Rehab 4470 - Working on the Front Yard

In the past we’ve been fortunate to not have spent too much time or money on the landscape. Probably the biggest time we’ve done is throw down a 10 x 10 brick paver porch to give the back yard some character along with a few nice plants. In fact at the last two houses we rehabbed did just that and the new owners proceeded to rip it out and either added a porch or a pool. Perhaps our outside creations inspired that! This house is perfect for a pool because of the large porch and quadruple sliders that totally recess to the porch.

Rehab 4470 however had yard problems and the landscape was just not cutting it. Since we had the house painted outside we decided to salvage some of the hedges and add some new stuff. Over the years the former owner had planted things here and there and the small trees in the front yard were held up with ropes tied to 3 foot metal rebar pounded into the ground. I found even more rebar in the garage. So we proceeded to cut down all the small trees and dig the stumps out (3 total). I got to buy a new hatchet to chop the roots out (yeah – new tool!). The picture to the right is me cutting down a tree in front of the Master bath window. If you look close you can see the rebar poking out of the ground.

We purchased the home at the end of winter which was actually quite cold this year in

Florida so the yard was pretty dead when we bought the house. I expected that when spring rolled around some water and sunshine would green it up. It did work for most of the yard with the exception of 2/3 of the front yard – wonderful. The spots that were not green were weeds. So I nuked the yard with Roundup and then proceeded to dig out the old stuff which then led to me ordering 2 pallets of sod (800 sq ft). Overall it looks pretty good and now we have to water it a lot until it takes otherwise green will become brown.

Jan originally purchased a bougainvillea tree to position outside the kitchen windows so you’d see it front inside but when we placed it out front we both realized it made the front of the house. So we proceeded to buy another ($50 each) and put them in black planters at the entrance along with river rock to give it a non cluttered look.
For the flower beds Jan convinced me to go with the red mulch (it has eucalyptus) which I have to admit looks better than I expected. I ordered 2 yards and we only did about half the beds – luckily we finished the front yard first. The border stones lining the beds were removed – they look like something a grandmother would do. For plants we stuck with hibiscus (yellow and red flowers) and border grass for replacement plants where we dug out the old stuff. Originally I wanted a couple of palms up near the front of the house and even toyed with moving the pygmy date palms near the street – 20 years of root growth changed my mind. It was like trying to dig through tendrils; besides the palms near the street look good. Inside I found 2 large White Bird of Paradise plants at Lowes and was able to get the price down from $200 to $75 for both.

Overall we think it turned out good – we laid the 2 pallets of sod, planted all the new plants, mulched, added ½ yard of stone and lowered the sprinkler heads on Friday and Saturday of the last weekend we worked on the house – it was hot and we were tired but it turned out great.

Rehab 4470 – Trimming the Windows and Plant Shelves

One of the easiest things that we do to dress up the inside of houses we work on is to wrap the windows which is essentially just adding trim around the windows and the sliding glass doors. It’s fast and adds a lot to the house and looks considerably better than the marble window sills that most houses in Florida have. We also always add trim to the plant shelves to add definition.

For windows you just need to break the caulk seal between the marble window and the wall (or window). Sometimes you can then pry the sill off. Most of the time I get the hammer out and break it into pieces. At one time I thought I’d be able to use the old sills or sell them – instead they took up valuable space in the garage. I install a new window sill out of finished pine. The new window sill is always 8” wider than the opening and 1” deeper than the old sill. I route an edge to give it a nicer look and cut out the portion of the sill that wraps around the sides of the window.

The sill is installed first using 2” brads followed by a piece of trim 1” shorter than the sill with the ends cut at 22.5 degrees. The fluted sides then go up next and are set back ¼ inch from the edge of the window. The top is a piece of molding that is as wide as the sides and cut at 22.5 degrees on the ends (occasionally we overlap it a ½ inch). Everything is nailed using 2” brads, then nails holes filled and caulked with white paintable caulk. At times there can be gaps between the new sill and the inside of the window because the window opening is not square. Small gaps can be caulked, larger gaps I use spackle and then sand it after it dries.

Most of the time the trim comes primed but the wood used for the sill never does and needs to be primed before the paint goes on. Otherwise the wood will soak up the paint differently than the other trim and not look good. For paint we use gloss white of high gloss ultra white and also paint the insides of the window opening. This gives it the look that we trimmed out the inside of the opening when all we did was paint it to match the trim.

The same concept can be used to trim out sliding glass doors. The only difference with sliders is we add an additional piece of wood across the top to give it a taller look. Other times we match the sliders to the nearby windows.

Obviously the bigger the window the more wood, trim, and paint needed. We estimate $50 -$75 a window and have found that it worth every penny. It really differentiates our house from all the others in the neighborhood and provides that wow effect that just adds to the overall look that we strive for. We want to the house to look better and different than the others.

BTW – the first time we trimmed out windows was our house years ago, one of the few times I did not learn something new on the job.