Old Church Converted into Residence?

[mayhem]

Partition off 1/3 of the building and make it a big attached garage, this reduces your necessary heated air volume significantly.

I could see a great big stove up on the former altar platform.

I'm thinking big TV and a home theater.

 

[heat seeker]

You realtor looking into the zoning isn't a bad idea, but he/she is hardly impartial. I'd get a lawyer to look into it, preferably the one you'll use at the potential closing.

 

[Jack Straw]

Do you have property taxes there? My concern here in NY would be the taxes and since it was a church there maybe no way in telling that. If they go by the square footage it could get expensive.

 

[project240]

Lots of older churches in my area are being converted and heating is a major headache. It looks like you may have some advantages though with more modern construction. It looks like you have a hydronic baseboard set up and therefore a boiler with an indirect HWH. Check the plumbing to see if it is zoned, and figure on doing so or modifying it. I would separately insulate and zone each living space or at least separate the main room from the rest. It looks like there may be a slab under the putting green, and if so, you could pour a gypcrete radiant floor. If not, think about ceiling or wall radiant. The baseboard is mostly convective, So the warm air will rise.

Ehouse

I like the fact that it is HWH, as we could probably install an outdoor wood boiler to supply the heat. This would tie in nicely would in floor heating. Definitely something to consider.

 

[project240]

Do you have property taxes there? My concern here in NY would be the taxes and since it was a church there maybe no way in telling that. If they go by the square footage it could get expensive.

The taxes are a little more than triple other SFH in the same price range as this property currently is, but closer to on par with other properties of the same sqft/land that are selling for triple the asking price on this one.

 

[project240]

Well, we got a bunch of information back from our realtor as well as a ton of pictures and not much of it was good.

We found out that subdivision is possible, however due to the layout of the land and current building placements, really doesn't make any sense. We also found out that the current boiler is broken and needs replacing as well as a lot of the electrical looks questionable (although she wasn't able to confirm anything because the power has been shut off for over a year). Also, from the pictures it looked as though all of the fascia, decks, all of the outdoor wood is rotten or close to it.

I still think it would be an awesome project to undertake, however, knowing what we know now, the costs would be much to high to make it worthwhile. I appreciate all of the comments from everyone! Working on brewing up another idea as we speak.......

 

[EatenByLimestone]

If I were to try to tackle something like this I'd probably want to add a ceiling to the main room and create a loft for the master bedroom, kids rooms, etc. It's an interesting idea for a house.

Matt