Article

2020-02-04 -Short Attention Span Theater-

We bought a crumbling French château - but restoring it was no fairytale

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Posted by Besoeker 2020-02-04 07:06|| || Front Page|| [6 views ] Top

#1 It would take a person with sizeable enthusiasm and energy to take on a restoration challenge like that. Not to mention the sizeable bank account. I figure a decentish restoration would run about 5 times the purchase price.

Posted by AlanC 2020-02-04 07:37|| 2020-02-04 07:37|| Front Page Top

#2 I've been watching it on television.

Here is a trailer piece.

Posted by Besoeker 2020-02-04 07:46|| 2020-02-04 07:46|| Front Page Top

#3 the perfect place to bring up their family, Arthur, three, and Dorothy, two. "They are now growing up in a place where if they play hide and seek, they may never find each other," Dick says.

... and thanks to the wild boar roaming around, little Arthur and Guinevere might get gored by one of Asterix's sangliers

Posted by Lex 2020-02-04 07:46|| 2020-02-04 07:46|| Front Page Top

#4 That's quite the 'contractor's special'. There's a house three spots / 150 feet away from mine, and they paid top dollar for a house they more or less had to nuke. It's taken them over a year (they're on the last stretch this & next month) and I bet they've spent at least $200K so far.

At least they don't have live bats to deal with!

Posted by Raj 2020-02-04 08:00|| 2020-02-04 08:00|| Front Page Top

#5 What a vanity project. Other than the family of four, which might together use as many as a dozen rooms, what use is the rest of it? Do they rent it out for period television shows and films? Provide space for weddings and company retreats? Have potluck weekends with 140 of their dearest friends, but only if they each bring a 12-roll package of toilet paper? And, most importantly, who is going to do the housekeeping and grounds work originally intended for a full inside and outside staff?

Posted by trailing wife 2020-02-04 08:30|| 2020-02-04 08:30|| Front Page Top

#6 = More material for their endless Reality TV Show life

Posted by Lex 2020-02-04 08:31|| 2020-02-04 08:31|| Front Page Top

#7 On PBS here. Interesting show. Rather half assed repair attempts but have to admire their enthusiasm.

Posted by Woodrow 2020-02-04 08:37|| 2020-02-04 08:37|| Front Page Top

#8 Ref #7: On PBS here. Interesting show. Rather half assed repair attempts but have to admire their enthusiasm.

Well after all, it is France.

Posted by Besoeker 2020-02-04 08:39|| 2020-02-04 08:39|| Front Page Top

#9 ...next California! (do I need to put a /sarc on that?)

Posted by Procopius2k 2020-02-04 09:32|| 2020-02-04 09:32|| Front Page Top

#10 I believe a château requires a set of servants.

Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-02-04 09:59|| 2020-02-04 09:59|| Front Page Top

#11 Mr. Wife estimates the work would take $20 - 50 million (all new electrical, plumbing, heating, roof, mold abatement, plaster/drywall...) He wants to know if the good lieutenant colonel brought home unreported funds from Iraq or something.

Posted by trailing wife 2020-02-04 11:13|| 2020-02-04 11:13|| Front Page Top

#12 ^ that's the order of magnitude I was thinking, TW.

I used to dream of doing this, too, but when I consulted people who'd actually renovated chateaux before they said forget it, it would be less expensive to build a new one.

So figure $400 per sq ft or maybe €4,000 per square meter: that's easily >$10 million for a typical castle.

Posted by Lex 2020-02-04 11:28|| 2020-02-04 11:28|| Front Page Top

#13 Priorities folks.

First you hire some men-at-arms, longbowmen, cavalry, go Crecy and fill the coffers and labor from the countryside.

Posted by swksvolFF 2020-02-04 11:45|| 2020-02-04 11:45|| Front Page Top

#14 And 'This Old House' proved Bob Villa could restore ANYTHING in 60 minutes; and these morons believed it...…
If they are looking for sympathy, it is in the dictionary between sh!t and syphilis.

Posted by USN, Ret. 2020-02-04 14:33|| 2020-02-04 14:33|| Front Page Top

#15 ...Any man with a mustache like that isn't going to be stopped.

Mike

Posted by Mike Kozlowski 2020-02-04 17:25|| 2020-02-04 17:25|| Front Page Top

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