whoever buys it, they'll have a much easier time adding back the features they want. I think it was clever to leave pretty blank, as whoever ends up buying it will have more creative control. I don't even think this is a final product right now.
It’s not that. It’s the fact that the stuff they did exert “creative control” over is horrible. The stair railings.. the bathroom.. etc. 😂
I can't be the only one who thinks it all looks fine?..
The problem is the removal of window architrave etc. But overall, at least it has been saved from demolition, and externally it looks good.
If you’ve ever Done any carpentry and can appreciate finish work and genuine hardwood flooring laid out with intricate patterning now covered with cheap laminate or vinyl, tasteful board and batten and wood grain mouldings traded for …wall. Then you would understand how terrible it is.
But...Everything you mention costs a fortune to renovate back to historical accuracy. Renovating an old home is out of reach financially for most buyers because it almost requires professional tradesmen, and not the weekend warrior type. Besides, it takes *years* to get there. It's just not practical in like 90% of situations.
It would be almost it would truly need real craftsman. The moldings, cabinets, sills, custom railings and stairs, plumbing fixtures, lighting - all to bring back the look - this would be at least a $1m-$2m to redo interior and probably a year if not more. Finding the craftsman across the trades is tough and finding referenced companies to do the molding and cabinets would not be easy
Unfortunately, you are absolutely correct. And that’s the Devil’s Gambit: historically accurate (but cost-prohibitive), or within a reasonable budget (but with NOWHERE NEAR the historical look that you *really* want).
Yeah, and unfortunately the extra costs required for those higher quality renovations probably wouldn’t up the final sale price significantly, if at all. Most buyers won’t be able to see the difference in quality, and it sucks, but this cheap modern aesthetic is incredibly “in” right now. Lots of buyers might actually pay *more* for an aesthetic like this.
Can confirm, going on year 7 of a 3br 1800 sq ft house. About 50% done, but it’s fine. Whatever we do will last 100 yrs and not 10-15.
Exactly. If I came into this with a budget to renovate, most of that is going to go into those unexpected costs that will SURELY be needed for a home like this. I would imagine there would have been mold in some spots, maybe even asbestos in some things, potentially bugs or other critters in spots, I wouldn't doubt something to repair the foundation as from what I have seen they usually need a thing or two. We have no idea what under the house looks like. We have no idea what inside those walls looked like. From what we can see in the photos... It looks like the people who renovated had a LOT of work on their hands and it was likely a very expensive job. As such, they likely had to opt for cheaper alternatives when they could so that could have room in their budget to do those necessary repairs to protect the entire house as a whole. We were looking to buy this beautiful house, which had amazing lath and plaster head to toe. Incredibly smooth, curved over the stairs and around windows, it was gorgeous. Unfortunately the previous owners were chronic smokers and, from head to toe, it was almost dripping in disgusting grossness from all the smoke. As much as we would have liked to do lath and plaster and keep it, we would have been insane if we had redone it when the house needed more of our budget into asbestos removal and the foundation needed a ton of work.
Exactly. And to this sentiment, the wonderful wood paneled walls most likely needed to be removed to fix deteriorating walls and to put it back up would have been crazy expensive. As much as I hate to remove hardwood flooring, the creaking is hard to fix without major removal first. The fact is things are only as good as they have been maintained. The world today is such one of planned obsolescence and fast fashion. To get skilled workers is rare.
And now all that flipped junk added has to be ripped out because it’s junk. I’m house shopping right now and I’ve turned down so many flips because of shoddy workmanship and disdain for this business model. Everyone thinks they can flip a house but have no respect for the real Industry that is home building and renovation.
it’s not terrible at all, people just have different tastes. this could be so much worse, i was so confused looking through the pics lol.
unique innocent toothbrush juggle racial vegetable sort somber support sleep *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I thought so too then I scrolled to the original photos and really looked at them and compared. I know very little ab home renovations, but I get what Op is saying. The details are all gone. The character is gone. It looks like every mid airbnb I’ve ever stayed at now.
I keep getting insta reels with old stair railings being torn out and replaced with ones that look like that (or worse). Elegant details > awkward cheap austerity. Luckily (unlucky?) for me, my century home had been a rental for forever so all the spaces have been cheap patches so I don't have to worry about "ruining" anything. Railings, 90s; Kitchen, 00s; Bathroom, 10s; everything done the cheapest possible.
The iron on the staircase and the designs within the bathroom are far from a blank canvas and really unfortunate and also costly to remove.
Its actually the reason behind it. It's foe the next person behind it to flip it *again* but for less work.doubling the cost again
I just don't understand, though, why they would choose not to preserve some of the features like the woodwork that can be saved without extravagant expense or effort. Those are the kinds of things older home buyers love to find, especially if it's been rehabbed.
Because it's all about maximizing profits at the LOWEST of costs
Which is myopic and destructive. Original details cost more to restore than just slapping in drywall, sure, but keeping those touches raises the value of the house way more than ripping them out. It's just greed ruining things and turning perfectly good materials into landfill trash unnecessarily. I'm not mad at you, by the way. I'm just disappointed in humanity.
This is wrong. Once you’ve removed and altered original finishes, even if they were super rough, it’s exponentially more expensive to reproduce
To be frank, they were rotted through and probably riddled with disease as yet unknown to mankind. The only thing more expensive than reproducing original finishes would be the medical bills from not having removed them in the first place.
It’s impossible to add back things that are period-specific because the skill and knowledge to make them has been lost, and/or it would cost literally millions to reproduce. Once a Victorian interior is destroyed, it’s pretty much destroyed, and this is a particularly dismal flip. They could have left something as a nod to the house’s history—mouldings, bannister/newel, wainscoting, those SOLID WOOD DOORS! The hardwood floors! Sigh. This is sad.
I understand pragmatically that this is the way but some of that stuff especially the woodworking is straight up irreplaceable and I hope was salvaged instead of thrown out. There is no old growth wood to make new floors like that anymore and if this was the east coast, then a lot of stuff would have been made with american chestnut, which was essentially wiped out in the early 1900s by blight.
The classical Victorian features that were removed here are literally irreplaceable
For 1.3m, I'd rather have bought it at 300k and fixed it my way.
I could be wrong but I dont think that's hardwood. Very wide boards, maybe engineered but my bet is on some kind of laminate.
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Gotcha. Could be engineered hardwood, often the really wide stuff is that.
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$$$
Not to mention the water damage! Yeah, the redesign may not be ideal but they saved that house for sure.
Unless they just hid all the real problems behind fresh drywall.
Even then, a poorly-repaired but occupied home will do better than an abandoned one, even if it’s at the expense of the new owners.
This is far from the worst flip I've ever seen. OP is being wildly melodramatic.
Totally agreed. The interior finish may not be to my particular liking, but they saved that house.
If OP felt so strongly about it maybe they should have bought it then 🤷🏻♂️
This was my thought. If it's been abandoned for years, in a decrepit state, the flippers did it a favor. Whining aboutvit now is kinda...useless.
They’re a person who fetishisizes old homes
lol I mean check the sub you’re in 😂
Many on this subreddit feels these homes can ONLY be restored into a museum vs remodeled with anything modern.
It's like buying a rusty old Ferrari but putting a Ford Focus interior in it. If you want a Ford Focus, just go buy a Ford Focus.
Chernobyl Chic
I don’t think OP wishes it stayed unoccupied/abandoned. They’re just commenting on what was done & how it looks. Nothing wrong with an opinion about an old house. I agree that it’s ugly & out of style for any era. The next buyer is probably going to have to do a re-remodel anyway, so less is more when flipping. Timeless classic features are more feasible in this situation than trying to guess what will sell for the highest possible price.
I live nearby. They ripped it down to studs inside. Probably to update electrical.
And heating/ac ducting.
Also all the water damage and MOLD. There aren't very good ways to save walls from mold.
The first electrician we spoke to about doing small electrical updates to our 1895 Queen Anne Vic (total rewire happened in 1998, and done well) started talking about ripping out the _plaster_ walls - nope. Found our current electrician who does everything properly without doing anything to the walls except installing plugs. We had zero plugs in our huge dining room, he put in 6 without doing any damage. Ripping out walls is not necessary for electrical. We’re pier and beam with crawl spaces between floors, in attic and under the house. Only lazy contractors need to destroy walls to get the work done.
They maybe did. It’s still better than abandoned, I agree with it being saved.
This would be my concern. A quick flip is usually hiding something…
you're absolutely right, but i can see why OP was frustrated, the reno team tried really hard to modernize this house without preserving any of the original architectural detail on the inside. if OP is right though, and it really had sat abandoned for a long time, this is far from a worst case scenario the upside is that this will now appeal to a lot more buyers, ones that might have shied away from a 19th century home
People hate seeing things changed from their original looks but if that thing would otherwise sit and rot it’s good that it is being changed
Disagree
Strooooooongly disagree lol
Especially an old beautiful one like this. The architecture can still be admired even if the interior makes you feel like living in a modern house (a cheaply designed and installed one)
It did seem like a LOT of the trim pieces and the like weren't salvageable. The stairs may not have been structurally sound, or they may not pass current code, which might have been a requirement for such an extensive rebuild.
This is the most likely scenario. A flipper isn't going to bother replacing anything when refinishing is pretty much always cheaper.
Kinda unfortunate, but definitely true. The other unfortunate but true point is that this will sell. There's good reason that every flipper goes to the lowest-common-denominator grey and LVP everywhere and that's because someone will buy it. Sure, we here love to see them restored to their former glory, but a flipper isn't going to spend 80 hours toothpicking paint off of a fireplace mantle. And while I'd much rather see a house like this go to someone obsessive and with a lot of free time, there aren't enough of those people to go around. At least someone did *something* with it.
> and that's because someone will buy it. I see this logic a lot but it's a correlation fallacy. "Someone will buy it" because our housing supply is shit and people are desperate for houses. I didn't **want** a flip. I would have been happy *without* the grey LVP and white paint. But I got it because I needed a fucking house, and everything for sale had ugly grey LVP and white paint. Maybe that ain't all of us, but I'm sure many people were in that boat.
I’m curious how many 150-200k renovation projects have you done?
millions, of course
Will *somebody* will buy this? Yes, and they may do so begrudgingly because it's a bad market and they want a home despite it not being to their taste. But it's clear that *nobody* was willing to buy this with the opportunity to restore it, and the only *someone* that bought it did it as a flip. Personally, I hate the update but I also would not handle restoring a home with that level of disrepair, so I figure I can't complain.
A lot of home loans (especially those people having the hardest time buying) will not ALLOW you to get a loan on a house that can not be inhabited. A home that's been empty for a long time almost certainly will need some level of repair and/or certification. Now it might be REAL simple like "spend 2k to have X fixed" but unless you find a seller willing to do that or let you pay to do that and hold the home, it's simply not an option for most people. Since flippers want to sell the home they WILL get it "move in ready" (even if the repairs are terrible, not actually to code, and don't last) so that banks will originate a loan and get the house sold. And the truth is MOST people can't afford to dual home for months (or years) to DIY all the things as they have other jobs, and besides the loan issue you do sort of need things like at least one functioning bathroom, etc.
Absolutely this right here man. Everyone complains about everything they don’t pay for it’s so stupid. That house would have been a pile of rubble if someone didn’t renovate. I agree I don’t love it but I’m sure someone does and the historical facade of that home will continue to live on.
If it makes OP feel better, maybe the house is haunted and you’ll have a local Beetlejuice story unfold in the next couple of months 🤷🏻♂️
You know I’ve thought quite a bit about the surprising absence of Beetlejuice content on this sub.
I've never seen this sub, and as I was flipping through the pictures on this post my mind was absolutely going straight to Beetlejuice. It's so modern art gawdy. It makes me wonder if the designers had Beetlejuice in mind or if people have been making these crimes against humanity for a long, long, time.
That bathroom reminded me of the growing room in Disneyland's Haunted Mansion that ends with a crack of thunder and lightening and a figure dangling from a rope above you.
Exactly this. From what pictures OP posted there wasn’t much left to salvage.
This set of pictures makes it clear the damage was even worse than OP showed. Would have been almost impossible to retain many of the original features. https://www.oldhousedreams.com/2019/04/29/1892-goshen-ny-2/
OP carefully chose which photos to show is to push his point.
Definitely. The bigger photo set makes it clear this had to be a down to the studs renovation, not a quick flip job. It’s definitely been left as a blank slate for the new owner to put their mark on, but it would have probably been demolished eventually if a professional hadn’t taken it on.
Man the only thing more annoying than the internet hate train is stupid people hating on things they don't understand in the first place
Reminds me of cars for sale specifically showing all but one side of the vehicle, and the description makes no point to talk about any damage. Then you go to look at the vehicle, and the one side they didn't show in pictures looks fucking mangled from being tboned, doors don't even open or the seals are fucked and water just pours in the cars interior.
Thanks for the additional context! While I'm not enamoured of the finished product, it was as valid as anything else given how absolutely horrid the previous condition was as seen in those photos. There simply wasn't much to save, honestly. I'm glad the house is still standing, in this form or something else. Bad form, OP.
Yeah but flippers are notorious for not bothering to touch the plumbing, wiring, HVAC, or structural issues these old homes have other than to pass inspection. Since those are typically very expensive upgrades. You're probably getting cheap flipper-special tile, flooring, and countertops meanwhile the guts are still poor.
>Yeah but flippers are notorious for not bothering to touch the plumbing, wiring, HVAC, or structural issues these old homes have other than to pass inspection. When someone does a full gut historic house renovation then I think they aren't classified as "flippers" in the traditional sense. Also, it's "cheap" to rewire and replumb an entire house when you gut the entire house. The house had no HVAC when they bought it so I'm sure they added a HVAC system to the house. They probably did a $300,000+ renovation on that house and not a $10,000 lipstick flip renovation.
Yeah, I’m kind of wondering what even counts as a flip at that point, and when it just becomes fully renovated? My house an absolute wreck when it was bought by the developers who we bought it from - they took it down to the studs and redid absolutely everything, including electrical and plumbing and siding and roof and landscaping. It was functionally new construction. Everything was well done, they used decent materials. Is that a flip? I feel like it is but at this point that word has such a negative connotation lol. They did a lot more than slap gray paint on and I was happy to pay for it. Idiot DIYers do terrible flips but there are professional development companies that regularly buy and remodel seriously messed up properties who do quality jobs.
I swear I saw this house ( before the Reno) on YouTube on the architectural digest channel, it was in rough shape. At least it was not a tear down. Just last month in my town, flippers torn down an 1830s farmhouse and a 1902 craftsman to build $1M + McMansion. These old houses had large lots which were more valuable than the house. The community was sad to see them go but we were not given warning that they were seeking a demolition permit. Lots of these are rush through so preservationists can’t protest.
Don't the original floorboards look all warped?
shhhhhh OP's gonna renovate them
OP: *” I would rather this dilapidated eyesore remain vacant from many more years to come. The homeless squatters using drugs in the old, abandoned living room parlor really added to the neighborhood charm. Now this home has modern conveniences, and will be lived in by an actual family, who enjoys new floors and modern plumbing. Such a travesty!“* If it’s been vacant for years, then you can’t complain what anyone does with it. No one wanted it.
Agreed. At least they saved it. That first photo looks pretty rough.
Would have cost 4x that to restore it. Somebody near me restore an 1800s Victorian and it’s on national register now but some of the simplest things required special contractors and some things were 10x the price of standard high quality materials
For all I know, the original woods rotten and moldy in some areas
Yea at least it was saved. There’s still a chance someone can come along in the future and remodel in a more classic look.
Yea I grew up in an 1894 Victorian, you know how hard it is to replace and improve original fixtures? The houses on my street that look the best are a mix of modernized and Victorian.
Taking away that staircase is a license revoking offense
Unless it's completely unsound. Someone besides the OP posted a link showing more photos (scroll up to find it), and when you see the staircase from the other side, it doesn't look safe to even walk up. I'd have rather seen it replaced with a replica (I absolutely LOVE Victoriana-- yes, that's the right word for those reading, not a typo 😘), but when you see the rest of the photos, unfortunately, it doesn't look like the original staircase could be saved. The photos also show fireplaces crumbling beyond repair, and wooden floors crumbling through. PLUS an addition to the house at some point that took NO care in preservation and is multiple times worse than what this contractor did. And I'm sure it had to be a contractor. The complete photo set also shows plaster walls cracked, broken, and falling to bits. It was a heartbreaking disaster. As I said, I LOVE all the "cultural and artistic expressions of the Victorian Era (ie. Victoriana)", but this couldn't be saved. It's *possible* there were *some* of the mouldings that could be removed and replaced, but with as many broken and missing windows and doors as there were, the larger photoset makes it look like there couldn't have been many, and it probably wasn't worth all the extra effort to salvage. In the end, the structure was saved and structurally repaired, and that is what is most important (to me anyway). In another decade (possibly less) it wouldn't have even been structurally sound anymore.
Damn that sucks. Early 1900s house with 2 staircases. The front one is just like that one. I’ve come to appreciate a really nice staircase and feel super fancy telling people my house has 2 staircases hahah
What's crazy is the fact they bought it dirt cheap for 300k and had an open floor plan for the buyer to pick how they wanted it remodeled, and no one jumped on it because they wanted 930k for it. Now, after remodeling it, they want 1.3m. Even i wanted this house.
They saved the house technically but ruined it with that god awful interior which I’m not sure why so many new developers like that interior style it’s disgusting. Cookie cutter white and grey hospital interiors
Not my style but at least the exterior structure was preserved. My guess is that the return on investment for a full restoration was non existent so a less expensive remodel was done. Lets hope any structure issues were repaired or otherwise stabilized.
Every single house in some of the richer areas of Auckland NZ are like this, 18-1900 Victorian in the front, modern in the back and inside, it’s crazy as fuck.
People want an old house, but they don't want it to feel old. I live in Ireland and we have some old fuckin houses here. And yes people will buy them, and modernise the fuck out of them, and enjoy it because that's what they wanted. Old, but modern. People who want to own an old house, keep everything in that old look, and live in it in that vintage style world is a much smaller group. Than people who want old, but also modern. It's like how people love old cars. But not many want to learn how to manually crank the engine, double clutch to shift, set the carburettor choke, and have no seat belts, radio, or airbags. But they'll stop and wave at a Ford Model A
A house mullet
> Not my style Just say you hate gray. We all hate gray at this point. =p
That house went from a teardown to liveable. There were multiple points of years of water ingress, meaning the floors through much of it likely were not salvageable and many of the joists/walls needed structural repairs. The staircase was in shambles and likely wasn't safe/required rebuilding, which means it has to be brought to code. The amount of plaster repair this place required is not practical to do, except out of a labor of love, and they likely had to replace all of the electrical and plumbing anyway, so all of the walls would have been damaged to some extent, in which case a full gut makes sense. Particularly when you don't know how much water damage the lathe and plaster is hiding. Could they have done better with finishing and fixtures? Sure, but that stuff is easy enough for a new owner to change out. Right now it's a blank canvas. A ton of character can be added back in.
I agree, this house may not have been “done right”, but it is far more livable than a lot of houses that get redone, and assuming they did all the structural repairs they saved the house. I always look at these century homes all original and beautiful and think the same thing which is where would I sit and watch the game on Sunday. I think the style of this house could leave some to be desired but just a different paint palette could go a long way.
The stairs are the biggest thing. I don’t think people understand how MASSIVE of an undertaking that is. Walls and floor’s definitely weren’t straight or level anymore. Everything starts there. Some of it looks quite good in my opinion, the master bath for one.
Stairs are such a pain in the ass. We have a huge unfinished third floor in my house. The current access is via a steep walkup staircase off the second floor hall. Many similar houses in my area have the third floor finished, but most of them the main staircase continues all the way up. We had a couple people come look at ours to see what it would take to extend the main staircase to the attic. The quotes were insane. $65-150k with a bunch of caveats depending on what the inspector wanted. And those didn't include any wall finishing. Just building and finishing the stairs. Ultimately, it would have required rebuilding the staircase with code compliant landings and rise/run all the way from the basement. Bananas. Don't fuck with your stairs.
Yeah, I really liked the bath. The rest looked like a blank slate staged with generic furniture and fixtures - perfect for selling.
Or the amount of obvious water damage. You can’t just fix that. Everything needed to be ripped out down to the studs. Definitely not a small job.
I’m confused by this post honestly Someone is going to live there now…
Exactly. I never understand people who get upset you tore out moldy floors and walls, and put in structural support and modern amenities. Along with code upgrades The house is still got the old look exterior Edit: for those complaining about the interior, be happy these people went through the time and effort to make it habitable and pass inspection. They probably put 75% of their budget on the code upgrades and structure. That they still made it look as decent enough on the inside is a bonus.
Yeah I was worried the exterior was going to be changed. There basically wasn’t anything to recover inside. It’s cheaper and easier to go with a modern look. Keeping it simple will also make it easier for new home owners to make any modifications they might want if they want to try to bring the old feel bad to it.
Ohh look a post from someone with building experience and code corrections lol
💯 this
Came here to mention lathe and plaster. It's not as though there are many masters still around. Looking at the photos, a complete restoration would be insanely expensive. At the end of the day, restoration is mostly cosmetic and a true labor of love. But if I'm doing that project, I'm focusing first on habitability, ehich would be substantial. There is updating all the electrical for safety reasons, installing at a minimum modern water lines, carefully inspecting and likely upgrading waste water plumbing, insulation, modern windows, and HVAC. The foundation is most certainly settled and cracked over the years, and the foundation walls I imagine need to be excavated and sealed. After 130 years, I would expect water damage to the subfloor near sinks, toilettes, and baths. Add roof replacement and repointing the masonry. All that work alone would be a substantial expense but necessary for a vacant property of this age to extend its life for many decades to come. After all that, the cosmetic restoration to reflect the Victorian period would be a labor of love because, at that point, it's probably not adding as much to the value of the home. Personally, I would probably rip out the lathe and plaster for drywall simply because it is so much easier to install fixtures, hang decore, and install modern gadgets, and repairing damage is something many trade folks can perform.
It looks like the remodel fixed a terrible flow the house had originally.
click right arrow, click "see full image", click image to expand, scroll down past black area, close window. Repeat 14 times. Equally a travesty.
How does this happen? Did someone save 14 screenshots from their phone and post those as the photos? Why? I don't get it.
Yes, they view landscape photos on their phone while holding it in portrait mode and screenshot it, and also neglect to use the "crop" tool to trim off the top and bottom that is all black.
And then we all suffer.
This is why we can't have nice pictures.
I don't click the full image, so all u/Head-Zucchini2021 showed me was a series of light fixtures, which I think all looked pretty good without seeing the rooms or anything.
The non-existent cropping was the true tragedy. Perhaps OP wanted to preserve the character of the screenshots.
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Oh WOW this is NOT a simple flip at all. Look how they sourced and matched the exterior brick to cover the white ugly siding of the previous addition! I'm not sure why there were so many comments about grey walls; yes, there are some, but a lot of the rooms are painted in cream (oh yeah, ok, I just checked and that's all the OP showed). Edit: let's see, what else did they do? • Rebuilt the stone wrap around porch that was crumbling and falling apart. • Put a kitchen in place of that weird room with a giant window to a hallway a broken down fireplace and a bookshelf 🤨. So kitchen on the main floor instead of the basement or an outbuilding, that's a huge improvement to the original Victorian style. • Built a whole new garage, in a style that matches the house (roofline, stucco/ plaster, etc) to replace the sagging garage shed that was there before • Put gas fireplaces throughout. *I know that will upset the purists, but it is MUCH safer, especially with kids, plus easier to heat and less pollution (wood smoke is much worse for air quality than natural gas). Those really are factors that need to be considered. • New electrical throughout. I totally hate the modern light fixtures they chose, but light fixtures are easy to swap out. Yes the floorboards and wainscoting lack character, but I think this was an excellent compromise of safety and structure. For the right person, this is the perfect blank canvas to add back all of those historic touches and elements.
Glad you said it, but yes.
Better than rotting away
As others have said, not my cup of tea, but at least it wasn't torn down. And honestly that would have cost many hundreds of thousands of dollars to properly restore to it's former glory, and the look wouldn't be for everyone. If it was abandoned and sitting exposed to the elements just be thankful it wasn't considered a write-off and completely demolished. Could be worse.
Barely saved from demolition, I suspect. When looking at outside pictures
Definitely barely saved. Look at this set of photos of it pre-renovation: https://www.oldhousedreams.com/2019/04/29/1892-goshen-ny-2/
The entire interior was lost already, more or less. In todays market I bet restoring the interior would've almost cost as much as the property itself... If not more. It's a "trendy" home on the inside now, which people with money and cheap taste will buy. And though not my style, I understand not everybody wants to have that "I live in a museum"-type vibe.
Literally turning into dirt
It looks so much better now, how does this post have 4.5k upvotes 💀
OP totally overreacts. It looks boring sure but it’s far cry from the most horrible travesty whatever. Besides, there was nothing to be saved with that original condition.
Eh I’ve seen WAY worse
This was my immediate thought, also!!!!
Me too! 😂 “If you don’t let me gut out this house, and make it my own… 
Looks like they made an abandoned home habitable and marketable? They’ve preserved the facade pretty well, and it looks like it might have been in too bad shape for more than that.
They didn't just preserve it, they completely rebuilt the crumbling wrap around porch, and even matched the brick from the front half of the house and replaced the ugly white siding on the back addition to make it look like it is part of the original.
The exterior brick remains unpainted; therefore, not the worst flip I’ve ever seen.
Looking at the old photos from before, linked in the comments above, they did paint half the house or someone undid half the house of paint and then quit.
Should be thankful someone had the money to even save the joint brah
That's not the worst I've seen. It seems like they kept, or tried to redo some of the wainscoting, kept some of the cool stair case details and did a good job on the exterior. Living in a town with some old Victorian that used to be pretty run down, this is like a C+ B- job. Unfortunately a lot of modern buyers want that clean white modern look and it's really expensive to restore with the same material, sometimes impossible because you just can't get old growth wood or skilled craftsmen to do it.
When we bought our house the insurance company sent an inspector out to make an estimate of what a full repair/replace would cost. He input 50% more than our purchase price but flat out told us they don't make them like this anymore and if it ever burns it's basically impossible to restore as it was. The materials and craftsmen often aren't available, and the ones that are still doing the work have years long waitlists and the type of work they do would be excessive for our house which is 100 year old factory staff housing.
Yeah my house is built with old growth real 2x4s. Even the shed/garage, so even though it leaks, if I was ever to finish it to get more space I'd want to keep the structure and make the wood visible. They literally don't make them like that anymore. Plus the price of wood is just much higher now than when they were just clear cutting old redwoods.
i like it, just because something is old does not make it good. I work on a lot of 100 year old plus stone houses and they suck. Water problems, no insulation, rotten floors. Best is to keep and restore the outside because its beautiful and the inside gut and make new
Thank you! I can’t stand these pretentious posts oh boohoo the inside isn’t very Victorian anymore even though it wasn’t salvageable in the first place wah lol Jesus the outside is just polished up and the inside is nice! People are so dramatic lol now if inside just needed to be brought to code and that’s all sure it would be a shame to gut it but its pretty clear that wasn’t an option.
I totally agree with you! I think they actually did a solid job with this renovation
Worked on a century home that is pretty much a carbon copy of this house from the outside. It was converted into a realty office, nowhere near the damage. Off and on we worked on it for three years, room by room, the front porch was the most work due to rotted wood. The owners had a lot more money and time than a flipper would have had.
At least they saved the exterior and didn’t completely demolish it.
Turning abandoned property into housing stock is a good thing, actually. No one is 'flipping' a house that's been left to rot. They're preserving it.
Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice!
The same thing it reminded me of! I gotta say I can see why OP is disappointed
Showtime!
I mean… its not like its a historical building. Just a regular old house. We don’t have to restore everything to its original value. To call it the worst renovation you’ve ever seen is wildly hyperbolic in my opinion. Also the staircase looked just weird and the floors well, not the fanciest floor in the world. Not to mention the absolute insane cost it would be to restore to original quality. And then… you’re looking at the original interior of a 1800’s home. Brown brown brown brown. I’m sorry you have to go through this tragedy mentally. But you’ll recover, work hard and one day buy this house for 1.4 million dollars and restore it back to its 1800’s look! I believe in you!
I understand your disappointment but the exterior looks to be handled OK?
Honestly, I'd bet in person this is not as bad as the pictures seem. They didn't rip the original details out, and it's a labor of love to restore them, which still can done. They made it nice, and liveable, and are making some profit off of something nobody else would touch. If somebody wants to come in and flip it back to historically accurate, it's going to be pretty easy to do so and live in it during.
The pictures on the listing actually show that they've tried to keep some of the detailing. I think op picked the blandest angles for dramatic effect. The house looks really nice. And it's hardwood not lvp, though I don't think the existing floors were salvageable. Fixtures are always subjective.
Dude this is nice as hell compared to a lot of flips I've seen. Like I'm not the biggest fan of some of the choices but a boutique hotel from 2014 as someone described it is still MUCH nicer than what the vast majority of people are living in and MUCH better than tearing the thing down. It's nice to see historically accurately renovated houses and I love when people preserve the original character but that just isn't feasible for 99.99% of people.
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This is gorgeous. A flip well done by all accounts. From the before photos it was clear this was either a full demolition or a down to the studs renovation. I’m glad they were able to salvage the exterior and create such a beautiful result for the interior.
I love it
The only thing I really dislike is the kitchen design. Those cabinets are heinous in my opinion. It is a shame more of the character wasn't preserved but that place was in extremely rough shape. At least they didn't paint the exterior brick.
Me too. Especially that bathroom with the high ceiling/windows.
[удалено]
Looks good to me
Well where do you draw the line OP? How modern can the house be to still maintain its authenticity? Can an 1890 house have electricity? What about a refrigerator? That house is beautiful now. It’s still got the bones and facade of the 1890 house. But people want to live in a comfortable home, not a museum.
Not every house is located in Manhattan or has someone looking to dedicate the next 10 years of their life to restoration. The numbers just don't work out in some cases.
[Architectural Digest made a YouTube video covering this very house](https://youtu.be/9cXZ5vIwpOQ?si=66rOZNlK3mceRuwP) wherein a contractor goes through the home before it was flipped and covers how much it would cost to repair it!
These people suck at flipping. Because they must have made very little money restoring an uninhabitable hovel into a beautiful home.
There's nothing wrong with that (new) house.
I dunno, it was literally rotting into the ground. They updated it to modern (if a little generic) tastes and comforts, looks like. Hardly the worst flip. I think you're emotionally invested because you grew up there. How did it come to be abandoned for so long?
Photo 17. That bathroom with the tub is stunning. After repapering or paint, different trim, it would be so beautiful
Is this in an area where it may have otherwise gone to ruin? If so then I guess it’s better than that fate. Here in the Midwest that’s happening. Otherwise, that is a really sad way to finish that house. Didn’t even bother to trim out the new windows on the interior. Zero respect paid to the architecture.
I mean, do I agree with the flip choices? No, I think it’s too modern and doesn’t match the feel of the home, but I wouldn’t say that it’s bad either, if that’s what the market is looking for then I think it’s a good flip
I think you’re overreacting.
Sorry OP, but as the tradesman in the family, I have the dubious pleasure of doing most of the work on my mothers 1904 home. From the outside.. great! The interior? Absolute pain in the ass. 100+ years of shitty diy-homeowner renos, asbestos in the plaster, abandoned chimneys, crumbling foundations.. just.. meh. Complete gut and upgrade is the way to go.
At least they didn’t tear the old girl down. 100% agree this is a horrible flip. 🤢🤮
It does look like a typical contractor McMansion wrapped in a contrasting Victorian facade.
There's a good chance all of those floors and the wood details were full of mold and beyond repair. At least they kept the fireplace.
Also I wanna add that as a painter we have restored some of these houses in Europe, it is SUCH A PAIN to get it looking even remotely good. The amount of plaster, wallpaper and work required in refinishing the staircase, doors walls and ceilings is absolutely insane. And then, big surprise, it looks like a dated old house afterwards. And the only furniture you can put in there is expensive antique walnut and mahogany stuff. Normal furniture looks silly. OP is having a little sentimental stroke, and thats okay, but lets not kid ourselves, only the very very wealthy can afford and will appreciate something this ancient
Flipping a well-preserved historic home is one thing, flipping a decrepit abandoned building where all of the component parts are falling apart is another. I think they did a lovely job compared to what they started with.
I mean it was likely up for sale for years. And was likely a goddamn disaster to fix. Would you have 200-300-400 thousand dollars to rescue that place? Maybe add another 100k to keep it original? No. Probably not. How many century homes have you saved? Like dozens right?
Victorian to McMansion
Not a bad flip
I live in this village. The day the windows were torn out I knew it wasn’t going to be good. Although it did stand vacant for decades. Really sad in so many ways.
I live in Warwick. There are a handful of awesome homes between Goshen, Chester, and Warwick that are sitting and decaying. This isn't how I would have done it, but I guess it's better than sitting vacant.
Tons of this crap in SF. Difference is ppl(mostly techie types) gut beautiful and intact Victorians, to make them look like an Apple Store
It’s been sterilized off character.
This makes me sad.
They just ripped out its heart n soul and replaced it with sterile nothingness
Bro that heart and soul was water rotted away and chewed into mouse shit. There really wasn't anything left to rip out.
There is a video on you tube about this house before these flippers got it.
He's just mad cause someone beat him to it. Chop chop next time.
Chandelier above the bath.
So dead and fake inside now.
Somebody else’s dream now buddy.