In what turned out to be our last house hunting adventure, we looked at when seemed to be 4,873 homes that just weren't cutting it. On the MLS here, there were 2 kinds of homes within +/- $25,000 of our ideal purchase price. About 3/4 of the homes on the MLS were garden homes with ZERO yard and neighbors within arms reach. For those reasons and the fact that I was still stuck on a basement at that point made those deal breakers. So, that other 1/4. They were mostly 1960-1970 ranch style homes that would have benefited most from a full gutting. I think we looked at The Brady Bunch house during our search. I'm talking more green carpet, paneling and wallpaper than I have ever seen in my life. The bad part was that they were pretty much the same price point as the less than 7 year old garden homes but they all had good lots and big yards.
So, what do you do? Go in right above our ideal price and still have to do all the remodeling or sacrifice the bigger yard for a fairly new house? Good grief all the decisions. I swear I think from March to April, I aged 10 years.
We were throwing in the towel for that day when we saw one last house. My husband and I had driven by it once before. It looked great from the outside, had a huge lot, still no basement but worth looking up online. When we got home, the online listing said something like "Previous rental. Needs redecorating and carpet cleaning (which happened to be the understatement of the century). Exterior in excellent condition. New roof 2005." So I wasn't very optimistic knowing what the inside looked like from the photos but my mom, who is also my Realtor, encouraged us to look at it since it was a great buy for a pretty big house. By this time it was after 7:00 but she called the listing agent anyway. She wasn't game for letting us in the home that night so we peeked through the windows and decided we would come back in a few days. The next morning, my mom called her to schedule a showing and she says that she had just gotten word from the seller that they were reducing the price $30,000 that day and she already had an offer. Are you kidding me? All this before 10:00 a.m. and it had no interest less than 24 hours ago. The agent tells my mom that if we can look that day that she would submit both offers at once. We get in the car, make the 60 mile drive and meet the hubs on his lunch break.
From the outside, it looked pretty manageable. The roof looked good. The siding, while it was not a color I would have chosen, wasn't horrible. The lawn definitely needed some TLC and landscaping but it was a blank slate for us to work with pretty much.
Come take a look inside.
Ah, nothing says Welcome Home like Pergo, dirty walls and carpet that wasn't fit to walk on.
Please tell me it gets better.
To the right, there is a good size coat closet and to the left we have the dining room.
Lets see. What can I say good about the dining room? It has lots of pretty molding and great natural light pours in the 2 large windows. That was about it though. Again, the walls were dirty, the chandelier was brass and the carpet had one too many spaghettio's dropped on it.
Through the dining room was the kitchen. You might want to sit down. The wallpaper will make you nauseatingly dizzy.
Once my eyes readjusted, I saw the builder basic white cabinets with brass hardware. I felt confident that a few thousand Clorox wipes could fix them. Albeit navy, there was a decent amount of countertop space and plenty of cabinet space as well. This view is looking back into the dining room.
From the other direction is the eat in kitchen.
Lots and lots of great natural light and even more wretched wallpaper.
To the left is the hallway to the laundry room and the half bath.
Laundry straight ahead, half bath on the right and garage door on the left... and more wallpaper all around.
Had we continued straight off the foyer, you enter the living room.
 |
There are no words to describe the nastiness of that carpet. I didn't even want our dog walking on it. But it did have nice high tray ceilings, lots of natural light, recessed lighting, nice moldings and a pretty fireplace with gas logs.
To the right of the living room is the hallway. Go grab your sunglasses and consider yourself warned. You might want to just keep them on for the remainder of this house tour come to think of it.
 |
Oh Smurf! Who picked that color out? It was THIS that made me add a "No painting is allowed EVER unless color is approved by landloard" clause to my tenant's lease. The hall is pretty basic. Lots of doors, 2 el cheapo light fixtures and the attic access.
The first bedroom to the right is plain, and by plain, I mean really cruddy.
The first room on the left is...well... green!
And the second room on the left, it's the Papa Smurf of all rooms.
And, the master bedroom.
More nasty carpet, but lots of light, tall tray ceilings, a great closet and super size.
The listing agent didn't have photos of the other 2 bathrooms, but as you can imagine, they have a sink, tub and toilet, oh, and LOTS of equally tacky wallpaper.
So, let's review the wants and needs, shall we...
This house didn't have a basement but it did have a great yard. It had 4 bedrooms and 2.5 baths so it exceeded our wants and needs in that area too. The master bath did have a tub, just not a garden/soaker tub. I would barely call the flooring carpet, so obviously it wasn't hardwood.
What do we do? We have like an hour to put a contract in. And IF we do, what do we offer since they reduced the price by $30,000 that day? I had no idea. I really loved the bones of the house, but man, that is a lot of work to do, especially for DIYers on a cash only budget. I think impulse got the best of me but I was so afraid that we wouldn't find another deal as good as this one and unless we were willing to compromise and buy a garden home. Everything else we had looked at was $30,000-$60,000 more than this house and needed the same cosmetic work for a house that was 30-50 years old.
As you can imagine, we did put a contract on the house and before we could get to dinner, the listing agent called to tell us they accepted our offer. Then reality hit me like a ton of bricks. We were moving, what seemed to be 2 worlds away, and I had a big honkin' list 12 miles long of projects I needed to get finished before school started in August.
It was a Thursday in May when we closed on our new to us home. We left the very next day to go to the beach for the week and when we got home, I was working like a one arm paper hanger (Name that Movie and your are pretty cool in my book!).
Come back and see me soon and find out what I was actually able to get done before the official move in date, what is still to be done and what I already want to change.
No comments:
Post a Comment