When Gary Monson bought his north Everett home, it was the eyesore of the neighborhood: a flophouse with sagging porches, gaping holes and choking, snarled vegetation.
Now the two-story 1906 home evokes a country farmhouse feel with a welcoming wraparound front porch and an English side garden. The assessed value of the house has tripled and it’s now one of the cutest, tidiest homes on the block, thanks to more than a decade of sweat equity by Monson and his wife, Kathy.
The couple’s home, in the 2200 block of Rockefeller Avenue, was one of 49 Everett homes and businesses recognized this year with a Monte Cristo Award, given by the city to owners for their extensive efforts to keep their property attractive and well maintained.
The Monsons received a Rejuvenation and Transformation award, one of three categories. The other two are Pride of the Neighborhood and Neighborhood Friendly Business.
Monson, now 53, bought the house as a bachelor in 1990. His realtor couldn’t show him the entire house. “It was a drug house,” Monson said. “I could only see certain rooms at a time because of contraband, I assume.”
What Monson could see would have made all but the hardiest buyers balk. The former occupants had littered the house with beer cans and stained mattresses. In one room downstairs the floor had collapsed leaving a gaping hole. The front and back porches sagged dangerously. The house had an odd floor plan, with multiple doors leading into one room. “Dirty, dirty, dirty,” Monson said, shaking his head. The real estate assessor told Monson it was one of the five worst he had seen in his career.
Underneath years of filth, damage and neglect, the house retained some of the features that likely made it a charming home years earlier. A classic staircase with a wooden banister and fir floors remained as did some of the original millwork around windows and doors.
Monson, a carpenter, wasn’t afraid of a challenge and bought it for $70,000 because of its “initial affordability.”
“And I do stress ‘initial’ because it didn’t stay that way.”
He began remodeling the home immediately, putting in four hours of work after a full day at a construction job.
“Structural stability was paramount,” he said. So he had the home jacked up and fixed the foundation, floors and porches first. He stripped the inside of the house down to the studs and removed a rotting back stairwell. Later, he added new cedar siding and painted the home oatmeal with burgundy and hunter green trim.
Reasoning that the 2,000-square-foot home was too much space for one person, he decide to make the house a duplex. He added stacking bathrooms and a second kitchen, and took in a renter for a brief time. His decision to remodel the home into a duplex came before Monson fell for the “girl next door.”
A few months before Monson bought the home, Kathy, now 60 and a pediatric nurse at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, had bought the house next to it. At first, she didn’t realize she was living next to a reputed drug house, partly because the vegetation engulfed the home.
“I don’t think I could describe what color the house was,” she said. “There might not have been paint.”
Although the neighbors didn’t bother her, she was relieved when someone bought the house. She recalls seeing debris flying out of the windows as Monson cleaned out the house.
Her new neighbor showed her the inside of the house. “It was hard walking around. The house was completely trashed,” she said. “The kitchen was one of my vivid memories. The appliances – if you could call them that – were rusty and unclean. He actually sawed the (appliances) apart to get them out of the house.”
As the house began to take shape, their relationship blossomed and the two married in 1999. When Kathy Monson moved in, the house, although clean and sound, remained a bachelor pad with boat motor parts stored downstairs. The two decided to get serious about beautifying the house and garden. Both sides made concessions: Kathy Monson left her collection of cat collectibles behind and he disposed of the boat parts.
“It was a guy’s house and I brought a woman’s touch,” she said. The couple wanted to re-create the special, warm cozy feel of their grandparents’ homes. The home is furnished mainly with antiques.
They tackled the tangled yard together, first removing weeds and “bluebells from hell – they were everywhere, hundreds and hundreds of them,” Gary Monson said.
The Monsons added a planting bed along the front of the house filled with annuals and perennials and a pebbled patio in the back. A side garden now flourishes, obscured by a lattice fence covered with clematis and honeysuckle. The casual mixed garden incorporates whimsical pieces, such as an aging baby carriage and a plow.
“We’re real comfortable here,” she said. “It’s a warm place people like to visit.”
Reporter Debra Smith: 425-339-3197 or dsmith@ heraldnet.com.
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