A recent discussion

Not sure how much DIY you are looking to do, but I made my bouquet out of flowers from Trader Joes. Cost me less than $10 and was beautiful. You could buy some fresh from there and dry them at home. It would save a lot of money, as long as you have a few weeks to allow for drying.

I called 911 and they advised to stay away. It took me a second to realize what was happening but I wanted to make sure I had his license plate. I have the absolute worst reflexes especially in stressful situations.

if you can book 60 days out amtrak has several NE regional trains a day for 30 bucks one way.

Assuming the foundation doesn't need any work, but everything else does, I wold estimate around 100K for something like this. You're going to need to get a GC (or GC it yourself if you can). You'll need a building permit and all the trades will need permits and inspections. The basic order of operations is:

1. demo/trash out
2. Roof
3. framing
4. plumbing (need permit)
5. hvac (needs permit)
6. electric (needs permit)
7. framing inspection
8. Walls, sub floors
9. Paint, flooring, cabinets, fixtures, windows, etc.

You'll also need to do some exterior work at some point - those steps look like they need work.

I do this professionally, and I can also tell you that no one who does this actually has the money to do it themselves. It's all borrowed money. The standard thing to do is get a hard money loan (short term, high interest rate) to buy the house and rehab it, then either sell it or refinance into a long term mortgage once the work is done.

Middle Branch Fitness and Cahill Recreation Center are two city run gyms with pools. They are more south Baltimore but they are city run facilities that are newly renovated and very cheap to access.

Nextdoor for non-boomers?

It’s like is this a real response? Do you believe that being a rude on Reddit to strangers magically heals all of your life problems?

Idk. You can just keep scrolling if you don’t have anything productive to contribute.

Amtrak is cheaper if you can book a good ways in advance. So if your work trips can be planned in advance by a couple months you can get tickets for $30-$40 each way.

Take the bus up and train back or vice versa

Yeah, there's really not a huge financial upside to rehabbing a vacant vs. starting over from scratch. It's one of the reasons the vacant problem in the city is so intractable. It just doesn't make financial sense to rehab them.

Learn how to teleport.

It’s like is this a real question? Do you believe there is magic answer out there that defies the laws of physics which you just haven’t figured out?

Idk. If you book Amtrak or the bus like 6 months in advance you can get a good discount.

Can you get reimbursed for the travel?

I would take the train and sign up for the rewards program. Just try to book early and use a credit card to earn points.

Or move to CT or NJ or Brooklyn or Queens or the Bronx.

Or not take the job.

Overpaid for what, exactly? I am partly in the industry as well. Buying nicer than contractor grade cabinets and appliances isn’t over paying. I was living in the house at that time. You can’t get a decent encasement window for under $250. I bought a vacant house all the plumbing was stripped and not a single appliances in the kitchen was remaining. Edit: I may be off on my appliances cost by $1300. It was 10 years ago.

I am in the industry. You overpaid.

Sabor de Cuba...in Frederick.

I second Local color Flowers. Try B willow. You could also ask the people at Good Neighbor too. I’m sure they’d help.

Just an update. Couldn’t find any of the NOLA ones this year but Eddie’s had their own store baked ones.

The vacants could be remaining vacant for a bunch of reasons. They could be owned by a speculator type, who bought the house with no intention to fix it and is just timing the market. They could be in bad enough shape due to structural issues that even at a $200k selling price it’s not worth it to fix and flip.

The houses being 2 story just means they wouldn’t sell for as much. I expect adding a third floor would be very expense and not worth it from a ROI standpoint.

The 150k number I mentioned earlier, is location/size specific. It seemed to be the price point around me when a lot of 3bd, 2 story houses started getting fixed up.

I think they stopped making it in 2016 or thereabouts.

There used to be a food truck that came to McKeldin Square by the harbor on Wednesday that had the best Cuban in the city, and bomb fries (when they were fresh), but can't find them since the pandemic. If anyone remembers that food truck, comment with their name.

Cubans are not hard to make at home, and they will be far superior to anything you can get at a restaurant.

Particularly with 12' wide or 30' deep rowhomes. Most lots in the city are 60-80' deep, but a lot of them are mostly grass behind a one and a half story 19th century townhouse. Those kinda houses only have like 600-800 sq ft, but the lot itself can fit ~2.2k sq ft with a 3 story build that is 50' deep and has a partially finished basement.

What even is this subreddit at this point?

The average sale price of a house with modern amenities on my street is like 200-225k but there are still vacants. I think the problem is those are 2 story and the ones that sell are 3, so I guess adding a third floor is cost prohibitive?

That will be interesting!

The facility fee as a separate line item is Maryland law.