Door (or Window) #2 Please Bob

Oooooooh. The crowd moans in unison as the door (window) opens to reveal a big FAIL! No grande prize for you contestant #1, move along!

So one of the things you encounter over and over again in a "fixer-upper" is the surprise WTF happened here. It usually starts with a small clue that something is not right but it can also be a pretty obvious sign of damage. In this case we could see some water damage under the old carpet. The subfloor was pretty stained with urine and other fun things so it was near impossible to tell if there was water coming in from the window. 

IF there was water coming in from the window and we decided to lay down the new floor without fixing it we would be basically asking to have our new floor ruined in the spring. 

If the window framing was solid and the staining was just due to whatever the other staining was due to then we would be able to assume that the window was sealed properly.

We needed more information! We examined the window framing and noticed that there did appear to be fading due to water damage. Nothing conclusive but we now had enough 'doubt' in the reliability of the window to pull off the drywall. This is best avoided because once you pull it off you will need to put it back on. That's hours of sanding, mudding, taping and other messy work you don't want to jump into lightly. We jumped. It is always better to know for sure. This is what we found. 

To break it down, it appears as though there is a good amount of water damage. Some very old discolouration that could be mould but is most likely just staining from the rotting wood. It Also looks like we have some insect damage. All of the supporting framework for the window, the insulation and the window itself will need to be replaced. Better luck next time contestant #1. The prize you selected is an unplanned inside/outside build job with thousands of dollars in materials.

Now as much as we grabbed a beer, sighed and stared at this particular problem child for a good long time, this kind of thing is to be expected. A lot of a houses problems can't be seen with the naked eye and a lot of them can't be fixed with a coat of BM decorator white.  I wish! Sometimes you get lucky. Sometimes it looks a lot worse than it is. 

When we pulled the tile off the old bathtubs we always cross our fingers and hope for clean framing. No Black Mould! We scream in our hearts a hopeful mantra and then fearfully look behind the drywall. So far so good! No black mould! Even though the tiles an grout are often grossly covered with patches of black we have gotten away with minimal clean up. 

Not so in this case but it really is pretty rare to start ripping things apart and not find some kind of WTF behind the walls. This is the main reason you want to be really careful about the ripping and tearing of walls and plumbing. We gave it a good once over and decided it would be a job for the spring. We are going to cover it up for now, only temporarily until we can shop around for a cheap window. Maybe we can even get the deck that will run under the window up first to give us a little boost. 

It's going to be a lot of work and a big job. Surprise! This is why you always have a case of beer in the fridge when you are doing your own demo. 1 to feed friends who pop over to help and 2 to take the edge off surprises like this one.