Hi Neal, i'm in the house now and have pulled off the ceiling tiles and
there is only 1/4" x 2" runners then the attic floor which is about 1' and completely covered.
So there the headers and joists are behind that. Which i guess is not possible to see what has gone on.
Nothing really seems all that wrong in the house.
There is a 70x45" bay window and above i see some the wood is pushing inward a bit, above is the attic room with the floor tilting as you saw before in the picture..
The area around the a stair case is the same, nothing to see, except runners. The stair case is in the middle of the house above the main support beams of the house in the basement.
It seems to be the house is sagging live V on the side, a little bit. I'm thinking the main thing to do is support the basement with footers. I think this is the only structural issue. That at the time in 1947 it just wasn't build with 2012 in mind.
I'm thinking now maybe the inspector i hired was just 'earning' is his keep, which he did do because he got me so feaked out that they lowered the price. I wonder now if it is really not so much of big deal afterall.
Why worry about the stair case if there is no sagging? It looks supported well enough.
Basically the only thing wrong here is that the attic bedroom floor is tilted a bit and kitchen floor is not tilted but wonky in a fee places.
The supporting wall that i'm think of taking down does not seem to have adequate support in the basement. So i suspect that is the apex of the problem. What i can tell there is no way check anything the attic floor/ main floor ceiling unless complete excavating. But what would the point?