50s: Starting with a storage ring

Chapter 574 The Veteran Craftsman
Now that the Chen brothers, the owners of the two courtyard houses, are going abroad together, they will naturally not keep the houses. They will need to rebuild their property and will have many expenses.

However, in people's minds nowadays, courtyard houses are not considered good properties; wealthy people are unwilling to buy them, and those without money cannot afford them.

Although the price of courtyard houses has been rising in recent years, most of them are in high demand but not in demand, and are just hype.

For example, the two courtyards owned by the Chen brothers are like this. They are asking for 3 yuan per courtyard, and there are quite a few people who inquire about them, but no one really wants to buy them.

Six months have passed, and the Chen brothers and their family have completed the procedures for going abroad, but the house still cannot be sold, which makes them very anxious.

Now, another buyer has finally come to their door, and the two brothers are very enthusiastic.

Sun Zhiwei arrived on a bicycle, wearing only an ordinary military uniform, but the Chen brothers did not dare to underestimate him at all.

The experience of selling houses over the past six months was unbearable to recall, but it also broadened their horizons considerably. Nowadays, you really can't tell a lot about wealthy people just by looking at them.

Just like an old man they hosted half a year ago, who was dressed in tattered clothes but knew everything about the house like the back of his hand.

Many stories related to these two houses were unknown even to the two brothers themselves, yet the other knew them perfectly well, as if they had experienced them firsthand.

Later, because he was dissatisfied with the house, the old man left.

But a month later, the two brothers heard that the old man had spent 5 yuan to buy a five-courtyard mansion on Xishiku Street.

Five courtyards! Even the Prince Gong's Mansion only has five courtyards. Compared to that, their two courtyards are just ordinary residences.

Sun Zhiwei was willing to come and look at these two houses, so he must have done his research first.

These two houses are actually incomplete. They were originally the main part of a five-courtyard house, but the two side courtyards were demolished years ago and have since been used to build other people's courtyards.

What he valued was the layout of the two courtyards; unlike a typical three-courtyard siheyuan, the front and back courtyards were quite small.

The front and back courtyards of these two three-courtyard houses have the same layout as the central courtyard, both being large courtyards with side rooms on the left and right.

Originally, there was a small courtyard in front of the current front yard, which was the front yard of the complete siheyuan (traditional courtyard house) back then. Now that place has been demolished and turned into the main street of Fuyou Street.

If Sun Zhiwei knew about what happened to the old man a few months ago, he would understand why the old man didn't choose those two courtyards.

Because it is incomplete, most elderly people buy courtyard houses for the sake of a memento.

For example, he may have lived in this courtyard when he was a child, and now that he is old, he wants to return to his roots and spend the rest of his life in the original old courtyard.

However, these two courtyards were demolished in pieces, which saddened the elderly, making them unwilling to go near them.

After Sun Zhiwei arrived, he toured the entire courtyard with the two brothers, thoroughly examining every detail inside and out. He then decided to buy the property.

From the brothers' conversation, he already knew that the two men had no idea about the history of the two courtyards.

Sun Zhiwei, however, was different. He learned from the materials he found at the Beiping Library that this place was originally the old residence of a noble family during the Ming Dynasty.

Over the centuries, it has changed hands, been expanded, and been divided several times, and its history has gradually been lost, which is why no one knows the origin of this courtyard house.

To further corroborate the credibility of the information Sun Zhiwei found, he discovered, through the unfolded space, that there was actually a secret room underground in the last courtyard of the right-hand courtyard. Based on his observations, the secret room hadn't been entered for many years, as a thick layer of dust had accumulated on the ground.

The contents of the rows of decaying boxes in the secret room did not interest him.

Because he could see that it was mostly filled with rotten rice, flour, cloth, and armor. The only thing that could be considered money was probably a pile of paper in one of the boxes.

He could vaguely make out the words "precious paper" on those rotten papers.

These things are useless to him, but they are from hundreds of years ago, so the museum might be interested. We can call them over to take a look.

After communicating with the two Chen brothers, they agreed to let Sun Zhiwei buy the two courtyards in US dollars.

It wasn't that Sun Zhiwei didn't want to use his family's savings to pay the bill; the main problem was that his and Tong Jiajia's total savings weren't enough to buy both houses at the same time.

In addition, since the two Chen brothers were going abroad anyway, and they would be ripped off by the intermediary if they exchanged their own dollars, it would be better to give the discount to Sun Zhiwei.

A week later, the transaction was finally completed, and the two Chen brothers moved out that same day.

After obtaining the property certificate, Sun Zhiwei went to find Master Lu, the builder of Dashizuo Hutong who had renovated his courtyard years ago.

Master Lu still lives in the same small courtyard. When Sun Zhiwei visited, his house was deserted, with only Master Lu at home.

When Master Lu met Sun Zhiwei, he still vaguely remembered him.

Of all the projects he had undertaken in his life, Sun Zhiwei's courtyard was the most special, especially its long, narrow corridor.

Back then, Sun Zhiwei found him to do the project through Aunt Liang from the neighborhood. He dared not be negligent and naturally used all his skills to get the job done.

He put a lot of thought into waterproofing the fishpond, and to ensure the effectiveness, he even secretly paid extra to use the anti-seepage technique passed down from his ancestors, which was used to build mausoleums for the royal family.

The outcome was naturally good. Later, Director Liang was promoted one after another and stayed in this area, so he always protected their family and gave them a lot of help.

He is now retired and living at home, but his sons have all moved out, and his apprentices are all pursuing their own careers and don't come around very often.

His wife passed away a few years ago, leaving him alone to look after the old house. Only on weekends do his grandchildren occasionally come to visit him.

Master Lu has passed on most of his engineering skills to his three sons and two apprentices, and now the apprentices and sons are all doing their own thing.

However, the old-fashioned craftsmen always leave behind some of their true skills to pass on before they die. He also had a few unique skills that his apprentices couldn't match.

Sun Zhiwei also knew that if he wanted to modernize the courtyard house without destroying its ancient style, he needed a master craftsman like Master Lu who was very proficient in ancient architecture. He had more confidence in Master Lu's skills.

Furthermore, seeing his miserable old age, Sun Zhiwei felt some pity for him and decided to contract the construction of both three-courtyard houses to Master Lu.

Master Lu was a shrewd man when he was young, and he naturally saw Sun Zhiwei's good intentions. After thanking him sincerely, he accepted the big project.

He also wanted to prove to his children and grandchildren that he was just old, but not useless.

(End of this chapter)