inthehotsun

You knew eventually this would come up....

Many people do not realize that funds for facilities versus funds for maintenance and operations (basically, the $$ that funds teachers' salaries, technology, nurses, counselors, etc.) are two separate pots of money. Legally, a school district CANNOT use facility money (mostly thru bonds that are passed by voters; some thru the state facility funds) for maintenance and operations.

The Berry Center was APPROVED by the voters. Even if they did not use the bond funds to build the Berry Center, they still could not redirect those funds to cover their expenses to run the schools.

(Disclaimer: I do not work for Cy-Fair, btw.)

In terms of HISD having run down schools even though the taxbase is huge (and it is)...people do not realize that any "additional" monies generated by propery tax growth does NOT go to HISD. In fact, it goes to the state's general revenue funds. Ask your local legislator what they are doing with that money.

Everytime your property taxes go up, the state gets that increase not HISD (or any other local school district). The city and county, however, do keep that increase generated by property wealth.

The current school finance system was based on what each school district was able to raise on tax collections per student in 2005-2006 or 2006-2007 (whichever was better). If a district had given their property owners the optional homestead exemption or for whatever reason had a poor rate of property tax collections (I believe one year, Enron protested their taxes so HISD had a particularly low level of tax collections that year but the following year had a "settle up"...but if that had been the year that current school finance system was based on, HISD would be in a bad situation, too)...then the school district is screwed.

Texas is about 47 on the list when you rank the states on how much the state government is funding their schools. However, Texas is about in the middle in terms of achievement. And when you look at how Texas is doing on the NAEP scores (the only national assessment test around) when you disagregate certain populations (e.g., economically disadvantaged, Hispanics, etc.), we do better than most states with our most at-risk populations.

So, in terms of cost/benefit....Texans for the little $$ they invest in education (compared to the rest of the country) actually get a pretty good deal. Most school districts (no way in heck I'd ever defend districts like North Forest) are doing a pretty good job at stretching a dollar...

Get the facts.

Actually... shouldn't this have been noted on the survey? Any encroachments, easements should be noted... The inspector is typically focused on the structure (that you're buying) vs. property line issues...

Who know, I didn't know what the heck I was doing when I bought my house. It was cute little bungalow; I wanted to leave my apartment. I saw one house on a Saturday and one house on Sunday; by Monday, I was submitting my contract for the second house I saw.

I used the seller's realtor (since I didn't have one and really wasn't expecting to buy a house "that" soon) and the survey was already done before I got into the picture. It did not mention the awning thing. I'm not sure if it put up post-survey. I didn't notice it myself until my father pointed it out at least a year after I had lived here. (Note to self: ask father to check out property in the future before signing on the dotted line...)

Although there are five thousand things wrong with my property (the awning is just one of them), overall, I'm still happy with my house. The house is fine. The property since the previous owner owned the property next to mine carved out a better slice of the pie for his part of the land. Mine was like the red-headed stepchild, I'm sad to say, in the deal.

I moved to Houston from the east coast and since no one has any backyard/frontyard there, I was naive in what was "normal" for the Heights.

I was seduced by the curb appeal.

Oh well.

I do worry about resell value (if I decide to move). Let's just hope I find another naive, single-female with no real estate experience that falls in love with the adorable bungalow nestled between the flowering plants to buy this when I'm ready to fly away.

it sounds like some people have too much time on their hands (or need a creative outlet at work).

thanks for the laughs. i'll be sure to go back to this posting after our cat-fight and i need a little pick-me-up.

The fence is about five years old and still in good shape.

The neighbor's mental state...she is a recently divorced River Oaks socialite (lived there all her life)...who now takes to drinking too much champagne and has a tendency of coming into my yard and digging up plants...and putting them where she thinks they should be...or clipping my newly planted vine to the point where it's now a stubble.

It's really strange.

But she does buy my dog organic dog treats and leaves them in my mailbox.

The previous owner of my house used to own the house next to me and rented mine out. I bought my house from him and stupidly did not notice (nor my inspector) that the neighbor's outside deck's awning hangs over my fence. In fact, the outside posts that hold up the awning (small ones) sit on my side of the fence (the posts sit on the cross-boards on the wood fence between our two properties).

When it rains, the water falls off the deck's awning and under my house. I know water under a pier and beam home is not the best thing for its foundation so...

The previous owner of the house sold it to some crazy lady (really. she's nuts.) and I have a feeling that a friendly talk about either adding a gutter or removing the awning completely is not going to be an easy task.

What rights do I have under these circumstances?

I live on 12th and Nicholson. Just curious. Do you think property value will go up for houses near the trail?

I seem to never fully get rid of fleas. My dog constantly gets them even when I put Advantage (flea control) on him. I also sometimes get them when I sit outside in my backyard.

And it's not even that hot!!

Any remedies? What can I do to control them?

I don't know a lot about what it will take to add a second floor, but I am assuming I will have to do some structural work to the existing building to support a second floor.

My house/lot probably breaks every code imaginable and if I had been a more "savvy" homeowner and had a more honest agent who was more concerned about a quick commission, I probably would not have bought this house.

Basically, one side of my house sits within a foot of the property line and the other side...enough space for a person to get to the back. I think it would be very hard to do any structural work to the foundation given my tight quarters so I thought an addition would be easier/cheaper.

As for as just selling and buying a new place. Yes, I obviously have thought about it but I don't know how long it would take for me to sell this place given its size/lot size...and shouldn't we just try to work with what we have?

I was definitely was leaning towards selling it but then I read an article in The New York Times about a couple living in a 700 sq. ft. loft and thought why we do need so much space in Texas? So many parts of the country/world live with less so shouldn't I be able to live with what I have?

But...I also do not want to do something stupid and something so out-of-character for the Houston real estate market that I will be stuck with this house for the rest of my life.

i'm trying to think of resale value. and i guess that's what i cannot quite figure out.

is more house or more yard better?

i'm a single woman so yard-work-for-one....not so fun....but at the same time, i do not want to make a potentially stupid decision that will mean i will have a hard time selling my house if i need to sell it.

Do you know how those massage schools have their "discounted" massages that their students give so that they can get practice giving massages to clients? Is there a similar program for architects?

A promising architect student does plans; a faculty member reviews the plans....and client gets a good price?

Okay. I'm in education so when I bought my house in the Heights four years ago, I could only afford this itty-bitty one-story 1920's bungalow (~1000 sq. ft.) in the Heights on an itty-bitty lot (~2300 sq. ft.). I have been wanting to add an extra bedroom and storage/washroom in the back, which basically will take up my entire backyard.

I used to live in the east coast and it was not uncommon for homes to have no yard and all the "outside" entertainment occurred on the roof.

So, instead of buying a new house with a larger lot that I probably cannot afford, I thought I should make use of the house I currently own and on the addition, make a rooftop deck on it. Given that other parts of the roof would be around it, potentially could be an ugly view but I have found some nice sites of chicago roof "gardens" that have quite elaborate privacy structures around it to isolate the roof top living area. However, no downtown views will be visible.

Given the slope/height of the roof on the top part of my house (my bungalow is currently shaped like an L with the bottom part of the L the longer portion of the house), I don't think any structure on the roof would be noticable from the front of the house.

Is this a stupid idea?

I probably will live in my house for another five years or so and wondering about resale value.

OR should I just build my addition as a second story to the structure I currently have and make use of the (still) itty-bitty yard I do have?