Ron and Jutta Spanke spent the last three weeks repainting and furnishing their dream vacation home on Anna Maria Island in Manatee County, Fla.
But they weren’t sitting in front of their new 65-inch television or looking outside at the even-better view of Bradenton Beach. No, on Saturday afternoon they were sitting across from each other at a McDonald’s in Valdosta, using a plastic knife to spread a packet of butter on some pancakes.
“I’m expecting the roof to be ripped off,” said Ron Spanke, a retired telecommunications engineer. “Good chance the walls will get knocked out and the belongings washed out in the street.”
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They bought the condo, which has a floor about 3 feet above a regular high tide, in May for half a million dollars.
In the past weeks, Spanke estimates that he and his wife — a part-time teacher — have put nearly $20,000 more into it. They were going to leave the place in perfect condition, with hopes of renting it out when they weren’t there, but Irma has ruined all that.
After positioning sandbags and lifting items off the floor, they left Florida at 4:15 p.m. Friday. Along the way, Jutta Spanke said she probably called 15 hotels before finally finding one. After maneuvering bad traffic north of Tampa, they arrived at 2:15 a.m.
The couple plans to keep heading home to Wheaton, Ill., only to have to head back to assess the damage, some of which isn’t insured. Because they’d bought the home so recently, they didn’t have the paperwork to get storm surge and flood insurance.
“We hadn’t gotten around to doing it,” Spanke said.
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