u/Askeebe

It's a red letter day. I met my surgeon for my pre-op visit and went over everything. She said she thinks she will remove 700 grams from each breast, which sounds like a lot. We talked about size and I said I wanted to go as small as possible while keeping my nipple healthy.

And when I got home today, I had a letter from my insurance saying they approved the procedure! Oh happy day.

Now to buy some compression bras and button up shirts and pillows. This forum has been fantastic. Thank you to everyone who posted and encouraged people like me to go for it.

The housing market is nuts here right now. The house is in a prime location close to historic riverfront downtown on a 0.3 acre lot, big for the area. The price was right and we expected to need to do some improvements to insulation, maybe upgrade some electrical, but in general it seemed in good shape. I'd done a ton of research on buying midcentury homes because that's what most are around here. I never expected to buy a 145 year old home. We toured it on Monday and it's been upgraded in places but still has lovely old woodwork, doors and built ins. But I'm seriously scared about the basement and roof. The basement is old CMU, with significant effluorescence and crumbling/spalling of the concrete. There was drywall over a big run of the wall so we couldn't see it. There was a section of the wall that looked like it was bowing in, but only by an inch and it could have been flaking parge? The disclosure said they had an ice dam damage with water getting into the basement a few years ago that was all repaired. I didn't smell any must or mold in the basement and didn't see any obvious water staining except on the walls. I did see what looked like unmortared bricks stacked above the sill plate and maybe holding up some walls? Or maybe it was just fill? I don't know. And one section of the first floor slopes noticeably downward by 1-2 inches. My agent said it was likely stable and had been like that for a long time.

On the second floor, the ceilings were vaulted and looked like they followed the roofline. There were ceiling fans in all the rooms, suggesting to me that they get very hot in the summer. The power bill from the previous owners run 200-300/month with extremes reaching $450-500 in deep winter for a 2100 square foot house. I had budgeted for air sealing and insulation, but I'm terrified of foundation problems. My prevous house had constant foundation problems that ate up a lot of money. I'm currently renting and worried about getting priced out of the market with looming inflation. We have an inspection coming up on Friday and I asked my agent to find a structural engineer to go on the inspection with us.

I don't want to buy a money pit. Maybe I'm not the right person to buy a 150 year old home. Any suggestions?