Posts

Desperately Needed Roof Repairs!

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I'm really not good at heights, but this and a couple of other far less badly damaged spots need sorting out ASAP! Anyone know a roofer who could help me out??

Out Comes the Kitchen, Off Come the Wall & Ceiling Coverings!

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With rainy season on its way, I really need to get on with exterior work like replacing tiles to ensure the roof is watertight, but as it was raining a lot at the weekend, ironically, I was forced to work indoors. Pulling the kitchen out was easy, of course, but taking down the (70s, I guess) suspended ceiling was dirty, time-consuming work. Here are a few more before and after pics. This is probably the part I enjoy most; it's great exposing original timbers and whatnot. 

First Day, First Job!

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Quite how the front windows got broken I have no idea, but rather than getting the glass replaced, which by the way set me back 30,000 yen (for all 4 windows), the previous owners apparently thought it would make the house more sellable if they boarded up the space and left the broken glass strewn across the floor for people to walk on! And the (other) stupid thing is, they could've simply closed the shutters and used the time it took to go and buy the boards and nail them up to clear up the glass!! 

My lovely Taisho-period (1912~1926) 'kominka' in 2017

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Located beneath the lighthouse in Isumi-shi, Chiba prefecture, this is my very recently acquired kominka project (April 5th, 2017). I've been looking at this house for some 5-years now, since it first came on the market. The original photos posted on the estate agent's website looked as though the previous occupant(s) lived like animals and got up and walked out in the middle of the night! There was trash everywhere! However, I could see past all that and went immediately to view it. It was love at first sight.  However, at 25 million yen, it was rather ambitiously priced, and of course nobody bought it. Fast forward a few months, maybe a year or so, and it was taken off the market, cleared out and put back on the market at a more reasonable though still rather expensive 17.8 million. Still nobody bought it. I kept on dropping by whenever I was in the area, but couldn't really justify splashing out that sort of money. Another year or so passed an...