Just as we pay off the line of credit, we may need to use some of it. We have a lot of wood trim around the house (exterior), and much of it is rotting, and the paint is deteriorating, and the gutters are failing (and causing a leak). I’ve got quotes for the work, and the guy I’m going with will run us about $7,000 to do all of the work – replacing the rotting wood, painting, etc. And we’ll finally get to change up the colors on the house. A previous owner had some warm cream siding installed, with a bright white and bright blue trim. The clash of warm and cool colors even bothers my design-dumb eyes. While I’d prefer the cool color scheme, the siding isn’t getting replaced anytime soon, so since we’re repainting the trim, it’ll become “warm”.
I’ve got at least 30 days to come up with as much as I can before dipping into the line of credit, and we’re going to use some (not all) of our emergency fund to cover it. I estimate that we’ll need to borrow up to 3k from the line of credit, which would get completely paid off (again) in September. I don’t want to drain the emergency fund, so we’re taking 3k from there (leaving us with 2k), and before we really attack the line of credit again, I want to “refill” the emergency fund, which is why September is the payoff date rather than sooner.
We have to file for an architectural change with our HOA, which can take up to 60 days (neighborhood rumors say it takes less than 30), then the company has 30 days to start work. We need to put down 35% for materials, and pay the rest when he’s done, so we might not borrow as much depending on when the work is completed. The work needs to be done before our rainy season in August/Sept, but we can push it off just a little bit to try to save more, but there is some wood that I hope will survive the next month. We’ve already put it off as long as we think we can, and the leaking was the final straw that told us “OK, you need to take care of this”.
We looked at covering it with vinyl so that we never had to paint again, but several trusted contractors said not to do that because the wood still rots under the covering, and we wouldn’t know about it. So, we’re going with painting, which is guaranteed for 4 years, so it’ll be a while before we paint again 🙂