The house at 1247 Frankford Avenue in Fishtown had been empty for eleven years when Tom and Delilah Reyes bought it in March 2024. The previous owner — an elderly man who had lived there since the 1960s — had died without a will, and the estate had spent a decade in probate while the house sat vacant, accumulating L&I violations, a collapsed section of rear wall, and the particular kind of deterioration that happens to row homes when no one is watching.
Tom is a carpenter. Delilah is a plumber. They had been looking for a project for three years and had lost four other houses in bidding situations before they found this one — a shell, technically, in a neighborhood where shells were increasingly hard to find at a price that made the math work.
They bought it for $115,000. Their renovation budget was $180,000. Their timeline was eighteen months.
This is the first installment of the Renovation Diary — a running account of what it actually takes to bring a Fishtown row home shell back to life, told in real time as it happens.
Day One: The Assessment
The house is a standard Fishtown two-story row: 14 feet wide, built circa 1905, with a rear addition — probably added in the 1940s — that had partially collapsed. The front facade is intact: red brick, marble sill, wood cornice that needs work but is structurally sound. The interior is gutted to the studs from a prior attempted renovation that apparently ran out of money around 2015.
Tom’s assessment, standing in the empty first floor on the first afternoon: the bones are better than expected. The original floor joists are Douglas fir — standard for the era — and mostly sound, with some damage at the rear where water infiltration from the collapsed addition had reached the framing. The party wall on the north side is intact and structurally stable. The stair is original and salvageable.
“The previous renovation crew did us a favor,” Tom says, running his hand along an exposed joist. “They stripped all the bad stuff out. The plaster, the old wiring, the dropped ceiling. All the work I would have had to do anyway, they did. They just never got to the part where you put it back together.”
The Rear Addition: Demolish or Save?
The collapsed section of the rear addition is the first major decision. Option one: shore up the remaining structure, rebuild the collapsed section, and integrate the addition into the renovation. Option two: demolish the entire addition, pour a new slab, and build a new rear extension from scratch.
Delilah’s argument for demolition: “The addition framing is non-standard — whoever built it in the 1940s used undersized lumber and no permit. If we try to save it, we are building on a bad foundation, literally. Tear it down and do it right.”
Tom’s argument for saving: “Demo costs money. A new slab costs money. New framing costs money. The existing footprint is what we need — we just need to fix what’s broken.”
After two days of deliberation and a consultation with their structural engineer, they decide to demolish. The math, once the engineer’s remediation requirements for the existing structure are factored in, makes it cheaper to start fresh. Demolition is scheduled for the following week.
The Permit Process
Their contractor — a South Philadelphia-based general contractor who has done seventeen Fishtown row renovations — filed for permits in January, before the closing. The zoning permit came through in three weeks. The building permit is still pending at week four.
“This is normal,” the contractor says, with the particular equanimity of someone who has done this seventeen times. “Six to eight weeks for a building permit in Philadelphia if you have everything in order. More if you don’t.”
Delilah is less equanimous. She has calculated that every week of permit delay costs approximately $1,400 in carrying costs — mortgage, taxes, insurance — on a house that cannot yet be worked on. “We knew this going in,” she says. “It still doesn’t feel good.”
What Comes Next
The permit is expected to clear within two weeks. Once it does, demolition of the rear addition begins, followed by framing of the new rear extension, rough plumbing (Delilah is doing this herself, which is a significant budget saving), rough electrical, and then the long process of closing up the walls and starting on finishes.
Tom has a spreadsheet that tracks 247 line items in the budget. He updates it every Sunday night. “By the time we are done,” he says, “I will know more about this house than anyone who has ever lived in it.”
We will be following along. Next installment: demo day, and what was found in the walls.