Our offer was accepted!!!!!!!

Source in bottom right corner

So, the above picture is roughly how I feel right now. Light, happy, a few butterflies. Our realtor called this morning and said "I hate to say this, but you were right." I asked him why, and he said, "the seller accepted your offer without making a counter-offer." I was stunned. I had fully expected her to counter our offer, because we sent her an offer that was $10,000 below list price AND we had asked for a $5,000 seller subsidy on top of that. So technically we're getting the house for $15,000 under list price.

I was at work at the time, otherwise I might have done a happy dance right then and there. And luckily, as if he knew what was going on, Eric had just signed on to AIM, so I didn't even have to try to wake him up via phone call [an impossibility, especially when his phone is in the other room.... whereas I wake up to a phone call or text message even if the phone is in the farthest corner of our apartment from our bed]. He also couldn't believe it for a few minutes. And then it hit us, we're officially under contract for our house! The house I've been mentally moving into and gardening in since I first saw the place. It's going to be ours!!!!!! [Pending an inspection, appraisal, loan application, and all of the many other tasks looming ahead of us prior to our closing on the 31st of May, but really, who's thinking about those things... well, ok, that would be me].

My mother has already offered to come help us move in, paint, and get the garden started. Right now (if you'll remember my previous post) the yard is one empty rectangle of lawn. My in-laws have expressed similar interests, and I told them that they were more than welcome to come visit and help once my mother has vacated the guest room. She has dibs, because she's been planning to come help ever since we started talking about finding a house.

Hopefully, I'll be able to keep this thing updated now that I have something so exciting to write about. Here's wishing myself good luck. :)

Offer #2

Well, the perfect house from the last post didn't work out quite like expected. Apparently there were several other people who thought the same thing we did. Oddly enough I'm not in the least disappointed. DH, on the other hand, really wanted this to work out. But I had several reservations, like the lack of driveway and the distance to the Metro. Other than that, it was great. But we'd actually found a house a few weeks before that I can't get out of my mind. It's on the smaller side, but it's really well maintained. It's close to the Metro, has a driveway, and all the stuff we wanted.

Including storage in the basement and a dishwasher. It even has a fenced yard that is just waiting for us to put our stamp on it. We've been using it as our "yard stick of perfection," and measuring all other houses against it.

The kitchen is a bit on the small side and it might get crowded once we start having kids, but I know we can make it work. I already have a plan for how I want to arrange the furniture. That was one of my other problems with the first house, the layout was less than ideal, and I couldn't figure out how everything would work with the furniture.

Anyway, we've been debating back and forth about this place. And we couldn't seem to come to decision. But since the first house didn't work out, and we still haven't seen anything else to measure up to this one, we've finally decided to put in an offer. I'm extremely excited!

Putting in an offer today

Front of the house

So, we saw a house this Sunday that we liked. And it's amazing how quickly things happen sometimes, but our realtor called us that night to tell us that two other people/couples/families had expressed an interest and would be putting in offers for the house. And if we wanted it, we had to move fast. Not even having sketched the house, let alone measured, or thought about anything, we had to make a decision on whether or not we actually wanted to put in an offer, and if yes, how much. It's slightly above our comfortable price range, but with two other offers, we had to make sure to come in at a reasonable amount. It's at the very top of what we had set as our range, go figure.

Main room when you come in the front door

However, the house itself is so worth it. It even has enough space that we could rent out the basement as a 2 bedroom/1 bathroom apartment to someone we knew. It has a kitchen sink and room for a microwave and mini fridge down there too, but we would probably end up having to share our kitchen with whoever rented the basement. The information sheet said 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms. But in terms of what I know about bedroom "specs" (which admittedly isn't much), it looks more like 6 bedrooms to me, if the ones in the basement count. The main floor has hardwood floors throughout, which we love. You can get a taste of those in the picture of the Main room.

The drool-worthy kitchen

The kitchen is amazing! Especially with a chef in the house, the kitchen was really important to us. It even has a double sink and a dishwasher, which we were looking for. And since it has a built-in microwave, DH can't even complain about that. (He has some sort of personal vendetta against microwaves because they heat food by "shaking" the molecules. I don't know what he thinks heating it up on a stove does.) We might be able to fit a small bistro table in the kitchen, but it's definitely not an eat-in kitchen. From the kitchen you get down to the basement with 2 bedrooms, a wet bar area/"pseudo second kitchen", a bathroom, and brand new washer, dryer, furnace, and hot water heater. And new carpet. I'm not sure how I feel about said new white carpet, but at least it's new.

Back of the house

The backyard can also be accessed from the kitchen and it has a more gentle slope than the front yard, which has a hill. It also features a nice shed which we could use for gardening and storing various equipment and bikes. The only problem is that you need to climb three steps to get to the door, which as Eric pointed out might be a problem with a lawnmower. The back of the house has a covered patio, perfect for summer dining and grilling. We could even sit out there in the rain or during a nice summer thunderstorm and enjoy a glass of wine or something. There's two bedrooms and a bathroom on the main level, one of which may end up being our master bedroom for now. As my mother pointed out, we can always rearrange everything once our situation changes (aka once we have kids). The other downstairs room may end up being our living room/entertainment room, because there's really not enough room in the "main room" for a dining and entertaining area.

One of the three bathrooms

The attic is also finished and has one large open room (which could count as a bedroom since it has a closet and windows), another smaller bedroom, and the third bathroom. At first we thought of that as a potential master suite with craft room, and put the guest bedroom downstairs. But we weren't sure if that was the best arrangement for us right now. My mother said to put guests and our computers up there, for now (see earlier point about rearranging). All in all, I'm very excited about it, but it's going to take a bit more thinking and hopefully they accept our offer. If not, it's back to the drawing board, and DH for one will be very sad to see the last of that kitchen.

Blog Makeover

So, my blog is getting a bit of a make-over. Primarily because the old one felt way too dark and depressing. I didn't feel like it was inviting anyone in to read and comment. It also made for some depressing entries, because, let's face it, if the blog is dark and brooding, why shouldn't my posts match?

As you may have noticed, I've fallen a bit behind with my 30 Days of Lists. Never fear, I plan to continue, but definitely at my own pace, since the actual prompt is long since done.

There's been a lot of stuff happening in my life lately and I haven't had the chance to share it with much of anyone. Our house hunt continues, maybe more on that once I am at home and can post a few pictures. My job is going superbly well. DH and I had an altercation last night, but as always were able to patch things up rather quickly [after I retreated to the bathroom and he retreated to a friend's house for some much needed time to reflect on what happened and why, followed by the obligatory "talk" to explain why we thought it had happened and what we could have done differently]. The cat is still superbly silly and has returned to sleeping curled up in bed next to me. He had a good long sulk for kicking him out of the bedroom while my sister was there, and wasn't ready to believe that he could go back into the bedroom once she was gone [my sister is mildly allergic to cats, primarily to cat dander in her bed].

Well, perhaps more later.

A Week of Ups and Downs

This week has had some crazy highs and some depressing lows. It all started on Sunday, well, really it started as soon as I had sent this Sunday's list of houses to our realtor. I was so convinced that we would find something this weekend, because I felt like a we had a great set of choices in this batch, at least from what I could see in the pictures. They were all comfortably in our price range, they all had at least 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

My sister, DH and I took the Metro across town and ended up in Suitland, MD, which is the second to last stop on the green line (for all of you who are familiar with DC). The very first house we looked at was in a quite, safe-feeling neighborhood with lots of green space and a tennis court. The house itself was a foreclosure, but the bank had put in all new carpets and painted all the walls white. I really wish every home owner would do this when trying to sell their house, because it is so nice to start with a clean slate instead of some of the garish or just plain hideous colors, wallpaper, and carpets we've seen to date. Or if you have hardwood floors, rip out that old carpet and get them refinished.

Anyway, the first house was a split level, and part of what attracted us to the place so much was that it had a deck, it would have taken just enough work that we could put our own stamp on it without spending a ton of money or even really NEEDING to do anything right away (i.e. it was move-in ready), it was the brightest and happiest place I'd ever been in (part of that was due to the sunlight streaming in every window), and it had a finished basement that was just as light and airy as the rest of the house. Oh yeah, and it had three bedrooms and 3.5 bathrooms. One on every floor. As far as I could tell, the only downside was that the stairs were a bit scary because the upstairs stairs and the basement stairs overlapped with only a wobbly banister in between a fall of several feet (I'm scared of heights).

We measured, we sketched, my sister and my DH went through the whole house with a very critical eye (my sister is way more critical than I could ever be). Then we looked at the other 7 houses. Some of them were complete duds, one of them was gorgeous on the inside but had no curb appeal, had weird wires trailing along the front of the house, and was in a neighborhood where I did not feel safe, and one of them had potential but potential that would have cost a lot more than we were willing to spend plus again with the sketchy neighborhood. As far as I can tell, Suitland seems to be very hit or miss when it comes to the individual neighborhoods.

So that evening the three of us went out for dinner and discussed the pros and cons of the first house in detail. We discussed the furniture my mother had offered to give us (a piano and couch set my parents have had for years) and if or how it would fit into the house. The repairs we wanted to make. I was mentally moving in. I called our realtor to let her know we wanted to put in an offer and didn't hear back from her until the next day. She told us that the bank had received several offers on the house and was no longer accepting any more. I was completely crushed. I felt like crying, I felt like nothing was ever going to be good or wonderful again. Our house would never be ours. I told DH and he was equally crushed. After much consolation, I finally started to see that there might be some good to be gleaned from the situation. Like the fact that we knew which neighborhood to look in now. And I proceeded to look for every house in our price range and with our specifications in that same neighborhood.

On Tuesday, DH had an interview. He is currently a line cook, working for an upscale restaurant. He had a chance to interview for an executive chef position and was told to pitch his idea for the restaurant. The restaurant doesn't even exist yet, it's literally an empty shell. We'd both worked on the idea for days, he focusing on the food, I focusing on the design. We made visuals, I gave him pep talk after pep talk, and I waited anxiously to hear back about how the interview had gone. They loved it! They loved his idea and even went and grabbed the blueprints of the restaurant to show to him. And they wanted him to send them a whole menu (he'd come up with a few dishes to show them the direction he wanted to take things). So we worked on that after he came home on Wednesday and were both so elated when he sent it off this morning.

Then I got the news that our realtor wanted to stop working with us. All legitimate reasons: too far of a commute to look at houses, didn't know the areas we were looking in, kept getting lost, potential jury duty at the end of the month, etc. I'm probably the world's most insecure person, because my first thought was... did I do something wrong? Was I too pushy? Did I expect too much? Then I became angry... was our price point not high enough for her? It's not like I wasn't completely upfront about our price, the locations we wanted to look in, our expectations, our past experiences with realtors and all of that. She at least said she would refer us to a couple who does work in the areas we're interested in, so hopefully we won't lose too much time.

On top of everything, I've been sick since Thursday, and I haven't been able to sleep well due to constant coughing fits while lying flat. Quite frankly these lows and highs, this emotional rollercoaster is making me feel exhausted. Enough already.

The House Hunt Continues

Since we went to look at 8 condos and houses yesterday, I'll give you a quick summary first.
Condo #1: Immediate no, because of the price. It's almost double what the other condos in the same building cost and it doesn't even have a balcony or anything else that would make it stand out.
Condo #2: On the top floor. View of the parking lot instead of the green space behind the building, but otherwise nice looking. Updated kitchen.
House #1: Middle of three rowhouses, foreclosure, fixer upper, potential mold/roof leakage problem. Finished basement.
House #2: Couldn't get inside because the key was missing.
House #3: Immediate no. Floors uneven, layout haphazard at best. Most of the appliances missing.
House #4: Quiet area, park across the street, couldn't see all of the rooms.
House #5: Duplex, fenced backyard, foreclosure, fixer upper, new appliances, potentially dangerous walk from the Metro.
House #6: Immediate no, major structural/foundation problems (huge cracks in almost every wall), too big for the two of us.


Condo #2


Condo #1 was such an immediate no, that I didn't even bother to take any pictures. Although the kitchen had a nice big window, it lacked the storage space I had come to expect from looking at the first condo in the building. It also had no balcony, which I felt was a major crime. Plus the price was almost double what any of the other condos were going for.

Condo #2 was on the top floor of the building. It looks like it has brand new laminate wood floors (looks like hardwood but isn't), the kitchen and bathroom are nice, the furnace room doesn't look atrocious. There are a few potential issues, like cracks along one of the ceilings, broken doors, and haphazard molding, but all in all nothing a few extra bucks and some elbow grease couldn't fix. And the price is good. The appliances in the kitchen also look to be new and I love the tile work in the kitchen and the bathroom.


House #1


House #1 is a bank owned fixer upper with some black mold and potential roof leakage issues. It would definitely need an investment of ready cash, a brand new kitchen with all new appliances, a new washer/dryer, and various cosmetic touches to make it livable. The price leaves us some wiggle room to do that, however. It's in a quite neighborhood, about halfway in between the two Metro stops we're looking around. One of the bedrooms upstairs has part of the ceiling pulled out and the insulation laying on the floor is covered in black mold. I'm not sure if it's a bathroom pipe leakage problem, which should be fixable, or a roof leakage problem which could easily put us over budget very quickly.

I see a lot of potential there, but also a lot of work and money invested. It also doesn't have a driveway which worries me a bit. One plus side is that there were at least three nice cars standing on the street in front of the house, so maybe parking in the street isn't as much of a problem as I think it is. It had a nice fenced yard too, long and narrow, but perfect for a dog. The basement is finished too and has a small bathroom with a shower. We could potentially rent it out as a basement apartment (it has a stove) or just put guests down there when they come to visit.


House #3

 House #2 we couldn't even get into, since the lockbox key was missing. The yard looked nice though and it had a dog run in the back.

House #3 was a definite no. It looked promising from the front and even at first glance from the side entrance. However, most of the appliances were missing, the beautiful hardwood floors in the living or dining room looked more like a rollercoaster ride than a floor, the floor in the one bedroom bounced when you stepped on it, and the layout of the place was attrocious. Upon a further look, we saw holes in the foundations and the glass door in the back was smashed on one side.


House #4

 Before we could go look at House #4, my sister texted me to say that she was at the metro stop. We went to go get her, but she'd already walked to our apartment. So we met up with her there, dropped off her luggage and then took her with to look at the remaining houses. The house was on a dead end, across from a park, so the location was nice. Unfortunately, both neighbors had clutter in their yard, like they had so much stuff inside that they were spilling out onto the lawn. That was a bit off-putting. The house itself had no basement, but it did have a yard and a driveway. No dishwasher though and we couldn't look at all of the rooms because they were locked. There were also people at home, which always puts me on edge. The price does give us some wiggle room to make changes, but I'm not sure there aren't surprises hidden in the rooms we didn't get to see.

House #5

House #5 was by far my favorite. My sister liked it too and so did DH (I think, he's not very vocal about that kind of thing, but he seemed to like the yard and stuff). It's a foreclosure and definitely a fixer upper. But the price gives up a lot of room to play. It has new windows and new appliances in the kitchen (they haven't even been hooked up). It needs a major kitchen overhaul and the upstairs bathrooms has some mold issues (but they appear to be minor). It does have to be completely redone though (the bath that is). The three bedrooms upstairs need some major cosmetic overhauls, but that's most sweat equity not actual contract work. I see a ton of potential there.

The one big downside is the location. Although the neighborhood seems quite and there are some nicer homes in the vicinity, it's the walk from the Metro that's a bit off-putting. You have to walk along a river and through the woods behind the Metro stop, which sounds and is quite nice during the day, but becomes a lot more sketchy at night. And since it's dark by the time I get home in the winter and it's dark by the time DH gets home every day, that's a problem. But I'm already mentally redoing and decorating the place in my head.

House #6

House #6 looked really cute from the front. No driveway, but there was space in the front yard for one. But then you get closer and start to look. There were huge cracks in almost every wall, around every window and door. There was a very creepy looking crawl space in the basement and the kitchen needed to be completely redone. No dishwasher either. The backyard had a nice screened in porch, but that needed work too. And then there was the fact that the place had 5 large bedrooms. There are two of us, we plan on having two kids someday, but even then, we wouldn't need 5 bedrooms. Not to mention that we'd have to heat and cool those 5 bedrooms whether or not we actually used them, etc. The price also wasn't right in terms of the amount of work it would have needed and it was the house farthest from a Metro stop. So it's out.

The House Hunt Begins

So we went to look at houses and condos on Saturday, for the first time since the end of 2009. We also met our realtor in person for the first time. She's an older woman and seems to know what she's doing, so far.



House #1



I had given her a list of about 8 houses and condos I wanted to look at. Unfortunately, one of the houses ended up not being available to view until Monday and one of the condos went under contract (meaning someone made an offer and the sellers accepted the offer). In the process of making appointments for us, our realtor was unable to reach one of the condo seller's agents and another condo's agent forgot the keys at home (an hour away). So we ended up with 4, 3 single-family houses and 1 condo.

The first house we went to look at was one that we had fallen in love with from the picture of the outside. Unfortunately, upon closer examination, the picture didn't live up to the hype. Although the yard has major potential, the porch rails are rotting and falling apart in places. There is a varitable cable salad along one side of the house and the air conditioning unit is covered in duct tape and a trash bag. The worst part was that people were at home.

I'm used to people leaving before the house they're living in is shown to prospective buyers so the buyers can speak openly about the things they like and don't like. Even weirder was that some of the rooms were locked. When we left our realtor said something about it being a boarding house, and I feel she might be right, where people rent rooms for a while and then move on. There were some positive things about it, it had a really nice laundry room on the second floor with a nice washer and dryer. It also had 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, so it certainly had room for us to grow into it. The biggest downside was the amount of property taxes. At $6,900 per year on top of the price of the house and the amount of work we'd have to do (putting in a dishwasher for one) it's just not feasible.

House #2



Then we went to look at House #2, which was even worse than House #1 in terms of boarding house type. Again, there were people at home, which was annoying. Most of the rooms were locked. No dishwasher in the kitchen. Both staircases were literal death traps (my DH almost fell down the stairs to the basement, conveniently located directly across from the door when you enter the kitchen). And the basement had a second kitchen with the hood not actually over the stove. As with the first house, the amount of work, coupled with the property taxes, and the price made us dimiss that house from consideration entirely.

The only good thing about that house was the yard. And no amount of fenced in yard could make up for the lack of enthusiasm we felt about that house. House #3 was a few houses down from House #2, so after a brief sit in the car to jot down impressions, we continued on.



House #3

House #3 also had people at home, but it didn't look like a million people lived there. All of the rooms were available for us to look at. It had two bathrooms and a huge master bedroom. The yard had a lot of potential for a large deck and was fenced in all the way. Again no dishwasher, but there was space for one.

One of the true downsides was that one of the bedrooms smelled rather musty and they had never bothered to paint the room since they moved in 10 years before. It had some really awesome built in shelves in the living room though and had a nice large finished attic which would mean a lot of storage space. Another negative was that you had to pass by the washer and dryer to get to the master bedroom and the master bedroom had a pass-through window into the kitchen which was a bit sketchy. Again, the property tax is a bit crazy coupled with the price, but except for the dishwasher situation and a bit of paint, it didn't really need any drastic changes before it would have been move-in ready. Definitely still on our list for consideration.

Condo #1

 Next we went to take a look at the one condo that was left on our list. Of the places we'd looked at so far, it was far and away my favorite, but was also the smallest. 2 bedrooms, 1 bath. But the light was amazing in the condo, the kitchen actually had a dishwasher, there was no one at home (in fact, by the look of the packed boxes in the living room, the owners were merely using it as storage until it sold), and it had a balcony and the complex had security and a pool. One of the only downsides was that the monthly condo fees are $581 and it was unclear if all utilities were included in that price (at which point I would have said fine).

Another problem was that the closet with the furnace looked to have black mold and the furnace itself looked ancient and hadn't been inspected since 1999. The one bedroom closet also looked like it might have some water damage. On the whole though, I would have loved to consider it further but after having been on the market for over 400 days the owners received not one but two offers the weekend we looked at it. I was pretty bummed. I'd already started picturing what our furniture would look like in the space.

So I guess we continue our search this weekend. And maybe we'll find that perfect place, if not, we'll just have to keep looking or turn a fixer upper into our starter home.