If you prefer a home that is unique and has character, you probably are giving some thought to buying an older home. Before buying, it’s a good idea to carefully evaluate the pros and cons of owning the home. In this article, we cover the positive benefits I have realized by owning a home built in 1825. 

The Pros of An Old Home

In 1972, my husband and I bought a house built in 1825.  While maintenance has certainly been an issue, there are more than a few positives to the home. Everything is real. There’s no fake anything. Bricks are brick. Wood is wood. Slate is slate. Fireplace mantles, chair rail, crown molding, and baseboards are not dinky little things; they’re beautifully proportioned. The floors are rich, wide, heart of pine planks.

There’s a rich feeling of history and being connected to our country’s past that permeates through our neighborhood. George Washington grew up just across the river and trudged up the lane across the street from us daily to attend school.  James Monroe and Mathew Fontain Maury (the “pathfinder of the seas”) lived within a block of us. Our house was used as a boys’ military academy (Philips’ Military Academy) prior to the War Between the States. Put together, one gets a feeling of wonder when walking around the community.

Old houses can also be a very good investment. First, there is a limited supply of them.  With the popularity of historic societies and the preservation movement, people have become more appreciative of them.  Precisely because of the center city locations of many of them (which provided drawbacks for us when we first moved here), they are often in what have become highly desirable locations. Our house is within two blocks of commuter rail that runs into downtown Washington, D.C. and many old cities have old house neighborhoods in terrific locations.  Boston, Richmond, Savannah, and Charleston come to mind.

We paid $35,000 for our house in 1972.  Within the last year, two houses within a block of us have sold for more than a million dollars.  I have a feeling that our home may be the best investment we’ve ever made.

That about sums it up.  Beauty.  A sense of it being “real.”  Feeling connected to the past.  And a darned good investment to boot.  Yup.  We’ve spent some blood, sweat, and tears.  Real money, too.  But I’d do it over again in a heart beat

So you think you might like to buy an old home?  Perhaps even something old enough to be historic?  It’s a good idea to carefully evaluate the pros and cons before you decide.  There are plenty of both.  Will the pros be valuable enough for you to be willing to cope with the cons?  Where shall we start?  With a cautionary tale, I think.

The Cons of An Old Home

In 1972, my husband and I bought a house built in about 1825.  We moved in on August 15th.  My husband had an out of town business meeting and left about 5 AM the next day.  (What makes him so smart?)  About an hour later, I started downstairs and flipped the switch to turn on the chandelier in the downstairs hall.  Boy did I get light.  There was a flash, and then what looked like lightening ran up the cord.  I turned the switch off, but the fireworks continued.  I ran and yelled for our sons (10 and 11 years old at the time).  We got out a door off another hall and ran to our next door neighbor’s house to call the fire department.  (This is a very exciting way to meet one’s new neighbors.)  The fire department was really fast and got to our home before we got back ourselves.

By the time my husband returned late that evening, we had been visited by not just the fire department, but also an electrician (old wiring needed to be reworked and a fuse box replaced with circuit breakers), a painter (to get a price on fixing water and fire damage), and a floor refinisher (same reason as the painter), and both our sons had been offered marijuana.  (Did I mention that beautiful old houses are often located in intercity areas and sometimes the whole neighborhood has not yet been completely restored to its original state of gentility?)  We were asking ourselves, “What have we done?”

Well, we had the wiring fixed, put off having the floors worked on and did the painting ourselves. We also paid tuition and fees to keep the boys in their old school district.

You have to be flexible to happily live in an old house.  Nothing is a standard size.  Right angles are purely coincidental.  (The water damage mentioned above had showed us that the floor on the outside edge of the front hall is about six inches higher than floor on the far side of the living room.)  Go to Lowes or Home Depot to buy a standard replacement this or that?  Forget it.  You’re probably going to have to fabricate it yourself or have it done.  You need to either have a large home maintenance budget, be prepared to invest a lot of “sweat equity” or both.

We’ve lived in this same old house for over thirty years now. Items we’ve had adventures with include:

1. Plumbing,

2. Bringing in more electricity,

3. Replacing the heating system,

4. Repointing the chimneys,

5. Having dampers made for the chimneys so heat doesn’t escape from them when they’re not in use (did I mention we have four working fireplaces?),

6. Increasing the insulation, and

7. Painting many, many times. 

Our house is real wood, not vinyl, and the roof is standing seam tin – the original roof.  That, of course, means there is a lot of surface to paint, and, since the house is two stories and has high ceilings, some of the surfaces are pretty high.  (Did I mention that my husband has fallen off the roof twice?)  We’re in the process of having our home painted (not a do it yourself project this time) yet again.  The bids we got ranged from $15,000 to $20,000.  (Did I mention you need a larger maintenance budget with an old house?)

Whew!  I think the cons are clear, don’t you? Owning an old home is wonderful. Just make sure you understand what you are getting into.

Raynor James is with http://www.fsboamerica.org - an online site providing national exposure for sellers listing properties and a database of properties for buyers.