The basement

The basement is unique. It provides separate areas for both units divided by double doors. There is private access to each space from each apartment.
This area was worse than the rest of the house and that is saying something! It was almost like a hoard store. It was piled up all the way to the third step from the top to the first floor unit and ALL THE WAY to the top and up the stairs to top floor unit. It was A LOT to have to go through and cart out to the dumpster.
David gets credit for the work there and I am grateful for the work he and his father did there. I helped some down there, but they did most of the trash hauling to the dumpster and clean out while i worked upstairs. It was moist and smelly down there and of course, there was food rotted down there too. I cannot imagine having lived in such deplorable conditions for nearly four decades.
Believe me when I tell you that this house made ANYTHING that I EVER saw on the television show "HOARDERS" look like they were clean as a whistle.

Pictured above is the view from the landing of the top floor unit looking down into the basement stairwell AFTER it had been worked on for a good while to remove the trash. The bike was tethered to the railing with chain and was a real monster to get loose.
All cleaned out now. We only a few weeks ago finished throwing out the last few remaining piles. It is a large open space now with a clean concrete floor and plenty of storage and lighting. The windows are like English basement windows and are larger in height than most of the basement windows from the era the house was built.
We had to have both furnaces worked on to get them running. I was going to replace them early on in the project but was persuaded not to. I was told the older ones work better than newer ones and actually are more efficient.
The 105 unit furnace was first worked on with a replaced blower motor. When gas service was turned on, the furnace blew out cold air. It was freezing inside. One thing I hate is being cold. Luckily we had found a nice man who went to church with David's mother who told us about a good furnace man.
He was amazing to say the very least. He works for the city by day and works on things for people nights and weekends. He used to be a code inspector so I was confident in his work. He made sure to tell us he would not leave until HE KNEW the units were safe, working right and would be code compliant.
Here he came about half past eleven at night as he had been on another job. I am sure the poor man was worn out when he came. He got BOTH furnaces running right and only charged us $50 for each furnace. For $100 we got them both right as rain. He really blessed us.
Turns out the man who installed the blower motor had put the belt on backwards. A few adjustments and it was like Hawaii in July on the top floor.
The other furnace needed the gas inlet cleaned that was all. It went right to work as well. Good and toasty throughout the entire house now, even the basement as there are vents down there too. Of anything, I am sure grateful for the heat!!
When we got the house, the water heater was stolen as were are the copper pipes. Figures. I bought and installed a brand new high efficiency hot water heater and hired a man to replace all the pipes. OF course, another fly by night ding dong. He only connected plumbing for the first floor and did nothing for the top floor. What he did do failed and leaked. So we plumbed the top floor unit ourselves and fixed what he did not do properly.
I have to say it is not a monster job doing plumbing. They have these things called Shark Bites that are copper and attach easily by pushing on to either PVC or metal pipes. PVC pipes are easy to work with and take little effort to get in place as well. It was all a matter of time and patience. We are finishing this work this weekend. We had a really bad leak spring up yesterday from what appears to be a broken pipe in the wall. David is more patient than myself. I should be ashamed all the curse words I have let loose while working here lol.
But we will get it done in time to be inspected this coming week and cleared for occupation. It only took 18 months..........
I put a high efficiency front load washer and dryer in the basement. Another investment. The washer was on clearance at Lowes because it had a small ding in the back of it. It was normally $1,299.00 and I got it for $599.00 because of the ding. The matching dryer was $900 on sale and both pedestals were $300 on clearance for the pair of them. They are a color similar to chili pepper red. I love red. My favorite color. But took some getting used to seeing it used as an appliance color though lol. I had shopped around and even local rental stores selling their off lease items wanted $1,400 or more for a pair like that, without pedestals. I bought them the same day as the kitchen appliances. I also got a chest freezer there half price because it also had a small ding in it for $200. I figured it scared me to spend that much of the budget on appliances, but if we started out with good ones that were new it made more sense down the line. In all nearly $7,000 was spent on appliances. It was the biggest part of our budget. I have confidence it will be an investment well made.

So now we finally have enough storage. Thank goodness. I have come to detest even the smallest clutter.