There are so many aspects to owning a home that it is hard to think through all of them when you are in the market to buy another one. My husband and I spent twelve years remodeling a five bed room rambler on twenty acres. First we had water problems in the crawl space under the house. We raised the house and put in several more courses of blocks to make a complete basement. This opened up many additional possibilities regarding what we could do with this additional space.
Initially we thought that we would just leave the space unfinished. We decided that we did need to have some source of heat in the area due to our harsh winters. We had a wood stove and electric base board heat on the main level. It was very expensive to heat the entire house with electricity and quite inconvenient to try to heat continually with wood. We decided that we would install an energy efficient gas furnace. As the man was installing the furnace he mentioned that he would include vents in the duct work that would accommodate central air conditioning if we would decide to install this at a later date. He went on to tell us that we would save money having them both installed at the same time because we would not have to have them come back out and pay the labor cost. We had talked about having central air conditioning. We live in Minnesota, so we do not have that many days when we need the central air conditioning, but it is helpful to have it going to help remove the moisture from the air. We do get quite humid weather in the summer months.
Within six months of having our home exactly as we wanted it we found a lake house that was very appealing to both of us. We stumbled upon it be mistake. The house was over a hundred years old and needed some cosmetic work done to it. The couple had it listed with the understanding that they were going to replace the furnace because the existing one was not working properly. We offered them less money than they were asking for with the understanding that we would buy our own furnace. We wanted to install central air conditioning at the same time. The accepted the lower offer. We placed our home up for sale and sold it within seventy-two hours. Everything fell into place so well. We are glad that we had the central air conditioning installed at the lake. We do get cool breezes off the lake; however the humidity by the water will warp the wood moldings. The air conditioned air is much more comfortable to be in. We are glad we had it installed and we are glad that we are now living on the lake.