This summer included lots of changes for Brett and I. Not only did we get married and honeymoon, but we also bought a house...the week of the wedding.
What led to all that craziness you ask? Well, our house shopping experience went a little something like this:
August 2013: Heather Davis, my sweet friend and Realtor/owner of the Heather Davis Team at WestEdge Realty helped me get pre-approved for an alternative loan to start looking for houses. My goal was to be out of the Loft by the renewal for my next lease. Plus, a super awesome tiny house that was just perfect for 1-2 people had just popped on the market.
September 2013: Little tiny dream house sold, shoot...regroup and renew my lease for the Loft.
January 2014: Heather showed Brett and I a tiny house that I thought was going to be perfect, but when we left I was surprised to hear Brett tell me that he would rather buy a house and spend more not to live in a project. Part of my refurbish spirit was crushed, but at the same time he was so right. We are really busy people, and we wanted to move into a complete home and make it ours without a lot of renovation.
February 2014: Aris Knitter, from WestEdge, showed us all kinds of homes. Some really big piles of junk, a round house that felt like a maze, really old houses that I loved and Brett cringed at when he saw the basements, houses in weird neighborhoods, and ones with dogs/cats running all over. Note to sellers...if you ever put your home on the market, make it easy for the sellers to come walk through. If you are barricading your dog in the living room with dining chairs, that does not make it easy for me to walk through and then I have to corral him back in there before I leave.
March, April, May 2014: Stalk Zillow and local listings...never-ending showings. On top of that, working with lenders since Brett and I have chosen not to have credit cards and pay cash for purchases made us a nightmare for most loan officers. We went through a few people before landing at Evolve Bank & Trust with Angela Rose. We had to jump through some hoops, but we wanted to make it possible to put at least 20% down without having to pull a credit score to do it. In the end, Angela helped us make that happen.
Late Spring 2014: My dream home was re-listed. Call me nuts, but I have been watching this home come on and off the market for a few years. Well, what are the odds that it would come on the market when I was looking to buy?! It was meant to be, I begged Brett to take a look at it. Lucky for me, there was an open house that Saturday! Yippee!!
We drove up to the house and all it's character glory and pulled in the driveway to find one of the busiest open houses I have ever seen. "Look at all of these people at our house!" I declared to Brett in disgust, only for him to look at me and remind me that this was not our house and people are free to come walk through.
Long story short, my dream house lived up to everything I had hoped. Every corner I turned there was a new piece of character that caught my eye and lit up my heart. Thankfully, my man is also a man of vision and could look past the cosmetic fixes and into the vision and the color pallet I was already laying out to him in the living room. We both were swooning over the 10 foot fireplace in the living room, and the old barn peg beams that lined the ceilings on the main level. Somehow, facts like no washer/dryer hook up, and that it was turned from horse barn to house in 1915, were not washing the stars and hearts out of my eyes.
Brett and I sat in the truck in front of the house, and I was convinced this was the one. Apparently, I had convinced him too, since this was the first time I heard him say that he would live in that house with me and start a family there. He wanted to walk through with some trusty handymen before we put in an official offer.
Nothing describes the house buying process better than riding a coaster at Cedar Point. You wait in line forever, only to get on the ride, wait some more, go fast, take unexpected turns, sometimes you're upside-down, there's the dreaded drop, and the anticipation when you climb that big hill. Here I was climbing up that first big hill...walk through with our handy men, and Brett could hardly get the words out that he would not buy this house. Apparently, there was just too much out of date, and it was a real project under my pretty beams and brickwork. Heart = broken. Tears = shed. How could this happen? This was my dream house - er horse barn. No wonder it has been on and off the market waiting for someone with time and equity to restore it's inner workings.
Late May 2014: Took me a minute to get back on the saddle after the horse barn break up, but a cute little house in a quaint neighborhood was enough to spark my interest and schedule a showing. The house showed perfect! It had only been on the market for 4 days, but there were 4 more showings the next day. We did a second walk through the next day and signed an offer that night. After negotiations with the seller late into the evening, we agreed on a price and Brett and I looked at each other in bewilderment - we bought a house! Not only did we buy a house, but that night we found out that his childhood friend and best man had bought a house around the corner from our new house. Destiny? #neighbs4life was invented that evening.
Late June 2014: Inspection - check, but revealed a few things that were hidden during showings. Windows in showers not only proved to be oddly placed, but also a problem area for rotting walls underneath the shower lining. Yikes, plan a budget for remodeling and gutting the only bathroom in the house - check. Prepare for closing - check.
Appraisal - check, but whoa...it came back $20,000 lower than the list price on the home. Okay, what do we do now? Re counter to the seller with a new price, counter again, and walk away when they couldn't meet us at the appraisal value. We were not about to pay more than what a home was worth, and our bank wasn't about to let us do that either.
Heart = crushed. Moving day was only about a week away at that point, and I had already decorated the house for Christmas in my mind. Apparently, I was nesting and Brett had no clue how to deal with that disappointment when we decided to walk away from the house. Cue letting everyone we told that we had a house, that we no longer had a house (what a depressing process). By this time, we were less than 1.5 months out from the wedding, and time was running short. I was also not in the mood to shop for homes that did not meet the expectations for our new home. No other little house lived up to the adorable little listing that stole my heart and $300 in inspection fees. House hunting stunk, period. Could we just rent for the rest of our lives?
July 2014: By this time, the market was at its peak for the summer. Listings were flying off the market in a matter of days. When I could finally gather the courage to look at listings again, we picked a few in the same area of the cute little house to schedule together. There was even a house in the backyard of the best man. While Brett was making plans for a zip lines from upper floor rooms and tunnels that connected the basements, I was just hoping for one house to pop on the market and be the perfect place for us to call home.
Cue the little yellow house with the white picket fence.
When I was little, I had told my mom and my sister that I always wanted a yellow house with a white picket fence. Brett even began to pick up on this, when every house I thought had great curb appeal also was clad with buttery yellow paint. He had deducted that I would think any house was cute if it was painted yellow...he might have a point. This might be a theory to test, any takers that would want a house turned yellow?
A house popped up on my listings notifications, and low and behold, it was yellow with a white picket fence. Brett was on the phone in a matter of minutes to hear me gush about the new listing. He had to have been amused with my sheer infatuation with the color yellow and white picket fences.
IT HAS A WHITE PICKET FENCE.
Are there any interior photos? No, but it had to be as cute on the inside as it was on the outside, IT'S YELLOW.
Any descriptions or listing information? No, but we can see it tonight after our other showings. DID I MENTION IT'S YELLOW?
So we rushed from work to meet Aris at the house in the back yard of the best man's. I stood in the back doorway, and realized I could walk a straight line across our yards into his back door. Brett loved the yard size, the basement, and the garage. I couldn't get past the kitchen that could fit one tiny elf and the fact that I was about to have an underground tunnel connecting endless bro-time. Cringe.
Pulling up to the little yellow house was so majestically awesome; I can only imagine how much the little hearts were popping out of my eyes. Brett already knew it, I was in house love. We had been here before - he proceeded with caution.
Every turn Brett and I made in the house, we were unexpectedly met with charm and a home that was well maintained. Was this the perfect place or what? Brett, Aris and I stood in the driveway after our walk through and to my astonishment Brett proclaimed he was ready to make an offer...tonight.
Had the yellow and the white picket fence got him too? The little aesthetic piece of my heart was jumping for joy, while my common sense said let's go home and think on it for an hour or two. Why common sense, do you have to come and rain on my yellow house parade?
Closing was set for the week before the wedding, only to be pushed back to Monday the week of the wedding. Didn't they know I had more important things going on that week? It was a crazy move, but we have been back from the honeymoon and unpacking. We'll be posting design and decor photos as we make this house our home. -x&o- dar
Have you ever had a real-estate or house hunting nightmare? Are you convinced (like me) that any house painted yellow, would add charm and curb appeal? Leave a comment below!
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