The Plumber Stole My Listening Room!

[AudiocRaver]

Well, not quite.

A plugged 80-year-old cast-iron pipe that the plumber wants to replace goes through the dropped ceiling over my main listening area. So, think plumber, saws-all, and lots of black sludgy goo, and the plumber said I should gut the room to be safe. So now I have no listening room (I'm Cry----ing, I'm Cry----ing, [Zappa - "Shirleena" - Chunga's Revenge]).

Add the factor that my wife just retired and wants to move close to family in North Carolina...

In a few weeks we go house hunting and a studio / listening area / cinema are high priorities. New house new state, new listening area, treatments, setup, tuning, my head is spinning. So much is happening so fast and when I do set it all up it takes days (weeks?) which will all feed into the new AV NIRVANA Speaker Setup Guide.

This thread will serve through the initial phase of deciding on a house with the right layout for our needs. More detailed construction will have its own thread(s) later on.

 

[1_sufferin_mind]

The ol' pipe-full-of-sludge-through-the-HT excuse, huh? Slick (pun intended) way to get a new room! Here's best wishes on finding the best layout for your needs. Oh yeah, and congrats on your wife's retirement!

 

[Tonto]

Congratulations on the new house! I remember when we were house hunting, we would walk in and I would say...wrong layout for my speakers!!!! Almost all houses now days have an open floor plan which drastically affects speaker placement for optimal sound. It was very frustrating, but we finally found a great house and once renovated, had the room for my HT. Which I'm still working on finishing by the way. If I had to do it again, I would build from scratch. That way you could have exactly what we know we like and the dimensions for the HT would be perfect. That's a hint to build Wayne...if you're wondering. If that is not in the cards though, then look at as many houses as you can stand (I dreaded that part after a while).

It will be great to have you closer, you'll be able to pop over to Sonnie's for GTG's much easier. N. Carolina is a great state, you'll love it!

 

[Jack]

Sorry and congrats at the same time Wayne. Maybe this will allow you a good room in a good state with no bad plumbing. Moving is such a pain initially but once done can be a true blessing. I wish you and your family the best and good luck.

 

[Todd Anderson]

Where are you looking in Carolina, Wayne?

 

[AudiocRaver]

Our middle son and his family live in Arden, on the south edge of Asheville near the airport. We will be looking at places within a hour of them. I am dreading the move part, but there are some interesting possibilities we have found online that make me hopeful.

 

[Tony V.]

We were planning on buying a new house, but after both myself and my wife realized that you cant buy the location, and the ones we liked were $ 3/4 million we changed our mind LOL The location of our house is ideal as it has a park out front and large old Elm trees lining the streets. You cant buy that in new neighborhoods

Wayne, do you have basements in the area your looking?

 

[JBrax]

We were planning on buying a new house, but after both myself and my wife realized that you cant by the location, and the ones we liked were $ 3/4 million we changed our mind LOL The location of our house is ideal as it has a park out front and large old Elm trees lining the streets. You can buy that in new neighborhoods

Wayne, do you have basements in the area your looking?

Same here Tony. Although the houses we were looking at weren't quite $750,000 there was definitely sticker shock. $350,000 for a comparable house here in Missouri which is actually pretty cheap in most large U.S. cities.

 

[Tony V.]

Now our Canadian $ is not as high a value as yours but it sounds like the cost of housing is fairly comparable. Our house is a bungalow built in the mid 50s but it less than a 15min drive to downtown and in a quiet neighborhood. It was appraised last year at $400,000

 

[Sonnie]

Looking forward to having you closer to Alabama... my personal preference says you need to move to Georgia and split the difference. If you get too close family, well, it might be too close. But a couple to three hours away might be just right? Sounds logical to me, but I am sure your lovely wife ain't buying my nonsense.

 

[Tonto]

I thought you had a spare bedroom!!!

 

[Sonnie]

Yep... we do... and Wayne loves it.

 

[Leonard Caillouet]

I know moving is no fun, but you will be close to your son, and like Sonnie we will be happy to have you closer to us. And Carolina is a nice place to be.

 

[AudiocRaver]

Basements: It is hilly country, and walkout basements are fairly common.

One place that has us thinking is a foreclosure that a bank bought at auction and is reselling at a great price, has a roomy unfinished addition with real possibilities. There are some attractive possibilities in our range. And close to Sonnie is a big bonus.

 

[AudiocRaver]

Have never been to Leonard's place in Florida, but that also would be a shorter drive.

 

[Tony V.]

I want to plan a trip down on my motorcycle one summer to visit you guys. That would be an Epic ride from up here.

 

[AudiocRaver]

Edmonton, ambitious!

 

[Sonnie]

Love the mountains... maybe we can come visit you guys for a change!

 

[AudiocRaver]

Great, just give us a weekend to settle in!

 

[tesseract]

Ah, I am gonna lose my show partner! Good luck with house hunting and the move, Wayne.

 

[Leonard Caillouet]

Time for you to move south and east, too. There is a reason people want to live down here, you know.

 

[AudiocRaver]

We have a house hunting trip in a week, so there may be some news forthcoming.

Question: What tools are good to use for

1. floor layout?
2. sketched-up interior room views?

Looking for something that is fairly easy to use but with reasonable flexibility.

 

[Peter Loeser]

Google sketchup is popular but very basic. I prefer CAD software but that can be expensive and may have a steep learning curve. Our builder has generated some nice layout views for us - I'll ask what he uses.

 

[NBPK402]

We have a house hunting trip in a week, so there may be some news forthcoming.

Question: What tools are good to use for

1. floor layout?
2. sketched-up interior room views?

Looking for something that is fairly easy to use but with reasonable flexibility.

I picked up a nice little tool for house hunting... A Bosch glm-15 digital laser measuring tool. Works great for measuring rooms, and distances for your speakers. It is nice and small ( about half the size of a pack of cigarettes).

 

[Todd Anderson]

That's a hardcore AVer for ya. Laser measuring tools. Love it!