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Looks like a money pit to me!
If you really want to keep the cost as low as possible from a material standpoint, look at all the options for exterior cladding. Repairing/piece-mealing the thing together is probably out of the question.
The second "keep the cost as low as possible" scenario is to weigh all other options. Like, what's the difference in your purchase price compared to the comp's, versus the appraised land value?
You could possibly do nothing to improve the house- but improve the land by tearing down the house and selling the lot/land.
Your first pic is so lousy it's hard to tell what it is for sure. The second white colored pic on the left looks like some of the old Gold Bond Clapboard Mineral Siding from back in the 60's. They used corners that looked like those. If it is, you'll be replacing all of it as it hasn't been made in decades and the only product close to it will be Hardiplank. But since the wall is mostly apart, might as well insulated it and any electrical you might want to add to that wall is easily done now from the outside. I see no value in attempting to salvage any of the siding in the pics.
The old wide aluminum siding is often finished that way at the corners.
One thing to remember with aluminum siding, in some areas of the country it is very difficult to find aluminum siding that "matches" old siding in size and texture. I work at a building supply center and none of our suppliers carry the corners pictured in Hopes post above anymore.
The picture of the siding by the gas meter almost looks like it could be the primed hardboard siding that was popular years ago. The paint and surface on the bottom edges would peel like the spots in the picture quite frequently. Even though that stuff is still available, I don't think anyone could pay me enough to put that stuff on anything of mine.
As others have said...just do the back side of the house.
If you are replacing windows on the back side now would be the time. Strip off the old back side siding, insulate, OSB, then house wrap and finally horizontal Hardie board.
This is not a hard project to do......the windows are where you need a little knowledge and expertise.
I learned at an early age that I can learn to do a lot, roofing, electrical and a few others I will leave for the pro's though.
It's your first house, just relax and take it slow. Try to find a friend or family member who has some home repair experience to bounce your prospective repair contracts off of.
Any competent carpenter should be able to rebuild and repair that wall for you.
Here is a basic diagram showing you the layers of building material. It looks like you need to replace the insulation, sheathing, housewrap* or building paper and then the siding. House Framing Diagrams & Methods | HomeTips
Newer houses use "housewrap" as a waterproofing layer, older ones used Building Paper (felt paper).
I agree with CptnRn's post. You will need to have sheathing and wrap in addition to repairing any warped/rotted or missing studs, joists. Trying to "repair" just the bad parts of that back wall is a bad idea, do the whole wall. I have done siding/partial siding on two of our homes. I will never use aluminum siding again, vinyl works well, you can even paint it if need be. The hardboard's type siding may be less expensive, mine lasted 20 years...
I appreciate all your ideas. They are very helpful.
I went there myself to take more close up pictures and it looks like the horizontal siding (sorry I don’t know the exact term) in the back of the house is actually wood (picture 004a and picture 005a), whereas the horizontal siding on the 2 sides and front of the house are particle boards or cement(picture 022a)? Again picture 027a shows more details of the exposed wall. It looks like it has all the layers shown in CptnRn post.
I got one estimate and am waiting for the amount. I hope it won’t cost too much.
It means you don't need to match the blue! You can paint your house whatever color you want.
There's no need to match color of anything existing. All you need to do is match the width of the siding with whatever paintable material you want.
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