New to Real Estate · Tampa, FL · Member since 2018 · 10 posts · 7 votes
6y
My house in Tampa, about a mile from the water, is a wood frame home and was built in 1890. Obviously some updating has been done, and I've have to do some additional maintenance on the wood frame, (tenting for termites every few years) but its still standing 130 years later.
@Mary Jay Yes, referred to here as Concrete Block and Stucco (CBS) construction, which probably 95% of houses are, at least in south Florida.
Thank you !
I think like you said concrete block are probably the majority of structures in Florida. I tried to find cinderblock constructions and could not find any.
Have you ever seen cinderblock buildings in Florida?
My house in Tampa, about a mile from the water, is a wood frame home and was built in 1890. Obviously some updating has been done, and I've have to do some additional maintenance on the wood frame, (tenting for termites every few years) but its still standing 130 years later.
Thank you!
Do you encounter a lot of maintenance regularly?
Its an old house plus in a hurricane zone...
Not as much I was expecting. The owner prior to me had done some pretty extensive updating, such as foundation repair and updating the electrical and plumbing. The roof has held up surprisingly well, and even after a couple of hurricane seasons, I haven't had to do any significant repairs to it. I believe its 6 years old and is just regular asphalt shingles.
My major repairs so far as been:
1: Insulation. Most of the older homes don't have any sort of insulation. And if they do, it seems to be the stuff from the 50s/60s. I ended up having spray foam done in my attic and injection foam into my walls. I really saw quite reduction in the usage of my A/C after that. Well worth the cost.
2. Window replacement: This house had old aluminum windows from the 50s/60s, which were single pane and next to worthless. I ended up replacing every one of them with the Miami-Dade impact rated windows. Again, huge savings on energy cost and makes me feel a lot safer during major storms.
3. Crawl space encapsulation: To help keep the pests away, I had my entire bottom of my house wrapped with rodent proof mesh. This also counted as wrapping my crawl space and helped with the insurance problem. The insurance companies primarily seem to be concerned about fires, so showing them that if there wasn't any way for a mouse to get in my house, there probably wasn't much chance of a fire helped me find a insurance company.
The major issue I actually encountered with this house wasn't repairs related, but actually insurance. Most of the insurance companies in Florida want a enclosed or wrapped crawl space for the older homes, which my did not have. And with wood frames homes, that's actually terrible for the wood. My last bullet addressed how I solved that issue.
There are several 100 year plus homes down in my neighborhood. Some of been well maintained and updated. Others not so much. One of things to remember, is that Tampa is actually pretty protected. I haven't had any major wind damage thanks to the other houses and the old oak trees and even though I'm in a flood zone, I haven't had any issues and even the brick lined streets drain pretty fast.
If you can find a house that has had some of the major updating done, you will save yourself a lot of time and money. If there is one thing this house has taught me, its that everything takes longer then expected and you will encounter weird and unusual building techniques. Almost nothing is standard and there will have been very interesting repair decisions made. Check around old Port Tampa City. That's where all the Victorians were built to support the port and railroad.
Rental Property Investor · Tampa, FL · Member since 2020 · 77 posts · 42 votes
6y
@Mary Jay could be a lot of reasons. One it could need repairs. And in that case just buy it cash or hard money fix it up then do a cash out refi.
The next could be it’s too cheap. If a house is 30-40 grand even 50 grand then banks may not be interested in loaning because there’s no skin in the game.
Another reason could be the seller wants to dump is ASAP. They may have another deal they need cash for or just don’t wanna wait a month for it to go through. We just had a deal like this where the seller refused to sign a contract until we were ready to close and cash only deal.
So there are a lot of reasons. Could just always ask why they don’t want to do bank.
Real Estate Agent and Active Investor · Eustis, FL · Member since 2015 · 31 posts · 14 votes
6y
No, it means some of the maintenance has been "deferred". So it needs a roof or an AC or something. There are homes here over 100 years old and the newer ones are built to withstand a hurricane. Most of them are concrete block, so durability is not the issue. Proper maintenance is likely the main problem.