The Great Never-Ending House Hunt is over!!! Bought a house this week, and managed (I think) to surprise our families.
It's a bit bigger than we were aiming for, but the back yard is amazing, it's a good neighborhood, and we got a good price on it. I'll have quite a bit of gardening work to do, though - the recent owners had been there 2 years, and were not garden/yardwork people, it seems. Daylilies planted in the shade under the deck, something that wants to be a tree also growing under the deck, irises growing under a spruce tree (literally under - low-hanging limb). Too bad it's so late in the year, I think it might be too late to move the lilies and irises this fall. Have to Google that, along with ways to keep the deer from devouring the hostas.
I'll also have to deal with way bigger utility bills (as far as square footage, it's 4 times the size of the current place), along with a bigger insurance bill. Condo insurance is seriously cheap, being just a bit more involved than renter's insurance. The jump in price from a condo to a 4x bigger house with a deck and everything is a pretty good chunk of money. Time to adapt, and get more serious about careful shopping and saving energy. First plan is to put CFLs in all or most of the light fixtures, which should at least make a dent in the electric bill.
Showing posts with label house hunting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label house hunting. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Houses & Preschool
Update A: Signed a contract for the house today. If (knock wood) inspection and appraisal go okay, we'll be moving next month.
Update B: Finally heard back from the preschool. We're going for a school tour tomorrow, and if that checks out, El Burrito starts on Tuesday. Between the holiday and helping my brother paint his house, today may have been our last "normal" day for a while. Until the new routine becomes "normal" anyway.
I had three Tim Tams, and haven't hyperventilated yet. Doubt I sleep well tonight though.
Update B: Finally heard back from the preschool. We're going for a school tour tomorrow, and if that checks out, El Burrito starts on Tuesday. Between the holiday and helping my brother paint his house, today may have been our last "normal" day for a while. Until the new routine becomes "normal" anyway.
I had three Tim Tams, and haven't hyperventilated yet. Doubt I sleep well tonight though.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Pardon me while I panic
It's shaping up to be an interesting week (month?).
Put an offer on a house today. This is the second house we've made an offer on. Can I just say, "$250,000" and "a quarter of a million dollars" may be the same amount, but the second just sounds like more money.
And we're looking for a preschool for El Burrito. So far, our option is a morning half-day class (9 a.m. - noon) in a French-immersion preschool. First issue here: I know almost no French - maybe a dozen words, mostly related to horses (dressage, capriole, courbette). Second issue: that 9 a.m. start time means moving our whole schedule, including wake-up time, earlier by 3 hours. And preschool starts in a week. Cue the headache.
Plus, no more library storytimes, since they're all in the morning. And - unless we play hooky for a day - no "kids' tour" of the library next month, which El B (and I!) were excited about. I really need to ask why the storytimes are all scheduled in the mornings.
I'm off to find an ibuprofen. House + preschool = headache and nervousness.
Put an offer on a house today. This is the second house we've made an offer on. Can I just say, "$250,000" and "a quarter of a million dollars" may be the same amount, but the second just sounds like more money.
And we're looking for a preschool for El Burrito. So far, our option is a morning half-day class (9 a.m. - noon) in a French-immersion preschool. First issue here: I know almost no French - maybe a dozen words, mostly related to horses (dressage, capriole, courbette). Second issue: that 9 a.m. start time means moving our whole schedule, including wake-up time, earlier by 3 hours. And preschool starts in a week. Cue the headache.
Plus, no more library storytimes, since they're all in the morning. And - unless we play hooky for a day - no "kids' tour" of the library next month, which El B (and I!) were excited about. I really need to ask why the storytimes are all scheduled in the mornings.
I'm off to find an ibuprofen. House + preschool = headache and nervousness.
Friday, May 28, 2010
House Hunting (still)
I'm starting to hate house-hunting. El Burrito just turned four, and we still don't have a non-family babysitter lined up, so any house visits mean adding an hour beforehand for dropping off, and another hour after for picking up from Grandma's house. Blah.
We made an offer on one house, but they're underwater on the loan and still want what they paid for the house 3 years ago, when the housing market peaked. I suspect they had an interest-only loan or something scary like that, but who knows. We couldn't agree on a price, so it's off the table unless they drop the price again.
We've looked at, I think, 15 houses in the past week. One got marked off the list - serious water issues, they were replacing carpet and regrading the lot on the day we were going to look. That's enough to get them dropped from the possibles list.
Went to look at a house yesterday. In a nice planned development - mixed residential and business, which I like, but there were problems. First, little to no yard space, and what was there, wasn't fence-able because of the driveway location. Second, planned development = HOA and restrictions. There was a copy of the regulations & restrictions available; I stopped after reading the (short) list of approved trees, the single maker of approved mailboxes, and the shrub requirements (14 per lot - 2 5-gallon, 4 2-gallon, 8 1-gallon, all in mulch-beds). It went on for another few dozen pages - restrictions on what you can make raised beds and garden fences out of, sidewalk materials, paint colors, etc.
The house looked lovely in the pictures, and when we drove by. Nice wrap-around porch, screen deck, windows, dormers. Sigh. Turned out that the porch was maybe 3 feet deep all around - more of a covered sidewalk than a porch. No room for someone to walk past if you're sitting on the porch.
I think it's probably not at the top of the list. We need a yard.
Right now, the best option is one we looked at last week. Nice big house, 5 bedrooms (2 master suites - one on the top floor, one in the basement), split level decks, retractable awning. It does have a smallish fenced yard, which is all sloped, and not a little bit of slope, either. But it gets enough sunlight that grass will grow there. It's a tall house, though - two flights of stairs to the upper floor. If we lived there, I'd have leg muscles. :) It also has an open cathedral ceiling in the living room - the light fixtures are maybe 20 feet up. Be a bitch to change the bulbs there. The tall wall is all wood paneling, which looks pretty nice.
The yard is my big sticking point, and all the stairs. But it would probably do for a 3 or 4 years, until we could find ground and build our own.
We made an offer on one house, but they're underwater on the loan and still want what they paid for the house 3 years ago, when the housing market peaked. I suspect they had an interest-only loan or something scary like that, but who knows. We couldn't agree on a price, so it's off the table unless they drop the price again.
We've looked at, I think, 15 houses in the past week. One got marked off the list - serious water issues, they were replacing carpet and regrading the lot on the day we were going to look. That's enough to get them dropped from the possibles list.
Went to look at a house yesterday. In a nice planned development - mixed residential and business, which I like, but there were problems. First, little to no yard space, and what was there, wasn't fence-able because of the driveway location. Second, planned development = HOA and restrictions. There was a copy of the regulations & restrictions available; I stopped after reading the (short) list of approved trees, the single maker of approved mailboxes, and the shrub requirements (14 per lot - 2 5-gallon, 4 2-gallon, 8 1-gallon, all in mulch-beds). It went on for another few dozen pages - restrictions on what you can make raised beds and garden fences out of, sidewalk materials, paint colors, etc.
The house looked lovely in the pictures, and when we drove by. Nice wrap-around porch, screen deck, windows, dormers. Sigh. Turned out that the porch was maybe 3 feet deep all around - more of a covered sidewalk than a porch. No room for someone to walk past if you're sitting on the porch.
I think it's probably not at the top of the list. We need a yard.
Right now, the best option is one we looked at last week. Nice big house, 5 bedrooms (2 master suites - one on the top floor, one in the basement), split level decks, retractable awning. It does have a smallish fenced yard, which is all sloped, and not a little bit of slope, either. But it gets enough sunlight that grass will grow there. It's a tall house, though - two flights of stairs to the upper floor. If we lived there, I'd have leg muscles. :) It also has an open cathedral ceiling in the living room - the light fixtures are maybe 20 feet up. Be a bitch to change the bulbs there. The tall wall is all wood paneling, which looks pretty nice.
The yard is my big sticking point, and all the stairs. But it would probably do for a 3 or 4 years, until we could find ground and build our own.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
More house hunting
We just put in an offer on our plan-B house. It's lower than the asking price, so we'll see what their counteroffer is.
It's a nice house, very big. The yard is fenced already, but not as big as I'd like. There is room for a small garden, and play space for El Burrito. Bonus: it's not far from where we are now, so commute times won't change much.
How small is the yard? A decent size, but small enough that I may really consider a reel-type mower. If not, then a push-mower, because it's not big enough to justify any kind of riding mower.
Oy. The down payment check will probably make me a bit nauseous, but then I was a tiny bit shaky when I paid the down payment on my car (a very small car, $3,000 down).
It's a nice house, very big. The yard is fenced already, but not as big as I'd like. There is room for a small garden, and play space for El Burrito. Bonus: it's not far from where we are now, so commute times won't change much.
How small is the yard? A decent size, but small enough that I may really consider a reel-type mower. If not, then a push-mower, because it's not big enough to justify any kind of riding mower.
Oy. The down payment check will probably make me a bit nauseous, but then I was a tiny bit shaky when I paid the down payment on my car (a very small car, $3,000 down).
Monday, April 26, 2010
House Hunting update
Update:
After viewing 10 homes in 8 hours (with about 150 miles total driving), we've moved to Plan B - find something in town that will be adequate for 1-2 years (*), until we can find some ground and have a house built.
(*) Give our motivation levels, I won't be surprised if 1-2 years turns into 5 or so. Hell, we started house-hunting about 8 years ago, intending to be in a house before we had any kids. Uh huh. El Burrito is going to be 4 pretty soon.
We'd planned to park El B at Grandma & Grandpa's house over this past weekend, while we looked at homes. So of course, El B spent Friday puking (all over me!), and we didn't think he or his grandparents needed the hassle. I stayed home with Mr No Longer Throwing Up, and DH went with the realtor to look at 10 or so houses. In a drenching downpour most of the day - which demonstrated drainage/gutter issues at one house, and meant that another house wasn't viewable because of road/water problems.
Three of those made the short-list, so we're both going for another look this week, plus a visit with the mortgage people.
And on top of that, El B is still under the weather (although thankfully no longer vomiting), and the HVAC checkup on Friday revealed that our AC's issue earlier this month was a severe lack of freon. They came back today and took care of things, and wonder of wonders, it was all covered by the warranty. Yay!
By this time next week, we may have a house under contract. Our mortgage right now is seriously low, so the new mortgage could be 3x to 4x of the current one. I may get a little nauseous when I write the mortgage checks for a while.
After viewing 10 homes in 8 hours (with about 150 miles total driving), we've moved to Plan B - find something in town that will be adequate for 1-2 years (*), until we can find some ground and have a house built.
(*) Give our motivation levels, I won't be surprised if 1-2 years turns into 5 or so. Hell, we started house-hunting about 8 years ago, intending to be in a house before we had any kids. Uh huh. El Burrito is going to be 4 pretty soon.
We'd planned to park El B at Grandma & Grandpa's house over this past weekend, while we looked at homes. So of course, El B spent Friday puking (all over me!), and we didn't think he or his grandparents needed the hassle. I stayed home with Mr No Longer Throwing Up, and DH went with the realtor to look at 10 or so houses. In a drenching downpour most of the day - which demonstrated drainage/gutter issues at one house, and meant that another house wasn't viewable because of road/water problems.
Three of those made the short-list, so we're both going for another look this week, plus a visit with the mortgage people.
And on top of that, El B is still under the weather (although thankfully no longer vomiting), and the HVAC checkup on Friday revealed that our AC's issue earlier this month was a severe lack of freon. They came back today and took care of things, and wonder of wonders, it was all covered by the warranty. Yay!
By this time next week, we may have a house under contract. Our mortgage right now is seriously low, so the new mortgage could be 3x to 4x of the current one. I may get a little nauseous when I write the mortgage checks for a while.
Monday, March 29, 2010
The house-hunting marathon
We started house-hunting over the weekend. Packed El Burrito off for a day with Grandma & Grandpa, and met the Realtor for a 10-house 8-hour marathon. And this wasn't the usual day with five houses on one street or anything. These were rural places - we probably put at least 100 miles of driving in.
We saw some nice houses with lousy location, nice locations with lousy houses, and nothing that said "Buy me NOW" (unfortunately). A few "What were they thinking??" moments out there. Who puts the second-floor stairway exiting into the garage? Who really thinks that an acre of wooded pasture is sufficient ground to keep a horse? Why spend a load of money upgrading a recently-upgraded kitchen, in a house you're selling (because you're having money problems)? And who puts a beer tap in their kitchen?
Apparently the latest fads are jetted tubs and those quotations/phrases painted or decal-ed onto the walls.
We saw some nice houses with lousy location, nice locations with lousy houses, and nothing that said "Buy me NOW" (unfortunately). A few "What were they thinking??" moments out there. Who puts the second-floor stairway exiting into the garage? Who really thinks that an acre of wooded pasture is sufficient ground to keep a horse? Why spend a load of money upgrading a recently-upgraded kitchen, in a house you're selling (because you're having money problems)? And who puts a beer tap in their kitchen?
Apparently the latest fads are jetted tubs and those quotations/phrases painted or decal-ed onto the walls.
Friday, March 26, 2010
House Hunting 2010
We're going with a Realtor (Blogger's spell-check insists on the capitalized R) this week to look at houses. Haven't done this in 5+ years. We've got ten on the list of possibles for the first trip, but they're spread out quite a bit (all out of town) so I'm not sure we'll make all ten.
And now I need to start thinking about packing, decluttering, and making a list of what we'll need to buy ASAP after we move. Like some furniture (ours is minimal, old, and decrepit) and a kitchen/dining table. And a hammock. And a freezer.
And now I need to start thinking about packing, decluttering, and making a list of what we'll need to buy ASAP after we move. Like some furniture (ours is minimal, old, and decrepit) and a kitchen/dining table. And a hammock. And a freezer.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
House Hunting
We need to get going on the house hunt. It's spring. El Burrito's Birthday is just two months away, and it would be nice to have his party at our house, instead of having two parties with his grandparents. And my sister keeps nagging me about it. (She thinks looking at 12 houses in one weekend, 30 minutes per house, is realistic. If you're looking at houses outside of town, not so much.)
Which means that we need some sort of criteria about what kind of house we want. You know, to help narrow down the search. Our problem (one of them) is that we're maybe too flexible. Right now, there are three options.
So, my criteria at first will probably be based on things that bug me the most about the condo, that aren't easily fixable. For example, I've watched some house-hunting shows and see people dismissing a possible house because they don't like the paint colors. For me, that's not really a deal-breaker. I know where Lowe's is, and I know how to use a paint roller. On the other hand, lack of windows and air circulation would be a deal-breaker for me. Ditto for really creepy neighbors, hideous floor plans, or seriously lousy locations.
We looked at two houses Way Back When that would have been considered if they'd been somewhere else. One was maybe 200 feet from Interstate 70, just off the access road; the traffic noise was constant. The other was on a bluff. It had a lovely view, but the edge of the bluff was maybe 75 feet from the back door. And there was a railroad track at the bottom of the bluff.
So, criteria.
Which means that we need some sort of criteria about what kind of house we want. You know, to help narrow down the search. Our problem (one of them) is that we're maybe too flexible. Right now, there are three options.
- Sell the condo and rent a house for a year while we look for a house with acreage.
- Look for a house with acreage, then sell the condo.
- Buy the first good house we see in town, sell the condo, and look for a house with acreage.
So, my criteria at first will probably be based on things that bug me the most about the condo, that aren't easily fixable. For example, I've watched some house-hunting shows and see people dismissing a possible house because they don't like the paint colors. For me, that's not really a deal-breaker. I know where Lowe's is, and I know how to use a paint roller. On the other hand, lack of windows and air circulation would be a deal-breaker for me. Ditto for really creepy neighbors, hideous floor plans, or seriously lousy locations.
We looked at two houses Way Back When that would have been considered if they'd been somewhere else. One was maybe 200 feet from Interstate 70, just off the access road; the traffic noise was constant. The other was on a bluff. It had a lovely view, but the edge of the bluff was maybe 75 feet from the back door. And there was a railroad track at the bottom of the bluff.
So, criteria.
- More than 1,000 sq. ft. In other words, it has to be bigger than this place. I'd prefer 2,000 sq. ft. minimum, but I can be flexible if there's an attic, unfinished basement, or whatever. Or if there's room to expand.
- Windows. Must have windows. Windows that open, and aren't part of the door. The cave atmosphere here is just too irritating.
- Must have a yard, whether there's acreage or not. A fence would be nice, but if it's not there, we can put it in later.
- Closets other than in the bedrooms. I'd love to have a closet in the bathroom or in a hallway, to use as a linen/storage closet. Walk-in closets in the bedrooms are nice, but they're not enough.
- Kitchen counter space.
- Basement level. Because I prefer to have a place to go when there are tornados. The second-floor bathroom option just doesn't feel safe enough to me.
Friday, December 14, 2007
I swear . . .
. . . that as soon as we get through Christmas and New Year's, we will be house-hunting again. The boy and this place are getting on my last nerve this week, and it wasn't a sturdy nerve to begin with.
Believe it or not, the only sizable place I can find to put things (Christmas gifts, fragile things, whatever) out of El Burrito's reach? The bathtub. Because there are really only 4 rooms here, none of which can be made a No Burrito zone, unfortunately. The bathtub hasn't been used for bathing in a few years, because the person who designed the front bathroom was obviously smoking something that day. After they squeezed in a tub, toilet, and sink, there's not enough room to turn around. There's about an inch of clearance between the door and the toilet, and when the door is open, the tub is inaccessible. (Which is why El Burrito is still getting sink baths.)
Anyway. The fact that I can't keep things out of the boy's reach is getting to be a problem, and it'll only get worse the taller he gets. Luckily he hasn't broken anything yet, or managed to hurt himself, although he's got a habit of "relocating" things (his comb has been missing for a month). He likes to play with the PC mouse and keyboard, and short of unplugging them, the desk isn't wide enough to put them out of reach. He's rebooted the PC once, and somehow has found a key combo that will log me out, log his father in, and make the PC attempt to install Paint Shop Pro (even though it's already installed).
So, we've got to move soon. Really. (Yes, I've been saying this for, oh, 3 years now. This time, I may actually mean it.)
*****
In other news, we got El Burrito's photo taken at Sears last night, and a family portrait. It took 2 hours, most of that deciding what to order afterwards (and I managed to not get a print of one of the best ones). Oh, and Jan? We made it out with $70 worth of prints. I was tempted to get the photo CD again, but they wanted $69.99 for it. Now, if they have a $19.99 "special" when I pick up the prints, I may consider it, but $70 is insane.
Believe it or not, the only sizable place I can find to put things (Christmas gifts, fragile things, whatever) out of El Burrito's reach? The bathtub. Because there are really only 4 rooms here, none of which can be made a No Burrito zone, unfortunately. The bathtub hasn't been used for bathing in a few years, because the person who designed the front bathroom was obviously smoking something that day. After they squeezed in a tub, toilet, and sink, there's not enough room to turn around. There's about an inch of clearance between the door and the toilet, and when the door is open, the tub is inaccessible. (Which is why El Burrito is still getting sink baths.)
Anyway. The fact that I can't keep things out of the boy's reach is getting to be a problem, and it'll only get worse the taller he gets. Luckily he hasn't broken anything yet, or managed to hurt himself, although he's got a habit of "relocating" things (his comb has been missing for a month). He likes to play with the PC mouse and keyboard, and short of unplugging them, the desk isn't wide enough to put them out of reach. He's rebooted the PC once, and somehow has found a key combo that will log me out, log his father in, and make the PC attempt to install Paint Shop Pro (even though it's already installed).
So, we've got to move soon. Really. (Yes, I've been saying this for, oh, 3 years now. This time, I may actually mean it.)
*****
In other news, we got El Burrito's photo taken at Sears last night, and a family portrait. It took 2 hours, most of that deciding what to order afterwards (and I managed to not get a print of one of the best ones). Oh, and Jan? We made it out with $70 worth of prints. I was tempted to get the photo CD again, but they wanted $69.99 for it. Now, if they have a $19.99 "special" when I pick up the prints, I may consider it, but $70 is insane.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
More ponderings
So at dinner last night, DH & I talked a bit about house-hunting (brought on by our Idiot Neighbor). DH came up with another possibility, given that we may not be able to find what we're looking for, at an affordable price, in the next few months. He brought up the idea of renting a house for a year or two, while we keep looking for some acreage outside of town, instead of buying a house in town and only living there for a few years. Now, that would be an improvement over what we have now, since a house would presumably have a yard, more space, etc. However, it would mean moving twice instead of once. Plus there's the whole inertia factor - we need to light a fire under our butts as it is.
But the idea of moving twice gives me a headache. If we were only in a house for a year or two, we'd probably just leave most of the stuff packed up, and most of it's been packed for at least two years already. I don't want to think about all the duplicate things that will turn up when we're finally in a house and can unpack everything. The Mother of All Yard Sales will be happening after we move, I swear.
But the idea of moving twice gives me a headache. If we were only in a house for a year or two, we'd probably just leave most of the stuff packed up, and most of it's been packed for at least two years already. I don't want to think about all the duplicate things that will turn up when we're finally in a house and can unpack everything. The Mother of All Yard Sales will be happening after we move, I swear.
Thursday, March 8, 2007
More space issues
Two other space issues that irritate me about This Place.
1. Thanks to the lovely issues of space, we have a really limited amount of seating. As it stands right now, we had to get rid of the couch to make room for the glider and baby swing, and we sold the table and chairs to make space for the crib. That leaves us with the love seat, glider, and office chair. Which means that on the rare occasion that we have company, we're limited to three people at a time. And that's if someone chooses to sit on our lousy folding chair. Not that we have a lot of company anyway, but we'll never be able to have both sets of parents over at the same time or anything. No parties for us! Usually it's my parents, when Mom needs a grandbaby fix. And I swear, the last person who came through the door other than us? Was probably the HVAC guy to do the fall furnace checkup.
(And don't get me started on the lack of post-baby visitors. All the baby magazines and websites were full of people wondering how to deal with the flood of visitors at the hospital and home, and tips on getting the visitors to run errands for you. Our "flood" was my sister and one of DH's brothers. The brother's visit ended up costing us money. And my grandparents came for an hour. That's it. We had a drought, not a flood.)
2. The lousy floorplan also makes it darn near impossible to do any indoor exercise. I bought a yoga mat two years ago, with the intention of working out indoors with videos and the Denise Austin show on Lifetime TV. After I got home, I looked around and realized that, short of moving the love seat every time I wanted to work out, there's not really any spot in this condo where I can unroll the yoga mat and have room to stretch my arms to the side. I took a fitness class while I was pregnant, and the home workouts were pretty skimpy because we have such a lousy layout. Yes, I can go outside and walk, if the weather is decent, but sit-ups, etc, are better indoors.
In short, just two more reasons why we want to move, soon.
1. Thanks to the lovely issues of space, we have a really limited amount of seating. As it stands right now, we had to get rid of the couch to make room for the glider and baby swing, and we sold the table and chairs to make space for the crib. That leaves us with the love seat, glider, and office chair. Which means that on the rare occasion that we have company, we're limited to three people at a time. And that's if someone chooses to sit on our lousy folding chair. Not that we have a lot of company anyway, but we'll never be able to have both sets of parents over at the same time or anything. No parties for us! Usually it's my parents, when Mom needs a grandbaby fix. And I swear, the last person who came through the door other than us? Was probably the HVAC guy to do the fall furnace checkup.
(And don't get me started on the lack of post-baby visitors. All the baby magazines and websites were full of people wondering how to deal with the flood of visitors at the hospital and home, and tips on getting the visitors to run errands for you. Our "flood" was my sister and one of DH's brothers. The brother's visit ended up costing us money. And my grandparents came for an hour. That's it. We had a drought, not a flood.)
2. The lousy floorplan also makes it darn near impossible to do any indoor exercise. I bought a yoga mat two years ago, with the intention of working out indoors with videos and the Denise Austin show on Lifetime TV. After I got home, I looked around and realized that, short of moving the love seat every time I wanted to work out, there's not really any spot in this condo where I can unroll the yoga mat and have room to stretch my arms to the side. I took a fitness class while I was pregnant, and the home workouts were pretty skimpy because we have such a lousy layout. Yes, I can go outside and walk, if the weather is decent, but sit-ups, etc, are better indoors.
In short, just two more reasons why we want to move, soon.
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Why we need to move
In a word, space.
In more words, not enough space, not enough storage space, and a funky layout that means the place seems practically not-child-proofable. Looking at it, it seems that the only way to make this place safe for a crawling El Burrito would be to back a dumpster up below the deck and throw away 95% of what we have, including part of the furniture. Even then, I don't think it would really work. There's a computer desk full of dangling power cords, and a 20-gallon fish tank with more dangling cords, and neither of them can be anywhere but the living room. Half the houseplants are probably poisonous. There just seems to be a lot of "stuff" that has no real out-of-the-way home. We're stuck with it living out in the open, where a crawler or toddler can trip over it, put an eye out on it, eat it, choke on it, or whatever. We won't even go into the stairs, the second-story porch, or the deck. Or the cabinet doors that don't have handles, just the little notch at the bottom to grab with your fingertips, that I'm not sure are compatible with those child locks.
It's also very dark, thanks to a lack of windows or built-in lights, and the air circulation is abysmal.
Space. We don't have enough of it, and what we do have is poorly designed and laid out. The fellow who designed these was obviously aiming them at single people, retired couples, and the like. He was also apparently freaking clueless about cooking, cleaning, and ventilation. And light. And had some sort of phobia about right angles, because the only square rooms are the two bedrooms.
We live in a 2-bedroom condo that's about 1000 square feet. It seems like a lot, until you look at it and realize how inefficient the layout is.
Other than a decent-sized closet in each bedroom, the only storage space is a tiny closet in the hallway. Ours holds the vacuums, coats, a broom, and a few tools. That's about all that will fit. There's technically a "utility closet" in the kitchen, but since it already has the furnace, water heater, washer and dryer, there's not a lot of room left to work with. Especially since the fuse box is in there, and we shouldn't block access to that. We managed to squeeze in a set of plastic shelves for canned goods, a plastic trash can for the recycling, and a few cases of soda (bought on sale). It's very frustrating to not be able to put things "away" because there's nowhere to put them. No closet for linens, towels, bathroom paraphernalia.
The bedrooms are a decent size, but thanks to the positioning of the doors (deck, closet, bathroom, and hallway), there's exactly one place to put the bed. Even then, the door out onto the deck won't open all the way. After putting in a nightstand, a dresser, and a chest of drawers, we're left with a path around the bed about two feet wide. To get the bassinet in the bedroom, we had to block off access to DH's nightstand, and if the bathroom door opened the other way, it wouldn't have worked.
We have no dining area. Actually, right now, we don't even have a table. To make room for El Burrito's crib, we had to move the computer into the living room. The only place for it was the corner between the entrance and the living room, formerly inhabited by the table that we never used. So we sold the table. And since we don't have a high chair yet (it's on the list for this weekend), we're feeding El B on the couch, which works surprisingly well as far as it goes, but doesn't really allow us to let him play with his food or anything. When we do get a high chair, I'm not sure where we'll put it. If it folds, we can store it on top of the washer, but I'm not sure where we'll put it while we're actually using it. The only options seem to be the middle of the kitchen (linoleum), or in the weird space at the top of the stairs, between the computer and the glider. The drawback there is that it's carpeted. Granted, we're going to replace the carpet when we sell, but still.
And a tangent - who in their right mind puts carpet in a bathroom? Or in what is supposed to be a dining area? Or just inside the door, where you can track snow and mud in? Gah.
Two things that I will not miss when we move? Light and air. Two big design problems here. There are three doors that don't really go anywhere - 2 for the screened porch, 1 for the deck, neither of which are connected to the ground. While those doors all have a big glass panel in them, the orientation of the building means that we get very little direct sunlight. The last owners painted the walls a pale shade of yellow, which added to the "I'm living in a cave" feeling. We repainted, which helped, but it's still dark. There are also practically no light fixtures in the place. Seriously. One over the stairs, one in the kitchen, one in the hall, plus track lighting over the kitchen/living room divider, vanity lights in the bathrooms and florescent tubes in the closets. Otherwise, zilch. The bedrooms are totally ignored as far as lighting. The living room has a ceiling fan, but they didn't bother to put a light on it.
We're thinking of putting a fan/light in the bedrooms, and adding a light to the living room fan before we sell. I wish we'd had this bright (pun!) idea a few years ago, so we could have gotten some use from them.
And the place has practically no air circulation. There's only one return-air vent, so the furnace air flow is sort of stagnant. I've got half the vents closed, trying to push some air into El B's room and the living room, but it's not working well. The temp drops noticeably when you go down the hallway. Even in the summer, with both porch/deck doors open, we rarely get a breeze through here unless the wind is coming from the west. All our doors are on two sides of the building, so there's no good cross-circulation, and the building north of us blocks a lot of the breeze.
I need to make a floor plan of this place. Maybe it'll give me an idea on how to rearrange what furniture we have, while not blocking the traffic flow.
In more words, not enough space, not enough storage space, and a funky layout that means the place seems practically not-child-proofable. Looking at it, it seems that the only way to make this place safe for a crawling El Burrito would be to back a dumpster up below the deck and throw away 95% of what we have, including part of the furniture. Even then, I don't think it would really work. There's a computer desk full of dangling power cords, and a 20-gallon fish tank with more dangling cords, and neither of them can be anywhere but the living room. Half the houseplants are probably poisonous. There just seems to be a lot of "stuff" that has no real out-of-the-way home. We're stuck with it living out in the open, where a crawler or toddler can trip over it, put an eye out on it, eat it, choke on it, or whatever. We won't even go into the stairs, the second-story porch, or the deck. Or the cabinet doors that don't have handles, just the little notch at the bottom to grab with your fingertips, that I'm not sure are compatible with those child locks.
It's also very dark, thanks to a lack of windows or built-in lights, and the air circulation is abysmal.
Space. We don't have enough of it, and what we do have is poorly designed and laid out. The fellow who designed these was obviously aiming them at single people, retired couples, and the like. He was also apparently freaking clueless about cooking, cleaning, and ventilation. And light. And had some sort of phobia about right angles, because the only square rooms are the two bedrooms.
We live in a 2-bedroom condo that's about 1000 square feet. It seems like a lot, until you look at it and realize how inefficient the layout is.
Other than a decent-sized closet in each bedroom, the only storage space is a tiny closet in the hallway. Ours holds the vacuums, coats, a broom, and a few tools. That's about all that will fit. There's technically a "utility closet" in the kitchen, but since it already has the furnace, water heater, washer and dryer, there's not a lot of room left to work with. Especially since the fuse box is in there, and we shouldn't block access to that. We managed to squeeze in a set of plastic shelves for canned goods, a plastic trash can for the recycling, and a few cases of soda (bought on sale). It's very frustrating to not be able to put things "away" because there's nowhere to put them. No closet for linens, towels, bathroom paraphernalia.
The bedrooms are a decent size, but thanks to the positioning of the doors (deck, closet, bathroom, and hallway), there's exactly one place to put the bed. Even then, the door out onto the deck won't open all the way. After putting in a nightstand, a dresser, and a chest of drawers, we're left with a path around the bed about two feet wide. To get the bassinet in the bedroom, we had to block off access to DH's nightstand, and if the bathroom door opened the other way, it wouldn't have worked.
We have no dining area. Actually, right now, we don't even have a table. To make room for El Burrito's crib, we had to move the computer into the living room. The only place for it was the corner between the entrance and the living room, formerly inhabited by the table that we never used. So we sold the table. And since we don't have a high chair yet (it's on the list for this weekend), we're feeding El B on the couch, which works surprisingly well as far as it goes, but doesn't really allow us to let him play with his food or anything. When we do get a high chair, I'm not sure where we'll put it. If it folds, we can store it on top of the washer, but I'm not sure where we'll put it while we're actually using it. The only options seem to be the middle of the kitchen (linoleum), or in the weird space at the top of the stairs, between the computer and the glider. The drawback there is that it's carpeted. Granted, we're going to replace the carpet when we sell, but still.
And a tangent - who in their right mind puts carpet in a bathroom? Or in what is supposed to be a dining area? Or just inside the door, where you can track snow and mud in? Gah.
Two things that I will not miss when we move? Light and air. Two big design problems here. There are three doors that don't really go anywhere - 2 for the screened porch, 1 for the deck, neither of which are connected to the ground. While those doors all have a big glass panel in them, the orientation of the building means that we get very little direct sunlight. The last owners painted the walls a pale shade of yellow, which added to the "I'm living in a cave" feeling. We repainted, which helped, but it's still dark. There are also practically no light fixtures in the place. Seriously. One over the stairs, one in the kitchen, one in the hall, plus track lighting over the kitchen/living room divider, vanity lights in the bathrooms and florescent tubes in the closets. Otherwise, zilch. The bedrooms are totally ignored as far as lighting. The living room has a ceiling fan, but they didn't bother to put a light on it.
We're thinking of putting a fan/light in the bedrooms, and adding a light to the living room fan before we sell. I wish we'd had this bright (pun!) idea a few years ago, so we could have gotten some use from them.
And the place has practically no air circulation. There's only one return-air vent, so the furnace air flow is sort of stagnant. I've got half the vents closed, trying to push some air into El B's room and the living room, but it's not working well. The temp drops noticeably when you go down the hallway. Even in the summer, with both porch/deck doors open, we rarely get a breeze through here unless the wind is coming from the west. All our doors are on two sides of the building, so there's no good cross-circulation, and the building north of us blocks a lot of the breeze.
I need to make a floor plan of this place. Maybe it'll give me an idea on how to rearrange what furniture we have, while not blocking the traffic flow.
House Hunting - why it bugs me
(For Jan, mostly, thanks for asking.)
House hunting lately bugs me for a couple of reasons.
A: General discouragement with the whole idea. In the five years or so that we've been looking, it seems like everyone we know has already moved. Some of them have moved more than once. Here's a list:
DH has two close friends from high school here in town. One has moved once, the other has moved twice. I swear, other than our parents, we're the only people I know who haven't moved in the past 7 years.
Oh, and #4, above? Asked at Christmas what was taking us so long to find a place. I was very restrained, and did not ask him what was taking him so long to find a wife. I was very tempted, but I bit my tongue. Someone also told us at some point, "If it takes longer than 3 months to find a house, you're doing it wrong." I swear, if I could remember who it was, I'd make sure they were first on the list when we move the heavy stuff.
B: Realtors. We talked to two realtors, one of which took us to see a lot of places, and had found a home for one of DH's co-workers. The first realtor didn't last long. We spoke to him in the office one day, and that was about it. He called at least twice wanting to come look at the condo so he could list it, but never put any effort into finding us a place to buy. Sorry, no dice. I'm not listing this place unless we have at least an idea on where to move to.
The second one was better, she drove us to a lot of places and got MLS listings and all. But 90% of the time, we found the listing in the paper or the Real Estate book and called her about it, not the other way around. I was under the impression that if you told them what you were looking for, they would put in a little effort to help find it. Maybe she just knew we didn't have a deadline and weren't going to be moving by the end of the week. I don't know.
House hunting lately bugs me for a couple of reasons.
A: General discouragement with the whole idea. In the five years or so that we've been looking, it seems like everyone we know has already moved. Some of them have moved more than once. Here's a list:
- My sister - moved from Detroit, to a rental in Indiana, to a house in IN, to Atlanta GA
- My much-younger brother - first year on the job, found a great farm just a few miles from our parents
- #1 - separated from wife, moved out, moved back in, divorced, rented a house, and now has a manufactured home sitting on a patch of ground
- #2 - moved once
- #3 - built Home #1, sold it, moved into #2, sold it, moved to rental, built #3, moved in
- #4 - bought a farm, moved into old farmhouse
- #5 - sold house, moved in with parents for a few months, put a manufactured home on 3 acres that the parents gave them from their land
DH has two close friends from high school here in town. One has moved once, the other has moved twice. I swear, other than our parents, we're the only people I know who haven't moved in the past 7 years.
Oh, and #4, above? Asked at Christmas what was taking us so long to find a place. I was very restrained, and did not ask him what was taking him so long to find a wife. I was very tempted, but I bit my tongue. Someone also told us at some point, "If it takes longer than 3 months to find a house, you're doing it wrong." I swear, if I could remember who it was, I'd make sure they were first on the list when we move the heavy stuff.
B: Realtors. We talked to two realtors, one of which took us to see a lot of places, and had found a home for one of DH's co-workers. The first realtor didn't last long. We spoke to him in the office one day, and that was about it. He called at least twice wanting to come look at the condo so he could list it, but never put any effort into finding us a place to buy. Sorry, no dice. I'm not listing this place unless we have at least an idea on where to move to.
The second one was better, she drove us to a lot of places and got MLS listings and all. But 90% of the time, we found the listing in the paper or the Real Estate book and called her about it, not the other way around. I was under the impression that if you told them what you were looking for, they would put in a little effort to help find it. Maybe she just knew we didn't have a deadline and weren't going to be moving by the end of the week. I don't know.
Thursday, March 1, 2007
Horses, Houses, and Dreams
Warning: this will be long. And probably whiny.
I want a horse. I had a horse growing up, and until I was 24, I couldn't remember a time when there wasn't a horse around. That was just the way things were, and it felt right. Then, on April 15, 2003, my gelding died and things changed. I had another horse for about three years, but it didn't work out and I sold him. Since then, I've been on a horse for about 90 minutes, in Ireland, and spent most of my free time and pocket change on horse books, horse magazines, and a decent-sized collection of model horses (mostly from Breyer, but also cheezy Japanese china horses, metal horses, and one wooden horse with metal inlay). But it's not the same.
For the past fifteen years or so, I've been holding on to the dream that I'd have a horse again someday. The past couple of years, I thought it might be close to happening. DH and I have been married for six years, money's okay, and we've been looking, off and on, for a place. We've got the same goal in mind - 20 acres or so, enough room for a garden, some chickens, a horse, a couple of steers for the freezer. Trees. Lots of trees. The ability to look at the stars at night. We both grew up out in the country, and we'd like to get out of town now. I love my neighbors (most of them), but I feel crowded all the time.
I've been thinking lately about whether I should keep holding on to this horse-dream, or give up on it. Yes, I've been in a funk, but it really feels like this just isn't going to happen, at least while I'm young enough to be able to do it. I'm starting to think that it's all been a pipe dream, and that I should just stop deluding myself, suck it up, and get used to the idea that all we'll ever have is a boring cookie-cutter subdivision house with a yard the size of a shoebox. It just doesn't seem to be working out. I swore two years ago that I would sign up for the summer riding program at a local college, and surprise!, I ended up getting pregnant. The baby was due the month before the program started, so there went that. The rest of it seems to be similarly jinxed.
We started looking for a new place about 3 or 4 years ago, and we actually went out with a realtor and looked at a lot of houses. We've slacked off in the past two years, what with the being pregnant and all, and haven't been out realtoring in two years or so, although we keep looking at real estate ads and listings. We can't really take the baby house hunting with us, and while he does have grandparents who'd gladly keep him if they aren't busy, they're 20 minutes away (one way), and by the time we drive out, do the obligatory chit chat, and drive back, it takes an hour if not more. (They babysat while we went to a movie last month. Start to finish, it took 8 hours. Seriously.) Unless DH takes a day off work to go out realtoring, it has to be done on weekends, meaning Saturdays, which are already in short supply.
But, although we looked at a lot of places, we couldn't really find what we wanted at a price we could afford. More on that later. Now, with El Burrito working toward crawling, and this place being seriously not childproof or child friendly, we're running out of time. So, unless we get very lucky and find the Perfect Place soon, we're going to end up buying a house here in town, with the idea of living there for five years or so, and looking for Perfect in the meantime. The problem with that is that we tend to procrastinate. Hell, we've been living here for 6 years, and looking for a place for most of 5. We meant to be in the new place before I got pregnant. Then it was "before the baby's born," then "before he starts to crawl." You see the pattern here? I can easily see us staying in the interim house for 10 years, just out of inertia and apathy. And that alternately frustrates me and depresses me.
Part of the problem is that land prices around here are freaking insane, in my opinion. Land outside the city limits tends to start around $5,000 an acre, and go up from there. Much of it, even farmland 15 miles past the city edge, is priced so high that only a developer can even think of affording it. A few years ago, we looked at an empty lot about 25 miles away, about 7 acres, nothing special. $75,000. It had a creek along one edge, and was probably a flood plain. Not where I'd build a house, thanks very much. We've found two parcels of ground that had a lot of promise so far. One, while almost perfect, was expensive enough that we would have been pushing our limits just to buy it, never mind building a house on it. The other place turned into something of a joke. The guy who was trying to sell it gave us the impression that he'd owned it for 5 or 10 years. Come to find out, he didn't own it at all; he had an offer in to buy it from the current owner and the deal was supposed to have closed a few weeks before we looked at it. The deal hadn't gone through, so he wasn't the owner, and I don't know what the *&^% the realtor thought was going on.
And don't even get me started on the county's rule against selling land in chunks less than ten acres without special permission. You end up with a lot of houses with 9.5 acre lawns, and 90% of the ones I've seen don't even bother to plant a tree, much less do anything other than mow their huge lawn with a lawn tractor. It wouldn't bug me so much if the owners would just do something with the ground - a garden, a few flowers, a couple of trees, whatever. But 9.5 acres of wannabe-golf-course just gripes me unbelievably. Good grief, people, do something with it! A sundial, a hammock, bird house, even a couple of practice holes for the golf game. Go crazy, fence it in and buy a steer for dinner!
But, anyway, I've been wondering why I keep holding on to this dream. Because it'll never be the way I want it to be. My childhood is gone, and I can't get it back. I'll probably never find another horse like my old guy, and if I did, I couldn't afford him and I don't know that I deserve another horse like that anyway. It was different when I lived at home - Dad had a lot of land for his cattle, took care of the upkeep on fencing, raised his own hay. Having a horse on my own would be a whole different ball of wax, and I don't know if I'm capable of taking care of everything. Lord knows, I do a crappy enough job of housekeeping and everything right now, and that's without a full- or part-time job, just a little boy to take care of.
I want a horse. I had a horse growing up, and until I was 24, I couldn't remember a time when there wasn't a horse around. That was just the way things were, and it felt right. Then, on April 15, 2003, my gelding died and things changed. I had another horse for about three years, but it didn't work out and I sold him. Since then, I've been on a horse for about 90 minutes, in Ireland, and spent most of my free time and pocket change on horse books, horse magazines, and a decent-sized collection of model horses (mostly from Breyer, but also cheezy Japanese china horses, metal horses, and one wooden horse with metal inlay). But it's not the same.
For the past fifteen years or so, I've been holding on to the dream that I'd have a horse again someday. The past couple of years, I thought it might be close to happening. DH and I have been married for six years, money's okay, and we've been looking, off and on, for a place. We've got the same goal in mind - 20 acres or so, enough room for a garden, some chickens, a horse, a couple of steers for the freezer. Trees. Lots of trees. The ability to look at the stars at night. We both grew up out in the country, and we'd like to get out of town now. I love my neighbors (most of them), but I feel crowded all the time.
I've been thinking lately about whether I should keep holding on to this horse-dream, or give up on it. Yes, I've been in a funk, but it really feels like this just isn't going to happen, at least while I'm young enough to be able to do it. I'm starting to think that it's all been a pipe dream, and that I should just stop deluding myself, suck it up, and get used to the idea that all we'll ever have is a boring cookie-cutter subdivision house with a yard the size of a shoebox. It just doesn't seem to be working out. I swore two years ago that I would sign up for the summer riding program at a local college, and surprise!, I ended up getting pregnant. The baby was due the month before the program started, so there went that. The rest of it seems to be similarly jinxed.
We started looking for a new place about 3 or 4 years ago, and we actually went out with a realtor and looked at a lot of houses. We've slacked off in the past two years, what with the being pregnant and all, and haven't been out realtoring in two years or so, although we keep looking at real estate ads and listings. We can't really take the baby house hunting with us, and while he does have grandparents who'd gladly keep him if they aren't busy, they're 20 minutes away (one way), and by the time we drive out, do the obligatory chit chat, and drive back, it takes an hour if not more. (They babysat while we went to a movie last month. Start to finish, it took 8 hours. Seriously.) Unless DH takes a day off work to go out realtoring, it has to be done on weekends, meaning Saturdays, which are already in short supply.
But, although we looked at a lot of places, we couldn't really find what we wanted at a price we could afford. More on that later. Now, with El Burrito working toward crawling, and this place being seriously not childproof or child friendly, we're running out of time. So, unless we get very lucky and find the Perfect Place soon, we're going to end up buying a house here in town, with the idea of living there for five years or so, and looking for Perfect in the meantime. The problem with that is that we tend to procrastinate. Hell, we've been living here for 6 years, and looking for a place for most of 5. We meant to be in the new place before I got pregnant. Then it was "before the baby's born," then "before he starts to crawl." You see the pattern here? I can easily see us staying in the interim house for 10 years, just out of inertia and apathy. And that alternately frustrates me and depresses me.
Part of the problem is that land prices around here are freaking insane, in my opinion. Land outside the city limits tends to start around $5,000 an acre, and go up from there. Much of it, even farmland 15 miles past the city edge, is priced so high that only a developer can even think of affording it. A few years ago, we looked at an empty lot about 25 miles away, about 7 acres, nothing special. $75,000. It had a creek along one edge, and was probably a flood plain. Not where I'd build a house, thanks very much. We've found two parcels of ground that had a lot of promise so far. One, while almost perfect, was expensive enough that we would have been pushing our limits just to buy it, never mind building a house on it. The other place turned into something of a joke. The guy who was trying to sell it gave us the impression that he'd owned it for 5 or 10 years. Come to find out, he didn't own it at all; he had an offer in to buy it from the current owner and the deal was supposed to have closed a few weeks before we looked at it. The deal hadn't gone through, so he wasn't the owner, and I don't know what the *&^% the realtor thought was going on.
And don't even get me started on the county's rule against selling land in chunks less than ten acres without special permission. You end up with a lot of houses with 9.5 acre lawns, and 90% of the ones I've seen don't even bother to plant a tree, much less do anything other than mow their huge lawn with a lawn tractor. It wouldn't bug me so much if the owners would just do something with the ground - a garden, a few flowers, a couple of trees, whatever. But 9.5 acres of wannabe-golf-course just gripes me unbelievably. Good grief, people, do something with it! A sundial, a hammock, bird house, even a couple of practice holes for the golf game. Go crazy, fence it in and buy a steer for dinner!
But, anyway, I've been wondering why I keep holding on to this dream. Because it'll never be the way I want it to be. My childhood is gone, and I can't get it back. I'll probably never find another horse like my old guy, and if I did, I couldn't afford him and I don't know that I deserve another horse like that anyway. It was different when I lived at home - Dad had a lot of land for his cattle, took care of the upkeep on fencing, raised his own hay. Having a horse on my own would be a whole different ball of wax, and I don't know if I'm capable of taking care of everything. Lord knows, I do a crappy enough job of housekeeping and everything right now, and that's without a full- or part-time job, just a little boy to take care of.
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