Home Inspection

Today we had the home inspection for the house in Salem. We dragged ourselves out of bed way too early (read: before Megan woke up) to meet the inspector in Salem at 7:30. When we got there we were a bit disappointed to find out that the Magoos (not quite their real name) would be sticking around for the home inspection. I kind of wanted to go poke around the nooks and crannies and turn on all the light switches right behind the inspector, but I felt like this was rude and so instead sat in the kitchen chatting with the owners. This was somewhat interesting as they had the house built for them and have been the only owners in the 25 year history of the house. They obviously love the house very much but need to downsize now that the kids are grown and they spend winters in Arizona. Mr. Magoo was a manager for a major lumber company and it was through his position that he procured much of the material for his house. While we were there we learned about this and many other stories about the house:

-"The siding is clear cedar 8" siding that came down from Canada. It is almost impossible to get clear cedar now" (I have no idea what clear cedar is)
-"The beams in the living room and entry come from old growth up on Snowpeak." (he admitted this is now considered bad)
-At one point he and his wife went to the mill to hand select all the 2 by 6's used in the house (they didn't use 2x4's).
- The bottom floor was only supposed to go halfway under the house, but the builder dug the whole thing out when the owners were away in Nebraska. That part of the house remained unfinished until ten years ago.
- The 175+ goldfish in the pond all originated from a Mother's Day gift of four fish.
-There is an alcove in the dining room for a china hutch because the builder refused to hang the light fixture off-center to make space for the hutch in a square room.

The neighbor called after we had been there about half an hour and told the Magoos to go into the street and look into their pasture. So we all headed out. Our reward was 5 elk next door. The Magoos were astounded. "We get deer up here all the time. In fact, many years they give birth in our pasture. And once we had a litte red fox that we saw a lot, but we have never seen elk here in the entire 25 years that we have been here!"

Overall the inspection turned up lots of little things (a toilet that rocks, a dead mouse in the crawl space, a broken window crank), but there was only one real sticking point for us: "The deck is toast," the inspector confided, using very official inspector jargon. At one point Mac watched the guy stick a screwdriver through many of the deck beams. Since it is a two-story deck with two stair cases, this is a big deal and not a cost that we want to incur. We have a meeting to renegotiate tomorrow evening.

Mac and I are still really excited about the house, but when I think of it, it always brings to mind a Kohler commercial - the one where paranormal experts walk through a possessed house and ask the owner if she is sure she wants to stay in the house. After looking at her beautiful Kohler bathroom she replies, "definitely. now get to work." My version goes like this: after walking through rooms and rooms of very tacky 70's decorating we ask ourselves "are we sure we want to do this?" but with one look at the view we reply "yes, now we need to get to work."

This is the view from the (very unsafe) back deck. "Our" property extends to the little red maple (in the picture directly above where the two fences come together). The water in the distance is part of the Ankeny Wildlife refuge.

While we were down for the inspection we also got a list of the community "rules." Mostly they are ridiculous anti-white trash ordinances (no mobile homes, no clothes lines, no corrugated metal sheds, no storage of disfunctional cars) and anti-commercialism ordinances (no businesses run out of the home, no raising livestock for commercial purposes). Then there are a couple of common sense things like don't let your livestock get onto other people's property and don't dump trash in the creek. As you can tell from all this our chickens will be welcome at the new place (as long as they stay on our property). In fact the only animals we can't have are "peacocks, mink, and swine." Dammit - now I have to ditch my Pigs, Pelts and Peafowl Farm idea!