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GraciesMom · 10-15-2008, 01:42 PM

I put it down myself with help from a friend before leaving Denver. It looks awesome - a few details I still need to clear up . . . around the stairs. But I am so happy with how it turned out. Had to tear up everything the other jerk put down - old vinyl, still wet adhesive and all. I got the LR wallpapered, the floor down, the two valances covered . . . and I'm still working away. Will post photos as soon as my computer is back on wifi. Can't post from the (ugh) library computer! And I filed against that jerk in small claims court and had the court date set up to September when I can get back to Denver next year. You have two years to file and two years to go to court. I went ahead and did it to try to scare him into paying. I know better than to pay for work up front . . . but under the circumstances I didn't have any reason to think he'd not be honest. Live and learn . . .

randco · 10-18-2008, 12:58 AM

When you least expect it... expect it!

NeilV · 10-18-2008, 01:36 AM

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by GraciesMom:
I put it down myself with help from a friend before leaving Denver. It looks awesome - a few details I still need to clear up . . . around the stairs. But I am so happy with how it turned out.

Live and learn . . . </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Glad to hear that you got it straightened out. Enjoy the satisfaction of being able to do a better job yourself.

You could try threatenening to turn him in to his boss or the main office of the company he works for at the apartment complex. Most places don't approve their staff moonlighting and ripping off their clients or their relations.

I have had similar experience being a former millworker in a shop that catered to the Boston Historical Society. Nobody around here seems to match up to the what I can do myself even though I am crippled and walk with a cane, despite the fact that I don't consider myself that good any more. I had to rip out and reinstall half my upper gally last spring due to unsatisfactory woodworking done by the dealer. I just couldn't stand looking at it any more. It took me less time than it originally did to drive the coach to the dealer, fill out the paperwork and pick it back up when they did the job.

Remember this rule when you hire work out and this is generally true 99.9% of the time. "You can only have two of the following three items: Good, Fast or Cheap" Most that promise all three are usually liars and won't be giving you any of them.

Get things the way you like them and don't forget to keep it safe along the way.

GraciesMom · 10-27-2008, 12:06 PM

OK - it's desk time. After getting several bids on a custom desk - I decided to "do it myself" again. I have shopped every furniture store in town and I cannot find one the right size that fills my needs SO . . .

I have purchased two small bookshelves, black, from Office Depot and an interior door from Lowe's. I'm having the door screwed down to the bookshelves, after screwing the bookshelves into the wall and the panel that separated the dinette from the door, gluing on a piece of nice trim on the side of the door facing out and painting the door black as well. Now I will have bookshelves (THANK HEAVENS) and a desk. Going to get some small baskets to put stuff in on the top shelves of the book cases and come up with something to secure them into place - probably a black bungy for traveling - then I can just remove it when I'm settled and it won't look so bad. All this for $150. Beats the heck out of a custom made desk and it's gonna look pretty good too! I'm also buying the honey comb shades at Lowe's and adding curtains instead of the upholstered valances. I can't wait to get done and post pics!!! The wallpaper turned out great, looks wonderful with the new wood floors. Now it's time to tackle the bedroom . . . bathroom is last . . . .

Steve Rankin · 11-01-2008, 10:12 AM

While I often hear that folks shouldn't look at their RVs as investments, ignoring the fact that the RV is an investment can have disastrous results. I think this applies to modifications made to the coach, especially interior modifications.

Modifications range from putting some holes in the walls to hang decorations, to wholesale replacement of interior furnishings. In general, minor modifications will have no affect on the resale value of the coach as long as the modification didn't reduce the utility of the feature changed or alter the aesthetics in a way that detracts. In other words, making changes that involve removing some feature (sofa or dining table, for example) and replacing it with a feature that has less universal appeal will have a negative impact on the resale. Or installing a feature (desk, for instance) that has a different appearance than the OE interior will also have a negative impact on the resale.

The big problem with negatively impacting resale is that it's not just about dollars. It's about finding a buyer. Just like real estate has it's "location, location, location" and RV's have "condition, condition, condition." When looking at RVs, the buyer is looking for the coach that has the right 'WOW' factor for them AND doesn't have any warning flags to scare them away. Missing furniture is a problem. It's easy to install a new sofa for a few hundred dollars, but rebuilding the booth dinette could easily be a small nightmare as the cost of having it rebuilt may seem outrageous, especially when compared to the future resale of a MH that's currently 9 years old. And finding the right fabrics might be an even bigger problem.

Since we're not fulltimers and we have ample storage in our barn we simply store anything we take out of the RV. For example, we have no use for the bedroom TV stand, so it's in a box labeled "Arctic Fox Parts" and located with the other RV parts. Right where we kept the 3rd seat for the Suburban, etc.

I understand the cost of custom furniture in an RV as we did some minor customization in our Beaver. However, we didn't do everything we wanted to do because of the high cost of new cabinets. If we were fulltimers, we may well have found the cost of those new cabinets worth it to us. We were very careful to make sure that all of our modifications looked exactly like Beaver had done them originally. In fact, some of the modifications were built by the original Beaver woodworking folks. As a result, the interior still looked 100% Beaver when we were done and it was very easy to sell partly because of its outstanding interior condition.

In the OP's situation, she's a fulltimer in an older gas MH. While many might question it's resale under the current economic conditions, its resale will definitely be impacted by the modifications made. The cost of restoring the coach to the original design might be around 10% of the value of the MH today. Unfortunately, the cost of restoration will only go up while the value of the MH goes down. In a few years, the cost of restoring the interior may be 20-30% which might be very difficult to stomach. The alternatives? Well, she could store the old interior, but it wouldn't take very many years for the cost of storage exceeded the value of the interior components. Unless she was already storing stuff.

It's definitely a dilemma.

GraciesMom · 11-02-2008, 10:21 AM

My interior was SO ugly, nothing I do could make it worse. Seriously - It had disgusting green and white cheap fabric, the puke green carpet was disgustingly worn, and the wood is mostly veneer or plastic - only the cabinet doors are real wood. I got it because it had low mileage and lots of upgrades - Gear Vendor, Banks, lifetime shocks, solar, etc. Not for it's looks. I will probably live in this rig until it falls apart then retire. I've thought about buying a newer one but don't want the payments. I like having all my cash available to travel and have fun. So - having said that - if I have to live in it, it's gotta look as good as possible - within reason - and be functional. It will cost very little to put a better dinette in it or whatevet to make it "normal" again. The "desk" can be removed easily and replaced. I thought about storing the old stuff, but after looking at new dinettes online, a new dinette would add much more value to it than keeping the ugly old one. I've rewallpapered the walls and saved wallpaper to repair where I remove pictures. I'm having the countertops, sinks and faucets replaced eventually. The dinette was a waste of space for one person - the desk will give me the space that I need to work as well as storage space underneath. The new floors definitely add to the value - as does the new carpet, wallpaper, the new captains chairs I'm getting and the new sofa and the new carpet in the cockpit area - doing one thing at a time but these are the master plans. The refurbished outside will help as well. But ya know - if it doesn't, it doesn't. Just like owning a home - you make it yours. The new owners can offer you less and make changes or they can take it as is.

I wanted to really do some cool striping on the outside, but I had resale value in mind so I'm sticking with the old green/gold/copper color scheme that was on there when I got it - although using different stripes.

Anyway - I'm thinking about comfort and aesthetics - not so much resale value. I figure by the time it falls apart, I go off the road, or whatever, it's going to have so many miles on it, no one will want it anyway . . . . if I can sell it and the toad for enough to get a nice new car, then I'll be a happy (retired) camper!

Lorna · 11-02-2008, 04:08 PM

I guess it's a pretty good thing that we have a really old RV. My daughter gets it (free) in another year or so. Since we only paid $2K and have less than $1K invested in it, I feel we would have a hard time getting any money out of it if we sold it!

So we will do anything that we want to do to it. We don't need to worry about no stinkin' resale value!!!