The bathroom from Fight Club, and 107 pages of doom

We were in the process of buying a very old neglected house. We knew it was going to be an epic project to undertake, but when the surveyor spent two full days documenting the problems and then phoned us, well, that’s not normal. Usually, you just get a vague report in the post.

She said, “I don’t normally phone clients, but I want to talk to you before you buy this house. It has a stunning view, and it's a bargain, but it’s a bargain for a reason. Hundreds of people have viewed it, no one wants it. I hope you have a strong marriage…this is the kind of house that breaks people. Think very hard before you commit.”

I didn’t know what to say. Brad and I looked at each other…

Brad smiled. I did not.

She went through the main problems with the house. It took her half an hour. At the end I asked her, “You have seen hundreds of old houses, if you were in our shoes, would you buy it?”

She paused for a long time. “Me? No. I would walk away. But when you look out the window, I get it. Just make sure you can handle the risk. This house has the potential to take over your life. Do you have kids?”. Yes... Four of them. She went very quiet.

The survey was 107 pages of doom. We bought it anyway. Because of this view:

We just had to…

Moving in was an epic challenge. There were hundreds of hours of work to do before we could even think about moving in with the kids. You know when people say “the house has good bones...”? That's just another way of saying it’s a wreck.

We asked everyone we knew to help, 66 people came over the first two weekends. We bought a lot of pizza and beer, and the kindness of friends was overwhelming. Here are some pizza eating heroes, a fake chandelier and horrible yellow walls.

The yellow walls had to go!

On weekend two, I was standing in one of the ancient bathrooms. The survey had mentioned significant damp in this room, but the source of the problem was unclear.

The entire room was tiled floor-to-ceiling in 80s tiles. What a brave and fearless decade that was for bathrooms… It was awful, but liveable. Just as I was saying “Well, this room will be okay for a while,” I leaned on the tiled wall.

The tile sank into the plaster.

I poked it, and it sank further. I pulled at another, and three fell off at once. I pulled at the tiles with my hands, and they came dropping off the walls with ease—taking chunks of wet wall with them. Rot everywhere.

This is what I found:

Beautiful…

I ripped off the panel and found the culprit, a pool of water. The bath waste pipe hadn't been fitted properly and must have been leaking, undetected, for years. The plasterboard, the studs, and the old stone walls were saturated with water up to chest height.

The leak was tiny. The damage was devastating. And it was all covered up with shiny tiles.

It took a full year for those walls to dry out. Little things become big things if you ignore them.

This happens with groups of people too. We’ve all been in teams where we know something isn't right, but we don't know what it is. Something is "off." People are snappy, things get uncomfortable, and you can’t put your finger on the why. Productivity stalls, projects slow down, and performance drops.

You try to boost things with some encouragement, a team day, some pizza, but nothing really changes. Then, something triggers it, and it all comes out.

Maybe it's a painful falling out between people who have always got along. Maybe it’s a team-building day that turns into a disaster. Or maybe your star players vote with their feet and leave unexpectedly. Someone usually breaks first, then the team falls like dominoes.

It's almost always a culture leak building up under the surface, unchecked. A collection of small issues that trickle away until a tile pops off the wall.

Investing in your culture will pay for itself ten times over. Don't wait for the tiles to fall off.

(I still haven't refitted the bathroom. It still looks like the bathroom from Fight Club)