A system programmer does new things: Renovating a cabin

Week 1

I've just gone through the ups and downs you experience when you buy some property which you know will need a lot of work, and everyone else is an expert. I've brought friends, neighbors and semi-professionals to look at the cabin before we bid on it. They all thought the cabin had potential and told me to go ahead. That brought me up.

So I bought it. 

Then I met the new cabin neighbors. They had no faith in the cabins potential. They were sure there was nothing to do but to demolish the whole thing and build anew. They were sure there was a heap of drilling beetles and molds. That brought me down. 

So I got me a professional. 

He just happens to also be a previous neighbor, so I kind of trust him more than an unknown professional. He went through the cabin and looked at everything. And he told me: "This does not look half bad. I've fixed worse places than this before". That brought me up. 

Then we had to start planning. 

What to do first? Where to put what? When to do what? 

The cabins only water supply came from a well outside. It did not have a toilet (or well, it did, but the toilet was a big bucket with a toilet seat on it, placed under the terrace). There is a hole in the roof and the stones on the roof is to heavy, so the roof has started to sag in the middle. The cladding and the windows are probably from the time it was built (1945). There's no isolation and the power should be there but it is not. 

So we started with the toilet. 

We have not received the key to the cabin yet, but we have bought a toilet. After going around the cabin at least 10 times to figure out where to put a five-chamber-privy, we gave up and bought ourselves an incineration toilet. This toilet only needs power (which we don't have just yet) and ventilation. So we can put it anywhere in the cabin. For now, we agree on putting the kids on the loft, and use the second bedrom as a toilet. 

I almost forgot. Its only 40 m2. Even a software programmer can fix 40 m2? Right?