Condo Rehab 1st Time Job Walk Inspection

Hey thanks for signing up for this course by the way!

When getting ready to work on a Condo rehab (or house), the very first thing to do & I mean the very first thing to do is to change the locks with new keys. The last thing you want is for something to come up missing because someone who had a key came in unannounced..or worse.

Inevitably all the keys won't be turned over to you & there's no telling how many other keys are floating around that the previous owner had given to this or that person. Don't believe everything you hear. Just go out & get the Condo (or house) rekeyed.

Yes it will cost you a few bucks but will be well worth it in the long run. As for cost, VideoJoe will give you a great idea for saving some money on rekeying your Condo (or house) & he does this all the time to save money.

Ah you'll have to watch this video to find out.

VideoJoe will show you what he has in mind for what to do to the existing door handles & door hinges? Well if you have the time & have a few bucks to spare, one of the things that always could be replaced is the existing door handles & door hinges as well as door stops for a fresher look. You could then decide if you want to change the color of the door hardware to satisfy your taste.

Speaking of a fresh look you might also want to paint the doors. In fact I heard that VideoJoe has a video course for that too so you might want to check it out. Might I say the doors turned out looking like new when VideoJoe got done.

The Condo is even going to be repainted & I'm talking everything will be re-painted. VideoJoe will give you some sound advise as to how to schedule the work & what all you might plan on doing.

Good info on this video. I hope you watch it as well as all the others as you never know what VideoJoe will say next!

If you are thinking about saving the existing carpet, take a good look at the carpets to see if you really want to keep it. If you decide to keep it does the carpet have any puckers near the finished edges. Does the carpet have any waves & ripples in it. does most of the carpet look good other than the carpet on the stairs?

You can always hire a carpet installer to come in & re-stretch your carpets & make it look much better. Can you get the carpets cleaned prior to moving in? These are the things to consider with the existing carpets.

Now if you decide to keep the carpets & if you're thinking about re-painting all the walls &/or ceilings then you will have to come up with a good plan for how to protect your carpets not to mention how to paint the baseboards all the way down with the curve of the carpet at the base.

As for painting the ceilings take a look at the ceiling area in the Kitchen especially if the Kitchen ceiling transitions directly into the family room for instance. VideoJoe will give you some ideas for painting ceilings.

If you decide to paint the doors then I would suggest taking the doors down & please do not think about painting the doors in place! It's so much easier & better to take the doors down, take the doors to the garage & remove all the door hardware on the doors.

If you decide to paint the door jambs then remove the door hinges & door strike plate every time. don't think about masking the door hinges & door strike plates. Not a good idea. This will be the right time to think about installing new door hinges, door handles, & door stops. You can also think about do you like the color of the existing door hardware or would you like to change the color not to mention the style of the handles.

Another thing you should look at is the doors. Are the existing doors opening & closing with the right gap clearance & do the doors look right for being flush when the doors are closed? Are any of the doors sagging rubbing the top portion of the door as well as the top portion of any door jambs?

Are any doors sagging but just barely not rubbing on the door jamb(s). these are the types of things to check especially if you are planning to paint the doors &/or door jambs. Here's something else...if you are planning on not painting the doors you can still do lots of things with existing doors that need to be adjusted without seeing any of the door repairs? You can.

In other cases if you think you might need to remove &/or adjust any door stops then yes you will have to re-caulk at least & depending on how much you might have to move a door stop you might then need to re-paint some door stops.

As for if you are not going to do any new painting...is there at least any paint that you can use for touch up that the previous owner left? You might want to see.

Do you happen to see any areas on the existing walls that might need to be repaired. Can you make the repairs yourself without having to call out a drywaller to patch & match the existing spray texture? Can you make the repairs yourself & make them better than what you see now & think you can do the patches good enough on your own?

What about the thermostat? How does the t-stat look condition wise. If you think you need to replace the thermostat did you know the electricity company might replace it for free for you? You might want to check that out.

Are there any bifold doors anywhere that look like they might be in need of repair? did you know you can get a repair kit for bifold doors?

If you are planning to repaint the walls then you will need to check out for marks on the walls that you might need to clean a bit before re-painting. You might need to caulk some picture hanger holes or removed miniblinds or window valances.

What about the stair handrail...is it in good condition? Did you want to change the support brackets because you'd rather see a different color there?

What about the closet shelves. If you are repainting you might consider removing the shelves if you have a metal bracket shelf assembly.

Are there any ceiling fans? What condition are they in? Are they old school design with pull chains? What about light kits? Do you even like them? You can change them out with new ones & you could do it yourself...of course VideoJoe has video courses for that too...take a look!

Do you have enough light in the bedrooms especially if the existing ceiling fans don't have a light kit?

Is there a jacuzzi tub there? what does the front cover look & is it secured properly? Do you have tile baseboards in the bathrooms? You might want to check to see how tight & good it looks. How many towel bars are in the bathrooms? What about a towel ring? Do you need to install additional towel bars & where would they go? How long are the towel bars?

Are the pop up valves in the bathroom sinks working properly? Can they be fixed?

All these things that VideoJoe is checking YOU can check all these same types of things around your house. That's the additional purpose of this video course!

Wow VideoJoe is showing you all kinds of things you could check around your house just by doing this one job walk Condo inspection.

How do the smoke alarms look? Do they look old? Are they hard wired or just battery operated. Do you know how to check to see how old they are? Are all the smoke alarm locations are they up there in fact?

How well do you want your paint job to look at all your closets? Are you going to paint the closets? Are you going to remove the light fixtures before you paint? Does the bedroom even have a ceiling fan in there? Can a new ceiling fan be installed to a light fixture junction box if you decide to remove the existing light fixture in the middle of a bedroom ceiling?

Are there any existing shelving that needs to be removed from some walls? Would you know how to remove shelves without damaging the drywall?

How do the existing window blinds/shade look? Are you going to replace them? If you keep them how are you going to paint around the blinds? What are you going to do around the blinds so the paint looks right?

Are the bathroom exhaust fans working? How do they sound? How does the cover plate look? Is it tight to the ceiling. What's a heat vent-a light anyway?

Any wall damage above the toilet in the bathrooms like did they remove a towel cabinet? How can you cover that up?

Can you remove the mirror above the bathroom sink? Lots of things to learn here...

Do you know how to add more towel bars in a bathroom even if you thought you didn't have the room? What about your bathroom exhaust fan. Did you know on some exhaust fans you can replace just the guts with new depending on the size of your exhaust fan?

Do you know how to set & reset a GFCI outlet? Do you even know what a GFCI outlet is? did you know you could change out a standard light switch to a dimmer switch in a bathroom for the lights?

Did you know it really makes a difference for when you install light switches? Have you ever noticed this?

Did you know just by changing the color of the walls in a Condo or house you can make the place look bigger?

Do you know what 3 way light switches are? How about 4 way light switches? Did you know they actually have 4 way light switches?

More learning for sure...

Have you ever looked at your kitchen cabinet doors? Are there door silencers on all the doors? Are half of them missing? Would you know what to do to fix them?

Would you know how to change the swing of a cabinet door if you had to?

Did you know on concealed cabinet door hinges you can adjust the hinges to make your doors work better? If your doors are rubbing when opening or if you have a double door like under the kitchen sink you could raise one door &/or adjust concealed door hinges in such a way to where you could line up the double doors at the top as well as the line between the doors.

Would you know how to prevent long cabinet shelves from bowing?

Do you know what self closing door hinges are & why you may need them & which door will more than likely have spring loaded door hinges? Why would you need a rated fire door? What's so special about this type of door & frame?

Do you know what smoke seal is for around a door. did you know you can remove the door seal to replace if your seals are ripped or damaged?

Do you know the proper way to paint a front door? What does the door seal look like? did you know you can remove the door seal prior to painting then after you get done painting the front door you can re-install the door seal? If your door seal is damaged or looks bad did you know you can get new door weatherstripping? Did you know you can get it in 3 different colors?

Do you know how to properly remove old plastic anchors in the drywall? Would you know how to prep the walls properly prior to repainting your walls? when is the last time you checked the top of all your baseboards? Wipe your finger on them & see what happens. Wehn you paint do you know what will happen to your paint down there? Do you really think your paint is going to stick to the top edge of really dirty baseboards?

Are you going to paint around your window blinds? Even the vertical blinds at a sliding glass door...what are you going to do there when you paint the walls?

Are you going to paint around your ceiling fan? What about your light fixtures or track lights? What about your smoke alarms? Do you have can light fixtures? Are you going to paint around the can light trim covers? did you know it's better to remove the trim covers rather than to leave them up there when painting?

Should you have the garage door checked out when you move in? When is the last time you checked your garage door by a service tech? Did you lose one of your garage door opener clickers? Did you know you can get a universal type or that any garage door company can get their remotes to work for whatever garage door brand you have?

Did you know most new cars now you can have a garage door guy can program your car to open your garage door without a hand held remote?

Would you know how to check & maintain your garage door? What if you are missing one garage door clicker & you want the very same brand that you always had before?

If you need to get a new garage door opener motor assembly, do you know which one is the best? Did you know there are at least 4 types of garage door openers you could have installed on your garage door?

Do you know how often you should lube your garage door wheels etc.? do you know how to do it? Would you know what type of lube to get at the hardware store?

Keep watching & learning...

Would you know what to do before painting doors & frames? Would you know how to fix a sagging door? Have you ever looked at your front door to check the door gap? Would you know how to fix it to get a bigger door gap?

Do you know how to check & inspect a door & know what to do if your doors need some adjustments?

Would you know how to adjust a door that's not latching properly at the door strike plate?

If you have a door gap that's so big you can pull the door right open, would you know how to fix this door? Would you have to fix this door before you painted the door, if you were repainting doors?

Would you know how to remove door stops so you can save them & re-install? Would you know why you might need to remove a door stop?

Well I guess this is the end of this video course...I hope you learned some new things that you can apply around your house to maintain your house & save some money along the way too...nice going!