Need guidance on what to do with this catastrophe of a pool! (Pics not for the faint of heart)

[marneman]

Background: My wife's grandfather (who she wasn't close to) passed away about a month ago and we've been busy trying to settle his affairs/estate. In the backyard of his home, he had a pool built at one point. According to what I can see in historical satellite photos, it looks like the pool appears sometime in the late 80s or early 90s. Hard to tell with some of those old sat photos, as they are super-grainy. But it's old. The house itself is a simple ranch home, in a busy neighborhood with not a lot of pools in other homes. The house itself is not in the best of shape either.

As you can see from the attached photos, it has been neglected for years. At one point, it looks like he rigged up some sort of homemade pool cover (smh) using some wooden struts that he made. That caved in years ago. So now, we have a frog army and other critters to deal with.

The debris at the bottom of the pool is about 3-5 inches deep on the shallow end, perhaps 12-18 inches on the deep end. And when I say "debris", I mean absolute swamp sludge. Don't let the layer of leaves on top fool you. This stuff is thick (see closeup photos). Not quite Georgia-clay thick, but still pretty thick. My original plan was to just use a pitchfork/rake combo to empty it out, or perhaps use a tarp inside the pool, load it up with the "relatively-dry leaves", and hoist it up a load at a time. But once I saw the sludge underneath, those ideas went into the trashcan.

As you can see in the photos, the liner is shot. The pool pump can be seen in the background of the first pic, and it is ancient, and would probably need to be replaced completely.

Soooo. What to do? I have a zillion questions, and answers to none of them of course lol

• Is this pool even salvageable to the point where it could help sell the home?
• Obviously, getting the debris out would be a first step before any talk of replacing the liner, pump, etc.
• What kind of investment range might it take to at least empty it and leave it up to the next owner?
• Would a waste/trash pump be a solution to clean the bottom (not sure, because it is so thick). After removing larger debris, of course.
• Would it be better to just fill it in with fill dirt and make a garden out of it?
• Curious to know what some more experienced folks here might do if they were in this type of situation.

Any guidance, thoughts, or ideas would be incredibly helpful!

Thanks in advance!

 

[jeffchap]

A pool in good shape typically won't help to sell a home. Many people just don't want to deal with a pool and won't even look at a house that has one.

So if your intent is to sell this property, considering the shape that pool is in, I think your best bet is to probably fill it in.

 

[Newdude]

If you are going to fill it in, I'd leave it open to attract more buyers, offering to fill it in if they don't want the project.

 

[Bill1974]

If your plan is to sell the home ASAP, I would leave it as it and give the buyer the option to have you fill it in or not, or leave it as it.

Get some quotes on what it would cost to demo and fill the pool. Probably would also demo the concrete around the pool too. A graded and seeded backyard would probably be an easier sell. Not sure what would get you the most $$$ in the end.

Rehabbing it likely going to be the most expensive, unless you get lucky and it just needs a liner and new equipment and have a buyer who wants a pool. If your ambitious, pressure test the lines and check to see if the power to the equipment is useable. If the lines are bad your in for a quite a bit to fix things and make it look sellable.

 

[HeyEng]

If your plan is to sell the home ASAP, I would leave it as it and give the buyer the option to have you fill it in or not, or leave it as it.

Get some quotes on what it would cost to demo and fill the pool. Probably would also demo the concrete around the pool too. A graded and seeded backyard would probably be an easier sell. Not sure what would get you the most $$$ in the end.

Rehabbing it likely going to be the most expensive, unless you get lucky and it just needs a liner and new equipment and have a buyer who wants a pool. If your ambitious, pressure test the lines and check to see if the power to the equipment is useable. If the lines are bad your in for a quite a bit to fix things and make it look sellable.

This. Too much time and effort to get the pool back in usable shape...unless you are planning a competed gut/redo of the house as well, then *maybe*. Personally, if the house is in as bad a shape as the pool, I would be selling it AS-IS.

 

[duraleigh]

Careful on your demo costs. Over the years, I have seen renovation costs and fill-in costs pretty close to equal. If you DIY, renovation will be cheaper most always. Assuming the shell underneath isn't hopelessly cracked, I would give a WAG and say $12-15k to renovate.

Not sure about fill in costs but most municipalities have some restrictions that can make it quite costly.

 

[borjis]

Lol I know the home I own/live in now sat with no offers because the pool was in similar shape, except there was no debris. I was so excited to get it and rehab. But that's very rare in a buyer.

 

[Lanzz]

I am going to be the contrarian here - here in the Southeast, you may not only get a bit more money for a house with a pool, it sells a lot faster. The emphasis on backyard living turned the "pool as a negative" thinking on it's ear from a real estate perspective. If you could renovate that pool for $12K, would selling it faster be of value? We just sold my mother's house - had to put $20K into it for floors, carpets, paint and a few other things to make it sellable as anything other than a teardown. If you assume the same in your situation, could you do a quick assessment of what it would take to renovate or fill in and handle the pool items in parallel so you are ready for a quick sale?

 

[Jaffles]

Time, money, and skills. How much do you have?
In the current eb and flow of labour and supply chains, unless you are a capable flipper and have decent relationships, and its in a great location of a decent neighbourhood, I'd just sell a run down house with run down pool.

Yes you can chase top dollar but given this came from left field, selling for good profit and little effort would be a whole lot faster and less disruptive to your life.

Alternatively would bulldozing the whole show and building something be more cost effective or practical?

 

[HeyEng]

I am going to be the contrarian here - here in the Southeast, you may not only get a bit more money for a house with a pool, it sells a lot faster. The emphasis on backyard living turned the "pool as a negative" thinking on it's ear from a real estate perspective. If you could renovate that pool for $12K, would selling it faster be of value? We just sold my mother's house - had to put $20K into it for floors, carpets, paint and a few other things to make it sellable as anything other than a teardown. If you assume the same in your situation, could you do a quick assessment of what it would take to renovate or fill in and handle the pool items in parallel so you are ready for a quick sale?

I would add that Charlotte NC is quite different that Macon, GA when it comes to the RE market. -Georgia Native

 

[darkrider]

Both Lanzz and HeyEng make good points. In the Atlanta burbs, it would likely be worth a reno as well, but the more rural you get, the less likely you'd get your money out of it.

I'd be inclined to at least clean it out and remove the liner before making a decision. At that point, you'll be able to get accurate demo and restoration quotes, and depending on market do either or even sell "as is."

 

[marneman]

Some great points have been brought up here. Thanks a ton! I need to digest all of this.

Quick question, though - does anyone know if a waste/trash pump would be helpful in removing the sludge from the bottom (after the larger debris is removed by hand, of course)?

 

[Newdude]

It would absolutely remove the fluid but it looks like it's mostly mud.

See how it goes once you get the solids out.

 

[YippeeSkippy]

I would think a pool would be a plus in Macon......?

 

[marneman]

I would think a pool would be a plus in Macon......?

Yes, it definitely gets hot in Macon. However, the pool is a bit of an oddity in this particular neighborhood. At the price points for homes there, installing a new pool would be 10-20% of the cost of the house. My thinking is that pool maintenance costs for most families at this price point would be quite a burden.

 

[Newdude]

installing a new pool would be 10-20% of the cost of the house

That's the same everywhere. With a fancier house you build a fancier pool and it keeps a similar ratio.

But I know what you mean.

 

[darkrider]

The pumping idea has some merit, even with mud. If you shovel the big debris out by hand, and then add a decent amount of water to the mud mix and keep it stirred, you can likely suspend a fairly significant portion of dirt/mud in a liquid solution to pump out. It would save your back anyway!

 

[marneman]

The pumping idea has some merit, even with mud. If you shovel the big debris out by hand, and then add a decent amount of water to the mud mix and keep it stirred, you can likely suspend a fairly significant portion of dirt/mud in a liquid solution to pump out. It would save your back anyway!

Yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking as well. Rent a 3" trash pump from Home Depot or somewhere, clear the big stuff out by hand, and get down in there with the pump hose and a garden hose and start working the muck out.

 

[darkrider]

Yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking as well. Rent a 3" trash pump from Home Depot or somewhere, clear the big stuff out by hand, and get down in there with the pump hose and a garden hose and start working the muck out.

Even with a new build, I was surprised how much nasty accumulated in the deep end between shotcrete and plaster/pebble.! The crew who did the cleanout before plaster used a similar technique with a simple sump pump , constantly stirring and pushing to the pump and adding fresh water from a hose. In the end, besides some light staining from our Georgia clay, it was very clean. I imagine the 3" pump will work very well!

 

[Mcow]

Ok so this sounds like purely an economic exercise since you plan to sell the house not live in it. Form a perspective of a house flipper if this was my property I was trying to sell I would look at a few things. I would run comps of house with and without pools in the area and try and determine how much of a return in price and days on market a pool adds. With that info I would then get a couple bids to have the pool renovated. I would use the highest bid for this exercise (even though I may use the lower bid to actually do the work). Then I would get estimates to fill it in. If I could expect a 20-30% return renovating the pool or if it drastically reduced the days on market then I would proceed. Obviously it would cost money to have it demoed but that would be a hard cost I would assume I had to do regardless. You may ask if the cost to fill it in is close to the cost of renovating wouldn't you just renovate? Barring any kind of crazy city requirements/permits if it was close to the same cost and did not meet my return qualifications I would choose to fill it in. The main reason is demo would be pretty straight forward while renovating could lead to all kinds of surprise cost along the way. Happens all the time flipping houses you think you only need to upgrade a panel and end up re-wiring an entire house or removing cast iron sewage pipes, etc.. The only exception to all this is if a pool is expected in the neighborhood/area. If every other house listed has a pool it would be much more of a driving force to go ahead and renovate even if the return is not great.

Another thing just to throw out there if the rest of the house is in bad shape you may consider trying to sell it to an investor vs. listing it on MLS. You can literally take a few pics and put it on Facebook Market Place or Craigslist saying "Off market house for sale". You will obviously not get full market value for the house because the investor needs to make a profit but you also do not pay Realtor commissions and you may find you will end up netting about the same and it would be a much faster transaction since they will be paying cash. You can even just try this first to see what you can get then list it later if it does not workout like you need it to.