The Wonderful Visit to Troy

Nothing beats going to Troy every day for HVCC. The traffic, the parking, the weather, and the sheer lack of roadside manners. You can flip people off, and they could care less. But today, I saw possibly the most disturbing house EVER. I've fixed up my sisters apartments before, and they were pretty bad. But I can say without a doubt, this house.... I wouldn't accept it as a gift. EVER

Upstairs

Behold! (captions and thought below the picture)

1st picture I took. This sums up the place very nicely

We're still trying to figure out if this is water-damage or deliberate. I'm thinking water.
 

This is it. This one picture makes the entire place look terrible. I have a picture of what we were looking at just below.
 

Severe water damage on this rafter. I wasn't about to poke it, but our specialist said it was pretty bad.

Just terrible.

The floor here was so slanted, you'd think you were drunk by the sway. We came to the conclusion, that this part of the house is great for rolling marbles across the floor.

The most disgusting bathroom I've ever seen. And that's saying a lot from a college student.

This is just cosmetic flaking. Probably the heat/cold doing that. Sanding it and painting it over would make it look nice.
 

Looks great for a future home huh?
 

The heater.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse....
 

It looks like the previous owners did TRY to do some electrical work. Every outlet in the house was grounded. Here we see an electrical "runway". They installed a light switch and an outlet on it.
 

Looks like more water damage to me.
 

   
These pictures show pretty much the same thing. Though the second shows it more clearly.... rotted floor boards.
 

Here's how they patched the roof. Wood. Reeeaaallly smart. I'll bet no water will get through that in the winter.
 

Gee, I wonder what could have caused that?
 

At least here they made a half-honest attempt to cover up the problem with the roof.
 

Basement
After helping my sister re-wiring her apartments, I have seen nasty basements. Ones used for storage, or just neglected for 10 years. This basement was forgotten for.... lets say 75 years to be generous. We did find Christmas decorations down there, so at least we know it was last used AFTER Christ was born.

Nothing like having the ceiling fall on the water heater.
 

We found a tunnel, so we went through it.

Yeah, ummmm, ok. Rubble/Debris/Garbage/Homeless-people-stuff

Our specialist pointed out that the house was raised because the bricks are set onto of the stone foundation. How observant.

   
This is one of the primary support beams of the house. It's rather old, but it as carved with hand tools, so it is rather stable. Notice how professionally it was installed. Especially how they are holding it up with bricks STACKED ON A PILE OF DIRT. Yeah, REAL stable. I wouldn't move anything into that house heavier then a desk lamp.

More of the tunnel. I think convicts lived here, and were practicing.

Yes that's green, for all you color-blind people. That's the exit out of the basement to the backyard. It's metal, and looks like animals have been getting in for years through it.

Pipes... unsealed of course, they work better that way. Keeps the pressure down.

A dead end in one of the tunnels.
 

   
The electrical boxes. One is surprisingly newer then the other.

   
The gas pipes. Those look used to say the least.

That water doesn't look to friendly.
 

           
The entrance to the tunnel systems.

Downstairs

The downstairs bathroom. Preferable to the upstairs one.

   
The dilapidated kitchen. Looks like they had a fire on the ceiling.
 

You can't see it because of the flash on the camera, but there's a lot of sunlight peeking in through that corner.

Something heavy was once here. Unless the floor naturally sank a good inch below everything else.
 

Downstairs heater.

Outside

We couldn't get in the yard. It was too cold, and the gate was blocked by a snow bank. We would have jumped the fence, but like I said... it was cold. Also, there's a piece of a car bumper in the yard (on the right side).

Nice artwork on the trimmings
 

In case you are interested, there's the phone number. The boarded windows help keep homeless people away, while lowering the land value.
 

903 River Street, Troy New York

We think that tree is the only thing holding up the second floor.

And that's us, trying to tell the nice REMAX lady we certainly weren't interested.