I was born and raised in Memphis but live in Phoenix now. Our ranch house was built in 1962, which is old by Phoenix standards. Having lived here for 30 years, we've thought about moving, but absolutely love the neighborhood, in a North Central Phoenix area (lots of mostly Palm, Palo Verde, and Eucalyptus and Pine trees and a mix of desert lanscaped and grassy lawns) with no two houses alike!
The neighborhood was originally designed with all one story sprawling ranch houses, but in the last few years, I've noticed more and more people adding 2nd stories, concrete tile roofs, stucco, and some houses (especially around the golf course) being torn down completely and rebuilt.
Though most of the new houses are lovely, I believe the character of the neighborhood has suffered somewhat, with the two stories in here now. It is still a beautiful area, however, and we have chosen to stay here rather than buy new.
Having raised our children in this house, it holds priceless memories.
A few years ago, my daughter and son-in-law bought a house in Anthem, a completely new Del Webb master planned community about 20 minutes up the freeway from Phoenix, which is actually a town now.
My daughter missed our neighborhood so much that they moved back last year into a 1977 Ranch style home, 3 blocks from us! She also wanted their daughter to attend the same great neighborhood schools she did.
This is what we have done in the last 10 years to update our home while still maintaining the integrity of the Ranch style:
Replaced the 40 year old cedar shake roof with concrete tile (Monier lifetile). For this we had to hire an engineer to do an analysis of how much we needed to reinforce the roof for the added weight.
Replaced all the windows with low E-4 double pane glass. In addition the large floor to ceiling picture window had to be tempered glass.
Removed one bank of kitchen cabinets to open up the floor space to the famly room.
Enlarged the center island, and added an all electronic cooktop which is completely flush with the countertop.
Overhead is a large European Island style stainless steel range hood with 4 halogen lights.
Replaced kitchen counter tops with slab granite.
Tiled the entire house with 16" (inch and 1/2 thick) handmade saltillo tiles. Added lots of easy to clean area rugs through out the house.
3 comments:
You forgot "fix the plumbing" a bunch of times.
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