You?ll never stop improving the soil, but sometimes you can coast for a while and just tweak things a bit. An annual soil test will tell you where you?re headed. Be sure to write ORGANIC on your test request, as most labs will automatically give chemical farming info. Natural inputs come in organic and mineral forms, or a combination of the two. Organic Matter is basically unbroken-down compost and the manure. Both contain varying amounts of nitrogen, and both CAN contain various amounts of various minerals, esp phosphorus and potassium, but there's no guarantee as to levels, because the compost ingredients and the animal feed nutrient values vary all over the place. HUMUS is OM that has been completely broken down by soil microbes, and is the long-term source of nutrients. They are not one and the same. A volatile nutrient like nitrogen can be washed out, blown away, off-gassed due to plowing, or used by the crop. Any of these can reduce the amount of what you think you've got, even from week to week. Minerals come from the soil, from broken-down rock. Some of them are in the organic matter, but not everything your plants need; some just plain isn?t there and won?t be there unless you make a point of specifically adding it. The more crop residue you return to the soil, the more minerals it will retain. Your local soil and climate is going to affect what your soil contains and maintains. If you live in a warmish area with not much more than 25" of rain and a fair (but not excessive) amount of clay, your soil will hold more nutrients than a rainy place. If you live in a wet climate, quite a few nutrients will be flushed out of the root zone by the excessive rain. If you live in a hot place like SoCal, TX, AZ or FL, the heat cooks the OM out of the (usually) sandy soil, but you might retain more minerals. What do your soil test results look like from your unfertilized soil? That's a major clue as to what you're going to have to keep up (or suppress), so find a spot that hasn?t been fertilized or mineralized if you have never gotten a soil test. And your soil pH is going to influence how much of the various nutrients are going to be available to the plants. Just because it?s sitting there in the soil doesn?t mean the nutrients are available. Here in the PNW, soil tests show how the heavy rainfall leaches out nitrogen, potassium, calcium, magnesium and boron -- IOW, all the main important stuff. We either have to keep adding it, or grow fall cover crops that will bind up some/most of those minerals and hold it until the cover crop is incorporated in spring. Some things, like boron, have to be added continually. What levels are ideal? It depends on what you're growing, as different food plants need different amounts of nutrients. Corn is the big nutrient hog. "Jolj" gave a basic list above. If your soil is nutritionally balanced, you can plant things closer together. If it isn?t quite up to par, space them further apart than recommended so their roots can search for nutrients. Here is what I?ve been able to glean from various sources, so far. Please chime in, folks, if you think my figures are off. Also, different labs use different methods, and those methods may produce different results. It?s not advisable to skip around from lab to lab. Find one you like and stay with them. Nitrogen: 5% good organic matter should have an estimated nitrogen release of 100 lbs of nitrogen per acre (100 ppm). Is that enough for the crop you have in mind? If you have too much nitrogen due to an overload of compost, the nitrogen will drive some calcium out of the soil, and your crop yields will suffer. If you add a LOT of OM and you have disease or insect problems, something else is off, probably due to the excessive nitrogen levels. Too much of anything will almost always cause trouble, including drinking excessive amounts of water. Moderation is the key. Phosphorus: 30 to 60 ppm. How much is available depends on your soil pH ? the closer to 6.5, the better. Phosphorus: 120-200 ppm, but it has to be available, not just sitting there inert. Calcium and Magnesium: The total combination of calcium and magnesium should total 80%. Normal soil should be near 68% calcium + 12% magnesium. But if your soil is sandy, 60 + 20 would be better. A heavier clay soil, 70 + 10. Keep in mind that although lime contains calcium, you have to know your soil pH and your calcium/magnesium percentages to be able to choose the right calcium-based minerals to use. Sulfur: 20-25 ppm, up to 50 ppm for high-yielding crops like woody plants and pasture. Sodium: Some of the areas of the country tend toward excess, above 3%. Other parts of the U.S. go the other way, and a deficiency is often less than 0.5%. Micronutrients only make a difference when all of the above primary and secondary nutrients are balanced. Boron: 0.8 ? 1.5 ppm. This is the least stable of the elements, your crops need a steady supply, it can?t be reused. Boron is one of the few elements that can?t be built up, so if it isn?t naturally in your soil, you may have to add it every year, and maybe even through the growing season. Chlorine is chloride: it normally isn?t deficient, esp if your calcium level is good; but excesses (usually much over 250 ppm) are known, esp in compacted soils, or known saline soils, and it isn?t easy to deal with. Molybdenum: 0.01-10 ppm. Copper: 2-10 ppm, but 5-10 is best. Most soils are deficient, but once you get your level up to par, copper is stable enough to stay there for quite a while. Copper and Molybedenum work together, so test and treat for it together properly. Iron: 200+ ppm. Check for it in chalky, high-calcium soils, where it is most likely to be deficient. Excess iron isn?t a problem. Iron works with manganese and sulfur, so check levels for all three. Lime added within 3 years will affect soil tests. Manganese: 40-250 ppm, but best results in 80-125 ppm range. Zinc: 6-12 ppm, 10 is excellent. Once the levels are up to par, it is easy to keep it up on clay and humus. Too much nitrogen will tie up zinc. Suggestion: for more info, get hold of Neal Kinsey?s book Hands-On Agronomy, available in the library system. Sue

I don't think we've worried too much about resale, even as we've completed major kitchen and master bath remodels in the last 18 months. However, with the more permanent/expensive projects, we have looked to the long run, and have tried to make choices that we believe will be pleasing to us in the coming years. Hence, "classic" choices of cabinetry (white-painted maple, raised panel), while making bolder or riskier choices on items that are comparatively easier to replace (cork floors). In our master bath, we've ripped out the hated Jacuzzi tub (never used, waste of space) and gone with our heart and gotten the large walk-in shower, even though some experts would say you MUST have a bathtub. Our biggest statements have been paint colors. We choose for US, and both of us LOVE color. Chili pepper red dining room, bronze-green living room, deep coral family room, searing green kitchen, etc. Those colors have changed in the past, and will change again, but not to beige. Interestingly, in our prior home, we were a bit more cautious, knowing we would move. Nevertheless, it didn't stop us from painting the living room and dining room hunter green, wallpapering an accent wall in the kitchen, and painting all the moldings and trims to coordinate. Our realtor advised us to paint/neutralize before listing the house, but we asked him to give it a try "as is." Maybe we got lucky, but in a very flat mid-90s real estate market, where identical homes were languishing, ours sold in a matter of days to a young couple who liked our decor so much, they offered to buy our furniture as well. Serendipity, for sure, but our house stood out.

herbflavor, We bought the place because it was all that we could afford at the time without a mortgage, and the housing crisis of 2008 was still fresh on my mind and I absolutely did not want a mortgage, and still don't. We could have qualified for one but we didn't want one. Our next house will also be paid for in cash but it's going to be our "forever" home and we are projecting that its going to cost 200k. DH owns a business, and now I also own a business. Both our businesses do well. We are not rich. We are middle class. But we will not get a mortgage; we are very debt-averse. -------------------------- homechef59: "I'm going to continue with the wall extension for the refrigerator. You said the refrigerator would be too big and stick out. So, frame the wall with an L-shape into the dining room just far enough to make the refrigerator sit flush with the line of cabinets. Just trying to keep a lid on costs and get you some improvements." That is still moving a load-bearing wall, which costs $3k+, right? -------------------------- scone911: "Given your sketch, and based on instinct and experience, I wouldn't put any more money into this house. It's not worth the hassle, and I don't think you will get it back if there are mass market developers in the area who can undercut you every few years with a new subdivision that has all the bells and whistles. This house is already nickel and diming you, and that's really bad for your finances-- when you are young, you have a golden opportunity to start saving for retirement, so you have the power of compounding working for you. Throwing cash into a money pit house on speculation that it might be worth something someday, if everything breaks just right, is asking for trouble, IMO. Don't take that risk if you don't have to." We own it outright; there is no mortgage or lien or backtax; nothing. Free and clear. "I'd divide the land, if possible, and put a stick built or modular in the new section. Keep the old place as a rental if you can. At least the old house gives you somewhere to live while you build, and a modular can go up fast." We prefer to save up our cash towards our "forever" house instead. Also, we think at this time that what the property really has going for it is the land. If we divided it up it would lose a huge amount of its charm. The house itself has no charm at all; the land has charm. It has trees and wildlife and feels like you're in a forest; it's quite pleasant. "If you can get the land divided and ready to go in the next couple of months, you might (just possibly) be able to move into a new place by Christmas-- and get on with your life." No, because that would require getting a mortgage. We believe debt is something you do when things are more certain, and given the state of the economy and world affairs we are very far away from the kind of comfort level that would draw us to a mortgage. I suppose that wraps up this particular thread. I'll post a new one with a much more accurate to-scale sketch of the kitchen, dining and laundry floorplan so it can be hashed out better. Thanks again everyone! This was very insightful and educational.

Have you verified that a a separate studio is permitted in you town? Many towns do no allow it a two family dwelling in an area of single homes. I think if it works for you without worrying about recoup money spent, country to hgtv you very rarely get back all the money you sink into a remodel or addition, than it is a valuable change.