Bringing our House Home

Christmas is gone, our new year’s resolutions are fading, and the snow is falling at a rate that makes you wonder if we will see daylight today. Things are just as they should be for the middle of January in the heartland of America, or are they? If you were on the right street last week you could have looked out the window and saw a 2000sq ft home inching by in the frosty morning light, something that is far from normal! The entire process of moving our home was one of the most thrilling experiences of our lives. Here’s how it went from start to finish!

Moving

Tuesday January 10th

The moving company we hired (Unruh House Moving) to take our home to its new foundation was slated to arrive early morning of January 10^th. Eddie and I arrived at the house just after 8am. We had minor cleanup we wanted to complete from the previous days chimney removal before Unruh began their moving process. Once we were done with our cleanup, Unruh arrived and got straight to work. They were glad to see the chimney had been removed, it was originally a job we had asked them to complete, but after assessing the amount of time and work it would take, we finished it ourselves.

The first thing Unruh got to work on was pushing in the original foundation. Their process of securing beams under the house can only be completed if the original foundation is roughly 90% gone. Scary? YES!! By using a skid steer, they bulldozed every side of the homes original limestone foundation into the basement. The only thing remaining after a few hours of work was about 8 stones divided among the 4 corners of the home.

Next, they secured two beams running east/west under the home. These beams were the main support for the home while moving, they were to attach to the truck and axels that drove the home down the road.

Once the main beams were securely in place, it was time to place the cross beams that would run north/south under the home. Placing these smaller support beams took the rest of the afternoon to complete.

Once they were secured Unruh called it a day and headed home. We stuck around for a few photos after they left, but then left and went home ourselves to marvel over the progress that had been made in just a days’ time.

Wednesday January 11th

We have been so blessed to have Grandma Buttenhoff watch our kids through our entire renovation journey. She has been amazingly flexible with our schedule and is always willing to watch all our kids when we need to work. On the morning of January 11^th, we were without her assistance, as she had prior commitments she needed to attend to. We loaded the kids up after breakfast and all went in to await the arrival of the movers for day two.

Once they arrived, we got a plan for the day set out and I was able to take the kids home while Eddie stayed on site and made himself available for any questions or problems that arose. We have never had a plan to hire a foreman or project manager for our renovation. From the very beginning we have always known exactly what we want to see happen with our home and we have been making sure every step of the process that we are involved and getting things completed. Basically, we are our own managers/foreman/contractor liaison, however you put it. By mid-morning our house was secured on all beams and ready to be slid into place. This will then allow Unruh to begin assembly for attaching the main support beams to the truck.

Once the house was slid off its foundation, the cab of the truck and the back wheels were attached. At that point our house was officially a mobile home!

Unruh got their work completed and the home was 100% ready to move by 1pm on day two. The only thing left to do was wait and pray that the weather would cooperate to allow for a smooth moving day tomorrow!

Thursday January 12th

MOVING DAY!! I have never met a person that enjoyed moving. It is always a tiring, tedious, long process. Boxes get packed, then organized, then loaded, then unloaded, then placed in the new home, and finally they await their unboxing. What a daunting task moving is! Our moving day was something completely different. While we were definitely anxious and ready for the process to be done, we were also incredibly excited and elated to finally see months and months of planning for this move come to reality.

Having our home sit on a truck is a thing we NEVER envisioned for ourselves. Normal moves involve the homeowner waiting for a moving company to arrive so boxes and belongings can be driven to their new home. As we awaited our movers that morning, it was a surreal feeling knowing we were waiting for a crew that would drive our entire house home. Unruh had said they would like to be on the road around 9am, and true to their word they arrived around 8:40 and were pulling off the lot before 8:55am. The entire trip lasted roughly 2hrs.

After our house was safely sitting next to its new basement foundation, everyone broke for lunch. It was such an exciting and adrenaline filled morning, Eddie and I stayed at the homesite for at least 30-40mins after everyone had left to talk and marvel over the task that had just been completed. When Unruh was back from lunch, they once again got straight to work and began making preparations for getting our home slid onto its new basement foundation.

Everything went as well as expected, and by 4pm our home was officially slid into place. However, when we say ‘as well as expected’ there was a minor problem with the actual foundation that had to be addressed. For anyone new reading this, we had some major issues with the company we hired to complete our basement. After countless mistakes and inconsistent communication, we had to hire someone else to come in and complete our basement project. One of our biggest fears when getting the home onto our final homesite was the probability that the house would not fit on the foundation because of an error made by the original basement company. Low and behold, that was almost exactly what happened. And while this sounds terrifying, in reality it was a small error, only about 3-5inches worth of concrete error on only one side of the home. The side of the house where the concrete was not complete flush is actually a side we have already planned to put a porch around, so the concrete error will be covered with new porch and no one will ever see/know. We also consulted both Unruh and our local construction expert, Brennan Johnson of Elite Construction, and they cleared the home of any safety issue that may have been a result of the concrete error. In the end, everything was safe and ready to be secured to the new foundation.

Friday January 13th

Friday the 13^th, what a great day to secure a 100+ year old home that has been moved 2miles in the last 24 hours to a brand new basement foundation, right?! It’s a good thing we had complete and total trust in the crew at Unruh because otherwise the bad omen of the day may have made us a little uneasy. In true Unruh fashion, they arrived before 9am and began working to get our home secured to its new foundation. The plan for the day was to install two steel beams under the home that would provide total structural support. This task took all day as they had to cut to size each beam and then install them. When the day came to an end Unruh packed up all their supplies, we said our thank yous and goodbyes and by 5pm our house was officially OURS!!

It has been the BEST feeling in these days and weeks since the move. Being able to drive to OUR property to see and work on OUR home is an amazing feeling. We finally have our house home!!