Install the new breaker box. It won't be a problem with not upgradeing the entire house wiring.
Install it in the proper place the first time. There are certain trestrictions on where and how a new panel can be installed.

Just what Joe said.

A service upgrade has nothing to do with the branch circuits in the house.

Complete re-wires are rare. Service upgrades are an every day thing.

An individual house is a wiring system that becomes yours after the power company drops off power to it. It starts with the service panel (aka "panel," "fuse box," or God knows what). Think of your service panel as a robotic card-dealer: it deals out the electric current, and stops it (ie, provides overcurrent protection) as needed, or required, by your feeder circuits and branch circuits. ( Heh heh, dont'cha just love Vegas?)

Do not go movin' the location of your service panel around - it's a real waste of effort. Planning any new installation, start at the last outlet box, and work your way back to the service panel. Inverse pyramid.

Now then, you expect to do this job without major re-wiring? You're a riot, Alice, a regular riot. House built in 1921, you'll most likely take the old system out and shoot it, period. Ain't nothing like starting from scratch. Quit fretting over where the new service is to be located, or re-located. You have work to do, my friend.

I concur with joed and petey. Put the new main panel in first, and get it in the right place. Otherwise you will have to repeat the same (major) expense and work to essentially do it all over again to get it in a new place.

In order to avoid moving all the branch circuit wiring at once, you may want to gut the old fuse box and use it as a splice box where you join each circuit of old wiring with a short run of new wire to the new main panel.

Or the old fuse box could be replaced with a new subpanel, but that would mean you have to go two different places to turn off circuits or reset breakers, so I would favor the splice box approach.

Okay, so... I have so many more questions now.

What I'm hearing is that it's okay to upgrade my service panel before I completely upgrade my wiring and that I should be sure to put this service panel where it will belong forever...

I think that using the "splice box approach" mentioned by billhart might be the way to go. Is the idea that as I rewire each room, I would slowly be emptying the old splice box of it's current wires and running the wires direct to the new service panel and eventually be eliminating the splice box?

And, so here's my other thing: the current fuse box is located by the back door in the kitchen. I have an eat-in kitchen with an awkward layout that I plan to remodel very, very last because I'm not really a cooking fanatic anyways and by then a lot of my house remodeling projects would be just about complete. But the location that I had hoped to move the service box to - the pantry closet - does not currently exist outside of my head (well, there is cupboards, sink and a window there right now) and won't exist for an extended period of time. The place where the current fuse box is, I want to create a little mudroom area, which means covering it up eventually.

But this is a two bedroom one bath 1,000 sq ft home with very few additional placement options...

My next thought is to install the new service panel in one of the bedroom walls that I will be using as an office. I'm not sure if this is a bad idea to install a service panel in the wall of a "bedroom"? I guess I'd like to add a closet around the location at a later date, but I hear that is frowned upon... is it only frowned upon if it is a clothes closet with things blocking the access or is this any closet in general?

Also, I hear that it is a bad idea to put a structured wire panel near the service panel, and this was the location I wanted to do that in too (again with the limited space here). Can anyone tell me WHY it is advised not to locate the two panels near each other and what the "code" is for where the structured wire panel should go in relation to the service panel? I guess I am looking for the minimum allowable distance between the two.

Code tells you that you need 30 inches wide (working space) and 36" in front (for 208/240 volts) for the electrical panel.

You can put the tele/data enclosure next to the service but it is not advisable because of the number of wires going in and out of each panel. Basically it would be a mess and increase your installation cost typically.

I am not an electrician so if anyone disagrees please let me know.

In term of replacing your service panel and moving it. You would also most likely have to replace the wiring from the meter to the panel unless your power company tells you that it ok for the new load.

I would suggest getting a new panel in the location that you want it to be and back feed the original panel. That way you dont waste the temporary wiring (except the 60A feeder) from original to the new and you have less downtime.

Forgive me if I left the impression that you gotta' do all this work at once; you don't, of course. Ain't looking at it, but if the wiring's original construction, vintage 1921, I doubt there'll be much to salvage. They don't build 'em like they used to, and when it comes to plumbing and wiring, it's a damn good thing they don't.

As to locating your service, think first in terms of unfinished, non-habitable space. Got a basement, or attached garage?

Lonesparky95 - I understood. It is my overall mission to update the electrical wiring amongst many other things, it is just my hope to do it piece by piece. The house used to have knob and tube wiring but that was all replaced at one point -- none of the knob and tube wiring tested as active in the home inspection but they left it mostly draped all over the attic. And it seems like they updated the fusebox when they updated the wiring so that it could handle the 60amps (I imagine that the house started out at 30amps).

I have an unfinished attic space with no insulation that I'm hoping to eventually use for ductwork, etc for a new HVAC system. Is it okay to install a service panel in the attic? It only has one of those drop down attic ladders in the kitchen, not dedicated attic stairs. Otherwise, this is a one story house with no basement, though it has an exposed crawlspace (pier and beams foundation). Basements are far from common in Texas. :)

Unrelated yet kind of related, since we are talking attics here -- the gas hot water heater is currently installed outside the house in a rather falling apart shack. I think I've recently seen in one of This Old House episodes that these could be installed in the attic (it was an observation of the pre-remodeled Austin bungalow -- not something they suggested doing). Would that also be an option someday in the distant future when I upgrade the hot water system? I guess in my ideal world, the one still rooted in the reality of limited space, I would either be able to install most of my unsightly utilities in either the attic or crawlspace, but I don't know what the feasibility of this really is...

Sorry, for some reason, instead of seeing "attached garage" I saw "attic". That's what I get for skimming. But I guess my question still stands, but I'm pretty certain the answer to installing the service panel in the attic (lots of space!), is a no.

There is a garage but it is detached and falling apart really badly.

Attic won't do. NEC requires a location readily accessible, not exposed to physical damage, not in vicinity of easily ignitable materials (that's why no clothes-closets), and very specifically not in a bathroom.

Surely the house has existing heat and hot-water. Is there no mechanical room? Perhaps unsightly in a bedroom/office, but legal. Hang something over it. Velvet art. Rebel flag.

It has no heating/cooling system, but the hot-water heater is in a little lean-too outside of the house that is rotting away. There is no utility room or even much in the way of current closet space either - that was why I was planning to eventually build out a kitchen pantry and had hoped to add the service panel there. :)

How about outside? Are you in a temperate part of Texas where an outside panel would be feasible?

I do have a screen porch off the kitchen that has the hookups to the washer/dryer setup there. I plan to move the washer/dryer inside at a later date, but I admit that I've not quite figured out exactly how I want to rework this whole kitchen/porch/pantry/mudroom area, so committing to putting the service panel somewhere in this area might be a bad idea until I have it all worked out in the design.

I'm not sure how you would define temperate? I live in San Antonio, Texas (south-central part of Texas). We have mild winters that rarely go below freezing but scorching summers that average around 95 degrees, and above 100 degrees aren't so rare. It's generally humid, but we aren't on the located on the coast so we don't get above average rainfalls. Usually we get more drought seasons than we get flood seasons.

What are the restrictions related to putting a service panel outside?

How about a small main panel outdoors next to the existing meter, and then run the existing panel as a subpanel from that.

When ready to start rewiring the rest of the house, install a full sized subpanel in desired new location.

This gets you the 200 A service you need for the insurance right away, while minimizing the decisions and modifications you have to make right now.

This seems to accomplish the goal of "Upgrading 60 amps to 200 amps without major rewiring?"

I like gblentz's suggestion. Nice and simple, and gets you the new panel right away plus minimal extra work invested in the old one you're slowly migrating away from anyway.

Note that you will need to separate the neutrals and grounds (if there are any grounds) in the fuse box, which would then be a subpanel. Or you could have BOTH boxes fed from the meter - that's usually only done with services over 200A, where (for example) two 200A panels are put on one 320A meter/service entrance. I wouldn't think you would need to do it this way, instead of the really simple 60A breaker in the new panel way, unless you were unable to separate the grounds in the old panel and your local inspector was really picky about that. (They might well let it slide, really depends on what town you're in.)

Hey, Lonesparky. A rebel flag? Is that code?

"Hey, Lonesparky. A rebel flag? Is that code?"

Not in NJ, it's not...