What a bizarre assortment of apartment buildings exist in Bangor/Brewer (Augusta: real estate, apartments)

[forest beekeeper]

We went shopping for apartment buildings [Multi-Family-Dwellings] yet again today. Triplexes, quad-plexes and the like.

The realtor that is assisting us is being very helpful.

My goodness I am aghast at the old falling apart structures that exist in Bangor / Brewer and that are filled with tenants!

We have done walk throughs of a dozen properties, in the area.

I have now seen so many falling apart structures that they are getting mixed up.

Leaking roofs, sagging roof lines, falling off gutters, missing gutters, dry rotted window frames, falling off siding,

kicked in doors, splintered wooden doors [where I know that code requires a steel fire door], door frames that were once kicked in and the door frame has been left split apart with a nail added to hold the door shut, and 24" wide doors,

bouncy stair wells, sloping floors, rooms with bowl shaped floor sags,

knob-tube wiring with bare hot wires, circuit breakers that supply sub-panels with fuses, ungrounded electrical outlets,

asbestos wrapped pipes, asbestos falling from piping, asbestos wrapped furnaces,

stair wells with no handrails, hand rails with no vertical supports at 3.5" intervals as per code,

molded walls, base board piping that is leaking,

Plastic bags taped up onto the ceilings to hold the drips,

and a lot of false walls.

3 days ago we were looking at one property and my foot went through an outdoor deck. Two different floorboards, two locations the floorboard cracked and broke in twain underneath my weight. I was up on the second floor with 14 foot of drop underneath me. This was an exterior fire escape, the secondary egress from a group of apartments. Fallen leaves have gathered and underneath those leaves the wooden planks have rotted away. Good thing there was no handrail or else I might have grabbed it and pulled it loose as well. One deck plank broke and I began to fall through the deck, but I caught myself, as I took a few steps away, I fell through a second plank.

In all of the buildings that we have walked through, I do not think that any of them had flat level floors. I mean most apartments have had floors where, in one room the floor slopes up, you climb uphill, you crest a hill [sometimes in a doorway] and the next room slopes downhill again.

I have gone into apartments with doors that have been 24 inches wide. I am not a terribly large man [in stature] and I have had to turn sideways to slip in through a few of these doors.

We walked through one basement where the foundation is being pushed in, it is cracked, leaking and is leaning inward 30 degrees. The building is resting on it, but that entire side of the building looks as it wants to collapse as soon as the foundation underneath lets go. the foundation is ready to let go. Only a good intention is holding that foundation up at all.

Today I was in a basement where the sewer lines had washed away the soil underneath the cement floor. The cement is very thin, and cracked and the sewer pipe is very loose, I could look down beneath the floor and see a large open subterranean vault that has opened up from the sewage waters washing away the soil, underneath that building [and thus underneath where I was standing].

None of these buildings were truly very old. 1900-irish is what the MLS says about their construction. So none of them could really be anything over 120 years old.

We have owned much older properties.

Odd mixtures of heating methods are in evidence. Oil, propane, electric, NG. Often in these buildings you can see where two, three, of even where all four of these fuels appear to be used.

One apartment I recall had oil-fired forced air vents in the floors of some rooms, and base-boards from an oil-fired furnace in all rooms, and an unvented propane heater in the living room, and electric wall mounted heaters in some rooms. All in one apartment. Don'T get me started on the rest of that building.

I can fix most of these types of things. But my goodness, with any of these properties I would be clearly over whelmed by the amount of repairs needed.

[Northern Maine Land Man]

This is not Connecticut.

[starwalker]

Originally Posted by Northern Maine Land Man

This is not Connecticut.

no s##t Sherlock! <g> I think Forest is finding the big brothers to the single family places I was looking at, as Maine Writer put it "the interesting side of Maine real estate"! LOL No wonder Stephen King lives here...

[boonelsewhere]

forest, these could Not be in America what you just describes, especialy in New England state where most people look up to as the true American live there.

[RHB]

Originally Posted by starwalker

no s##t Sherlock! <g> I think Forest is finding the big brothers to the single family places I was looking at, as Maine Writer put it "the interesting side of Maine real estate"! LOL No wonder Stephen King lives here...

If I recall, I saw one of the single family ones you looked at....yeah these are related.

[Trailmonkey]

I have been in some really interesting apartment buildings in Bangor. I found a small "grow" room in one of them. The minimal work required to keep them standing is the norm. One had a storage area (used to be a garage) which I didn't even dare to step into. Upstairs or down. The supports for the floor had all rotted away. Both floors. I could smell oil from the front door, and the heating company with me was required to call d.e.p. to report the spill. This is not uncommon. However, I find the same thing in Augusta. I did a building down there where it was built on the side of a hill, and the building was out of level corner to corner by more than a foot. I took one step into the basement apartment, and backed out because there was more mold on every surface than I had ever seen before. (and I have seen a lot). I could (and probably should) write a book about some of the horror shows I have seen. On the other hand, every once in a while, I get to go to a nice, clean, well built, modern building. I am sure that the price for these buildings will be a bit higher, however. Good luck in your search!

[BacktoNE]

I can so relate! 7 years ago when we relocated to, as it turned out, Hampden we went through a miserable experience trying to find a decent apartment. OMG!!! Dump after dump after dump. DH would pull up in front of a building and it got so we wouldn't even bother to get out of the car. We could tell by looking.

Thankfully one of his friends on his tennis team knew of a place in Hampden and he made a couple of calls, got us an appt to look, and we wrote the check right there on the spot. We made it with 1 week to spare before closing on the house we sold.

I'm sorry to hear that things haven't gotten any better.

[forest beekeeper]

Originally Posted by RHB

If I recall, I saw one of the single family ones you looked at....yeah these are related.

Yes, but on that red house, if you held tight to the door knob, and just replaced everything else, it would have been fine.

[starwalker]

Originally Posted by forest beekeeper

Yes, but on that red house, if you held tight to the door knob, and just replaced everything else, it would have been fine.

The WINDOWS were new too, remember...

For what it's worth, it was still standing as of a week or so ago...

[forest beekeeper]

Okay so the door knob and the windows were okay. a stiff breeze and the rest could collapse.