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Posted almost 10 years ago

When good photography masks a bad rehab

I was viewing properties this past weekend and had the following property on my list. It was listed as a 2 bedroom 1 bath property that had been newly rehabbed.

1348162bx

In looking at the pictures online, this property looked fantastic, and very upscale. And it was only $35,000. I had to go see it.

Well, when I got there I saw that this was another case of good photography masking a bad rehab job. What the picture above doesn't convey is the following:

- The door you see in the picture is not weather-tight at all. There is no storm door on the other side.

- The windows are all really bad.

- The window above the stove unit is actually partially covered up by the cabinets!

- The cabinets that were installed don't even touch the left side wall. There's a gap about 2 inches from the cabinet to the wall.

- There are a couple tiles on the floor that are cracked.

- There is a tile on the kitchen counter that is cracked.

- The range hood is not centered above the cook top and the window behind the cooktop is covered in grease.

- The tile work that was done on the wall was really shoddy. It was clearly done by someone who was a DIY'er and who didn't know what they were doing.

Okay, and all this was just from observing the kitchen alone. I won't go into all the issues with the bathroom, the wood rot in the garage, the lack of grass in the yard, and the other stuff that was badly done.

So my point is that if you're an out of state investor, you can't be too sure of those fancy pictures you see on a website.

That could be just good photography masking bad rehab work.

Have someone trusted in the area that you want to invest in, to scope out the properties and give you the true story. Or visit the area yourself to see things in person.


Comments (2)

  1. Why is 2/3 of the range hood floating in front of a window? I've not seen that installation technique used before. Also the in wall oven that is also floating in front of the window, does that have any counter top or lid to it? Someone really really tried with this kitchen and almost made it look good. They sure could have used some help from someone with kitchen design experience though.


  2. Great post!