Tracking down information on old houses

Joined
Oct 20, 2005
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Scruffy City
Does anyone have any tips on tracking down information on older (70s) homes.

Finding a set of plans would be really really nice.

Some old pictures would be neat.

I do know who the builder was (appears to be out of business - No real surprise - Name is fairly common) the address is now an (ironically) oil change place.

I also have found a bill from one of the suppliers (Modern Supply) and found a lumber company written on the back of some paneling (Schubert Lumber Company) Both of these appear to still be in business but at different addresses and I do not know that that particular information does me any good.

Some of this is for curiosity sake, but an in the middle of a fairly expensive remodel and some it would be helpful to know what is supposed to be places and what has been messed with... some of what has been messed with is obvious (soft roll copper pipe plumping repair for instance) but you never know.

If it was a Ford I would order a Marti Report ...
 
I would think your town hall that would have issued a building permit, may be the only place that info would be found. That, or a really old neighbor who had their house built around the same time. I know the first 4 houses on our block look almost the same. so it's a easy bet they were built by the same company back in the 1945 range. But most likely alot of the tech info was lost, thrown out, or destroyed thru out the years.,,
 
Yeah, it would be your local town or county government, which there are thousands in the US so any answer here may not help much.

Example on Long Island (I also did real estate there) going to the town website you could easily look up the tax records, attached to the tax records were the ownership records, purchase and sale prices, also attached in the tabs were building permits (or lack of) all details of the building including surveys where not only the foundation on the house/building but any extensions on the buildings, if it wasnt there, then it wasnt properly permitted.
I would think most town/county governments have moved into the digital age by now but have no idea on other parts of the country on how extensive the information would be. On Long Island it was pretty impressive how they digitized everything as in the general areas where I worked most homes were built in the 1950's. Every home has a photo but its current but maybe with the information you can search and find digitized print photos from other sources.

Then again, it is also has one of the highest property taxes in the nation so at least you get a little something for your money in this sense.
 
Check for local Facebook groups. You may get lucky and find someone who grew up in or near the house.

I found a local FB group and managed to find a bunch of people who grew up on the street and one who grew up in the house. Learned quite a bit about my disaster house
 
Many of the permit records have been scanned by cities, counties and historical societies. It was easy for me.
 
There is some information online some basic footprints approved outbuildings and such. Even some subdivision layouts... Guess i better go down to the county office and see if there is a historical society.
 
If the plans aren’t in the house somewhere, odds are the county won’t have something that detailed from 40+ years ago. Usually just a sketch of the structure and maybe any building permits.
 
There is some information online some basic footprints approved outbuildings and such. Even some subdivision layouts... Guess i better go down to the county office and see if there is a historical society.
Seems like a house built in the 70s would be a bit new for a historical society. I got lucky and found the blueprints for the 1963 house we had in Pa stashed in the floor joists and it wasn't built to plan.
 
I'm told that a lot of these houses were built right around / because of the worlds fair here. This particular one seems fairly unique in the area a great many of them are what is called here a "split entry" - it is basically a two story with the bottom half 50% underground and the front door halfway between the floors - there were apparently SUPER popular. Some of them still have very 70's features like triangular windows or more accurately keystone windows i guess most of my windows are newer so i kinda wonder did it ever have crazy 70's windows or anything...

This house is a basement ranch i guess i will basically have been far enough into it to know whats where before this is over but it would be interesting to know how it looked was finished and laid out when built. There was a room in the basement at some point that i figured out when i pulled up the VERY old carpet down there and found the outline on the concrete.

Be interesting to see what the front looked like prior to the vinyl trim, i found brown t111 siding in the back so i wonder if thats whats under the front too.

Anyway back to ripping out early 80s Kitchen and undoing shoddy add on wiring....

Mrs Duckryder would likely have none of it, but i could probably be talked into taking it back straight into the 70s.... outside at least...
 
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