‘60s Home Grows on Them

When Theresa and Randy Dickerson bought their Tustin home in 1987, two bedrooms, one bathroom and a den seemed plenty big enough.

But when son Mitchel came along in 1992, and a few years later second son Keenan was expected, the house suddenly felt cramped. Plus, it was not charming. “Squatly” is how Theresa described it.

“We had talked off and on. Should we move? Should we add on?” said Randy, 34, a controller for a printing company. But quotes from a few builders revealed that it would cost $50,000 to add just one room.

“It was like, God, we’re not going to get anything out of it,” said Theresa, 35, a landscape architect.

Finally the couple decided: Let’s buy a better house. They put their home on the market for $200,000--it was advertised by the Realtor as a “secluded cutie”--and hunted down their dream home.

Seventy-eight houses later, the couple realized the impossibility of finding what they sought: “We wanted a new house in an old neighborhood,” Theresa said, adding that new homes in their price range were on “postage stamp-sized lots with five-foot setbacks.”

And in established neighborhoods, the houses were 15, 20 or 25 years old, needing serious updating.

Eventually, they decided to stay and remodel. On the plus side, the house shares the lot with a grand old pine tree, is situated at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac replete with friendly neighbors, sits just blocks from where Theresa grew up, has hardwood floors reminiscent of her childhood home and is in an excellent school district. And the couple knew well their home’s limitations.

“When you live in a house for a while, you know how you use it,” Theresa explained. “You know where you need more space.”

To begin, the couple bought books on kitchens, baths and remodeling. After reading up, they hired a Tustin architect, Cecil Carney, who worked near Theresa’s office, and they put their initial plans out to bid to several contractors. When the contractor they liked the best, Louie Mogabgab of Tustin, came in with a high price, they asked him to lower it. He did, dropping his profit margin from 20% to 18%, saying, “We want to do this job. We’ll work with you to fit your budget.”

After six months of intensive planning, five months of construction--while the couple stayed in a two-bedroom apartment, gave birth to one child and potty trained the other--and a $125,000 investment, the couple moved back into their nearly new house late last year.

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While the foundation, wood floors and a few walls remained untouched, most everything else changed, and 575 square feet of living space were added.

Outside, the house took on a Cape Cod look with blue window frames and divided light windows. The old vertical wood siding and plaster were replaced with light blue horizontal Masonite siding with a wood grain.

The nearly flat rock roof was removed, which allowed the walls and ceilings to be raised, and a new, steeper roof was installed and covered with asphalt tiles that are guaranteed for 40 years. Plus, the steeper roof helped balance the house with the bulk of the pine tree, which once dwarfed the “squatly” house.

The drab front door was replaced with a white-painted mahogany door with side lights. The entryway was widened in grand fashion.

In the living room, the formerly flat ceiling is now highly pitched. A wall of windows and sliding glass doors now lead out to the backyard. Before, that wall contained windows only and the backyard was accessible only from a side door. Marble was affixed over the original brick of the fireplace.

The ceiling was also raised in the master bedroom and a luxurious master bath was added, with double sinks, tile counters and a separate bathtub and shower. Randy especially likes the device that keeps the shower water pressure consistent when the toilet is flushed. “I’d do that again and again and again,” he said.

A new den-office was added on the opposite side of the house from the bedrooms, and the former den was converted into Keenan’s bedroom. By building a closet in the den--at their contractor’s suggestion and with thoughts toward flexible use for resale value--a niche was created to relocate the washer and dryer out of the garage. Because the new room was built in a spot bordered by the original living room and garage, it doesn’t look tacked on. “We wanted people to say, ‘Well, where did you add on?’ ” Theresa said.

Most walls were reframed and/or replastered and re-drywalled. During that time, Randy nurtured his passion for music by stringing speaker wire through the walls and installing built-in speakers in most rooms. He was helped by Theresa’s dad, Walt Wands, a retired electrical engineer from Scottsdale, Ariz.

Wands also suggested multiple-switch panels in the bathrooms that control the lights, fans, heat and overhead night lights.

“Isn’t that cool?” Theresa asked.

But it’s the kitchen that transformed most dramatically and gives the couple daily satisfaction.

“It’s definitely my favorite part of the house,” said Randy, beaming at the high ceiling, the oak cabinets with white melamine interiors, the bone-colored tile counters with tan grout, the built-in wine rack and glass-fronted cabinets, the pull-out shelves in the pantry, the pull-out fan over the stove top. “Little toys,” he said.

As he drew up six kitchen designs during the planning stage, Randy was well aware of the old kitchen’s limitations: narrow, too small, not enough counter space, not enough cabinets and, worst of all, only two outlets. “We couldn’t plug in the microwave, toaster oven and coffee maker without blowing a fuse,” he recalled. During the remodel, “we got to put electrical outlets anywhere we wanted.”

As for the cupboards, “Our goal was to have more cabinets than we could use,” said Randy, opening doors to reveal several empty shelves. “And we did.”

For Theresa, the best place is the sunny breakfast room, which gathers the first rays of the day. “This I love,” she said. “I’m a light person.”

She retained the old deep kitchen sink in the remodel. “I love that sink,” she told the contractor. “I used to give my son a bath in that sink.” Mogabgab said: “Well, we’ve got to save it. It’s got memories.”

Truth be told, the couple didn’t set out to do such a major remodel. In fact, they were conscious about fitting in with their neighborhood of modest homes, where nary a second-story addition is in sight. Still, they managed to spend a bundle on their one-story house. As many remodeling homeowners know, the new makes the old look bad, and one thing leads to another.

“The project just kept growing,” said Carney, the architect. Actually, he wanted to go further, enhancing the Cape Cod look with a dormer over the front door. But the couple rejected it for money reasons. “You have to draw the line somewhere,” he admitted.

Mogabgab said, “We didn’t write anything into stone. You have to make changes when you get into it. There are things you don’t think about at first.”

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And according to Glen Pickren of Barron Financial Services, who helped the Dickersons get a “dream builder” loan based on the equity of the house after the remodel, rather than before: “They might have overbuilt their house a little. I would have recommended a more modest remodel.”

But, he said, for older neighborhoods to “reemerge,” someone has to be bold. While many homes on the Dickersons’ street have added rooms or improvements, the Dickerson job seemed to infuse the neighborhood with new energy. “We had a flurry of people getting new paint, new windows, new roofs,” Theresa said.

And as one neighbor jokingly told the couple: “The level of keeping up with the Joneses just got a little higher.”

Even with a handful of little regrets, the Dickersons are thrilled with their house.

“You get in there and you go: Wow, it looks even better than we thought it would,” Theresa said. “You say: ‘It looks really good.’ ”

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The Project

Major remodel to modest, 1960s tract house:

Add family room, convert previous family room to bedroom, totally remodel kitchen and add breakfast room, widen entry hall, raise all ceilings, widen hallway, redo most walls, add large master bathroom and walk-in closet.

Size:

Before: 1,204 square feet

After: 1,779 square feet

Architect:

Cecil Carney, Tustin

General Contractor:

LLM Construction, Tustin

Louie Mogabgab, site supervisor

Cost:

$125,000

Financing:

$100,000 loan

$25,000 in personal funds

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Wisdom From the Trenches

Do’s

* “It was great to work with an architect. When you live in a house for a long time, you get tunnel vision,” said Theresa Dickerson.

* If you find a builder you like, bargain with him. The Dickersons told Mogabgab they liked him best but his estimate was too high. He lowered his profit margin 2%.

* Pick the brains of the experts. “Like the painter: We said: ‘What color would you recommend.’ Or we asked our builder, ‘What would you do?’ It’s kind of fun for them,” said Theresa.

* It’s best to have a budget and firm plans from the very beginning, said the Dickersons’ loan broker, Glen Pickren: “If you don’t know where you want to stop, you’ll end up where you don’t want to be.”

* “If you pick a contractor who’s in your area, he’s going to do a better job. He wants to stay in the business. He wants referrals,” said Theresa.

Don’ts

* The couple think the kitchen subfloor should have been thicker and stronger; they can feel it give under their feet.

* “They might have overbuilt for the neighborhood,” said Pickren.

* If they did it again, they’d make the entryway narrower.

* Keenan’s room is dark with only one small window, and the couple now wish they’d added a bigger window.

* “We should have strung even more speaker wire when the walls were opened up,” said Randy.

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Kathy Price-Robinson is a freelance writer who has written about remodeling for eight years. She can be reached at: KathyPrice@aol.com