Ten Reasons I Love My House

10) Its 4 bedrooms. That means theres space for kids to be in their own rooms, space for my to have a sewing & crafty room...

9) Its in a great, friendly, low-traffic neighborhood where we can take walks, talk to the neighbors and play with the other kids.

8) A yard for my kids to play in. By themselves, if I want. That we don't have share with anyone else.

7) STORAGE!!! Not only does this place have an whole unfinished basement (with AWESOME food-storage shelving), but it has AWESOME, HUGE closets. With lots of space for clothes, and linens, and seasonal items... *sigh* =)

6) A fireplace. Sounds nice for our long, cold, VERY snowy winters.

5) Appliances that work the way they're supposed to (we have quite the history with not-so-great appliances in our past rentals)

4) Master bath. Granted... we're not exactly using it yet, but we will... once we get the shower doors moved out of the kids' bathroom. Cause who wants to bathe kids in a tub with doors on it?

3) Nice big kitchen with beautiful corian countertops. Good cabinet space, good counter space.

2) A playroom! Yes... a WHOLE ROOM just for the kids' toys for them to make what-so-ever messes they may, without making a mess of my whole house. Bliss!

1) Its mine... and if I decide that theres something I don't love about it, I can change it (or, at least tell Brian to change it).

Pictures to come soon(ish), I promise. Just let me find a few minutes (or a miracle) of neat and tidy rooms...

We are about to be...

homeowners!

Our offer was accepted by the sellers, we have our contingent home inspecition scheduled for Monday afternoon and we should close on or around April 6th. Its a great house and we're very excited. Our heads are still spinning just a little over how fast this happened (and how much money homes cost, even in Syracuse's very affordable housing market), but we are thrilled.

Highs and Lows

We found a house. 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bath, full, unfinished basement, 2100 square feet of living space. Good neighboorhood, less than 15 minutes to work. Not a lot of land, but a great backyard with a pool and a playstructure (swings, slide, fort kind of thing). We were all set to draw up paper work and make an offer tomorrow.

Our agent called us today after church.

The owner accepted an offer last night.

That was the 4th house that we've really liked that has sold before we've had a chance to make an offer. And we've only been in the market a week.

So, now its back to square one. And I'm sad now.

Lesson learned: don't wait if you want to make an offer. Good houses in our price range go fast.

House Hunting

We are officially in the market for a home of our own. It happened way sooner than we were expecting it too, but we are so ready to be done renting. Once we figured out that we could scrape together a good down payment in 8 weeks, we were all in.

So we're looking. Don't love anything yet. We thought we were going to love one. It was bank owned and looked so great in the pictures. The upstairs was GORGEOUS, but the kitchen was cheaply redone by the bank and it needed to have closet rods and shelves put in every closet and pantry, and the basement gave us come concerns too. I wanted to love it, but I was more concerned than in love.

Where do you make the compromise between a home thats the right price vs thats the right size, one that needs updating vs one that only needs personalization? I realize that with our budget and buying our first home I'm not going to get a perfect dream home that needs nothing and we'll stay there our whole lives. But can I get something that I like in my budget? I suppose its not fair to judge yet... we've only seen 4 homes so far. But is our house out there? Will it come along soon enough for my liking? And how much am I going to have to compromise?