Hey friends!! Ok so, our house hit the market last week and I’m ready to open up and chat about everything that has gotten us to this point. Its been a whirlwind to say the least. I guess the beginning is a pretty great place to start? Buckle in, cause this is going to be a long story.
I first need to start off by saying that its been really hard to not talk about and I’m kind of over keeping things shushed. Over the next few posts you are going to get a lot of backstory to catch you up to speed and then all of my secrets will be out and we can be best friends again. I hate having to stay mum about stuff, especially stuff that is interesting and can help other people on their journey. I also want to say, this is not a Surprise! We bought a secret house! situation, its still very unresolved, raw, and up in the air. Are you ready to join me and be my support team?
I’m about to spill my guts, hope you’ve got a catchers mitt.
As backward as this sounds there is nothing more perfect to me than the potential of an unfinished space. Anticipation of the inspiration that will launch it into action, and the process of creating something new are my favorite addictions. For me, its not about the finished project, its actually not about the project at all. Its about who I become while I’m working on it. DIYing saved me in the most literal sense of the word. I am the best version of myself when I’m neck deep in a creative problem.
Last October we decided that we were ready for something different, the boy wonder was coming to join our family and I was itching for a change. Our house is wonderful and adorable and was pretty much done, and I love living in a creative construction zone (it just feels really good to my heart.) So we started this whole moving/house hunting process, and I kept it secret for fear of something not panning out and looking wishy-washy and amateur-ish to millions of people. I didn’t want to say “We are doing this _______________” and then a week later say “Actually we are doing this __________________” and then 3 days later say “Both of those times I was lying, we are really real life doing ___________________”. But the reality of the situation is that THAT IS THE REALITY OF THE SITUATION. Its emotional and hard and extremely touch and go for everyone. No one wants to look a fool to their friends and family (let alone the entire internet) or jinx it, or spill the beans too soon. But, I should know by now that you guys are way more supportive than to judge me for that. Remember this gut spilling that happened mid Nugget reno?
p.s. As I’m typing this out it seems so lame to be scared of that.
Sidenote: I think keeping all of this stuff inside and secret from all of you was a huge contributing factor to my depression. I was in a really broken place and the potential backlash from internet strangers (that normally isn’t an issue for me) was just more than I could emotionally handle. My biggest fear was that you guys would think that I was fake and that we were moving just to continue to create content for the blog and would hate me and my house and my family and all bloggers ever for it. I’m in such a better place now and can see how skewed the fear was. So is that the case? Nope. But man, isn’t the blog a great perk? It means I have all of you to take the ride with.
Back to the story, we decided as a family that moving was a pretty great idea. So we did what most people in our situation do, we started looking at houses. I know that Southern Utah is not known for its trendsetting ways but man alive, if I see another MLS listing with beige walls, beige tile, beige stucco, and granite countertops I.AM.GOING.TO.LOSE.MY.FREAKING.MIND. Its the craziest thing, the houses all look the same whether they are $150k or $1.5 million. I mean, obviously the quality and size is different, but the finishes are all the same! Its maddening!!
I combed through every listing for months and every time felt so blah about it. I wanted something special that had soul (remember this guy I loved?!) Court wanted something that had been built in this century and had A/C.
He can be such a killjoy.
You guys know that I talk openly about everything, so though I understand its a little taboo to talk about money, I feel fine about it, hopefully you do to! To get the square footage that we wanted (3000-3500) our purchase price was going to be in the $300k-$500k range. Naturally I looked at everything from $1 million down to $200k (cause why not maybe I would find a long lost uncle that was loaded?) It was a huge bummer to see that we needed to spend $400k to hit our square footage goal but would then need to completely update everything on top of that. Travertine is NOT my friend.
The next (and obvious) option was to build. This is where the story gets really long so I’m going to end this post here and we’ll pick up at this point in the next one.
To really make this series as informative as possible, here is what I need to know from you. What things in the house selling, hunting, building, buying situation do you want to talk about? I really want this to be something that you can chime in below with your experience so that its a great reference point for anyone in the house buying/selling frame of mind. I’ve got my experience but you’ve also got your experience and that is valuable information that I would love to use my platform to share. How deep should I dive into it? Is money too weird to touch on? What about getting lending? Do you want to know my credit score? How about my blood type? Thoughts?
I LOVE home buying and selling. Like if I was an extrovert I should’ve been a realtor. I love financing and number crunching and all that jazz so bring on whatever you got! I think most readers, like myself, are just so grateful that you are willing to let us watch your journey. No judgments, just thankful and inspired hearts!
Oh yes, we were contemplating a move to Utah and did house searches. So. much. off-white and gold chandeliers and houses with zero personality! But that’s modern housing all over; they expect the homeowners will put their own stamp on it and hey, crown molding is not cheap, so fewer details = lower building costs.
House selling, I haven’t done that in 20 years so I’m petrified of even thinking of doing it. How do you get ready? What things do you have to do before putting the house up for sale? Is it better to leave that dark green paint in the foyer or have someone redo everything in beige or just offer a paint credit?
Frankly, money and lending are important topics and I think it doesn’t get touched on enough. When we looked, we were keeping a certain number in our head that quickly proved to be enough, as long as we wanted to gut and renovate the entire house. Most were foreclosures with green pools, missing ducting, and no toilets. So, you have to know how high are you willing to go and how much can you afford while looking for that dream home.
Credit score, wow, it drives what you’ll be told you can afford. It’s a yucky subject but important. Knowing where you stand from the get go helps immensely in the buying process.
I’d also like to see an honest discussion about realtors. Frankly, I know they’re important, but mine seemed to think I was “being picky” when I said there was a major roadway right behind the fence or there was no a/c ducting (every system and light had been removed by a vindictive owner). I knew what I wanted and I knew I needed no major roadway behind my fence and no slanted floors and especially, I needed ducting. There was no way the VA would approve a loan for a house that wasn’t habitable. I really wanted to fire her but at the same time, she’d put in so much work I couldn’t.
I ended up finding my current house accidentally; while trolling through the neighborhood looking for house signs, we saw someone had flipped this one. So we called the realtor and it was ours. I still felt awkward, she was very sweet but wasn’t a great match and I’d liked to have known how to break up without being rude.
As far as the house itself, a frank discussion about inspections and what to look for would be useful for those who’ve never really thought about such things as builder grade cabinets, OSB flooring, true HVAC needs and fast, cheap repairs versus well-done professional jobs (they patched in carpet pieces. In the Master bath. It was undetectable until we’d been in the house 6 months. Then we learned to tile. Fast.)
That’s all I have. Good luck on the transition, it’ll be interesting to watch someone else go through the process we’ll be going through in a few years!
I’m all for being as thorough as possible! We’ve had to put career goals ahead of buying a house so we’re still renting and I feel like getting a home/building is overwhelming! I’m also open to talking money because I like getting a realistic picture of what things really cost. Not the HGTV number lol Excited to see what this next stage brings for you and your family!
I would love to hear more experiences building a house – and I wish I had that info about a year ago. We just finished building a house and moved in a few weeks ago and it was the most stressful thing ever. Way more frustrating and difficult than doing a full home reno. When you DIY a reno, you get to make ALLLL the decisions which we enjoyed. When you build you can find a builder that will claim to be “custom” but then oh, I didn’t realize you WANTED to choose your window colors? And oh, look, the sub-contractor didn’t get the list of changes you made and put a window in the wrong spot. Oh and sure you can get that arabesque tile from Home Depot for $12/sq ft but the sub-contractor only gets tile from one supplier and they charge $40/sq ft. The amount of money we were over budget at the end still gives me nightmares. I love the house now! But we’re broke!
I would love to know the process of buying land and figuring out how to build on it and how you can build part of the house DIY while being your own GC and hiring your own subs to do things like foundation and the outside and framing. this is something I would really like to do one day in the somewhat distant future
I second the land buying and building on it request (not that is what you did) but if you have any experience with that……and I don’t mean buying land in a subdivision but more raw land covered in trees. Actually if anyone wants to pipe in on that it would be So helpful!!! how do you budget for running power, running water, clearing trees, prepping land…………?
I am currently in the same situation as you. I agree about every house house looking the same with the same beige colors. It drives me crazy. My hubby and I have done the “we’re going to buy, no we are going to build” dance for months. We decided if we are going to spend our hard earned money on a house it will be a house we love. Something with character and that reflects our individual personalities. So many houses here in Idaho are boring, cookie cutter houses. No. I can’t do it. I think the building route would be great for you because it will be a fun project but you can make it just what you want and need. Good luck! I’ll be watching to see what what you do……and maybe steal a few ideas as we are building our house.
I can so relate to the need for being in the process of a project. 4 yrs ago we bought a fixer on a rehab loan. We aren’t even completely done with the first house but last year we bought a burned down property. There’s something magic about imagining all the possibilities as we clean up the mess!
We are on the cusp of needing to figure out the new house design. I love mid-century, craftsmen, PNW styles, cabins, farmhouses. The clean slate of a vacant property feels like too many options! If you guys are building i’d love to hear if you struggled with how to narrow down the options.
It’s very interesting to me to hear these stories from others going through a situation that I might be going through at some point too. I feel that I learn a lot from listening to another persons experience. I agree with the above comment that I am grateful that you are willing to take us on this journey with you. Your current home is lovely and it would be very interesting to see what you would do with a new space. Congrats to you!
Thank you for taking us along on this journey and keeping it real (as always). We are hoping to move into a bigger home in the near future as our family is growing but the struggle you talk about with the finishings is R.E.A.L. here in south Texas too. If anything is updated it is to dark brown cabinetry, vomit-colored granite, beige walls, brown furniture, beige tile, and brown everything on the outside. It’s like there’s some unwritten code that everything you do to a home down here has to be in some shade of Snickers or poop. And most of the homes haven’t even been updated AT ALL but yet they cost JUST AS MUCH as a new home?! It has been so disheartening and I have no idea if we’ll find something, brown or outdated, that I can be “me” in, so we stay for now. Ugh. Sending you a big hug and am rooting y’all on <3
We are in this exact same spot Every house we look at within budget would cost so much more to make it ours. (Indiana also has lots of beige, and hideous travertine)….it almost hurts my heart more when it advertises “newly re done bathroom!’ and they are just horrible. Would have rather they not re done the bathrooms so we could have gotten a better price and re done them ourselves. The other idea is building…but we need to find land to do that. Good luck! Cant wait to hear what you decide!
I’m super interested to hear about building! The only people I know who have built did so in one of those tract development places where you get to choose from a couple different house plans. Meh. I have no interest in doing that. I would love to hear the ins and outs of building a house from scratch, though, so if you guys end up doing that, I’m all ears! Good luck, Mandi and company!
I like the way your brain works, so I’m in 🙂
Haha. I’ve actually said this about her in another post! She is so dang refreshing! MANDI, as some random that is head over heels for u and ur life, I want to tell u my lil motto for living life… it helps me make every desicion I ever make. “If I can’t tell my mom (she is VERY judgey) don’t do it!” Secrets kill!!! Haha so live ur life honestly and open and IF someone judges u it REALLY is THEIR problem. Thank you for being awesome…♡♡♡
If you choose to build…it’s crazy educational. My husband and I were young and too economically challenged to buy, so we built. We acted as our own GC and, despite the stress, it was ridiculous fun. When all was done, we had a home we designed, helped build with our own hands, and gained an understanding of how our home functioned – which means we fix our own crap now unless the big dogs are necessary (furnaces are scary). I can run some serious PVC now, have my own tile trowel collection, and can shim the crap out of anything. I’d love to follow your adventures if you build…I’ll stay tuned!
Reading this post immediately makes me think of “Daring Greatly” by Brene Brown. (Have you read it? You should!) All those gremlins in your head tried to silence you but you let yourself be vulnerable in front of the world and found new strength. Your deepest fear was that we’d think you were a fake but I can tell you that for me personally I was shocked to read that. It never, ever would have occurred to me to think such a thing. Never stop being Mandilicious! You inspire me to expose my own vulnerability and try something new.
Very well said!!! I concur!!!
We have been going through this exact thing! We looked at old houses, we looked at building in a builder neighborhood, my grandma has land we could build on (sooo complicated though), and we have been back and forth a million times. Then my husband gets a new job that’s all commission and now we have to wait 2 more years. I am already self employed and the whole tax return/net income s a total nightmare. Would love to hear everything about your experience. All of it.
Oh my goodness! I love talking about houses, especially building them. We built our house and moved in three years ago next week (with a 4-year-old, a two-year-old and a 6-week-old. I spent my maternity leave wearing my baby while meeting with contractors!). Our house was totally custom, as in I sketched the plans on a piece of paper and gave it to the architect and said “Here, put this in CAD.” We had a blast and would absolutely do it again if we didn’t love our current house so much we’ll never leave. I would be thrilled to hear about your journey and offer any advice I can. Or just look at pretty pictures of things!
Funny that I read this post as my husband and I are on our way to court mediation as we are suing the people we bought our house from. My biggest piece of advice is to ask your insurance agent to run a report on a potential house to see all past claims. That data is stored and can be used if like in our case the sellers lived in their home for 30 years and filed a flood claim. They did not disclose it on their sellers agreement like they were legally supposed to. So we have spent thousands of dollars to fix the issue and now are left with the burden of selling this house and disclosing the flood mitigation work.
I love home buying and selling and really want to get my real estate license! If you are comfortable talking about money, then I think it’d be great. I think it can paint a real picture for people who don’t know too much about this. I think you were checking about sharing the credit score, but I do think it’d also be good to share if you needed to do anything to help your credit/secure lending. I’ve bought a house before so know a bit about this, but I remember when I was in the buying process two years ago, I tried finding blogs that talked about real life stuff like this and just didn’t have any luck finding anything!
My hubby and I know all about building houses. We live in Hurricane. Our home is 5800 sq ft. We literally built almost the entire thing by ourselves, from paper to finished product. The only things we subbed out was the framing for the main floor (yup, he and I did the basement), sheetrock (because that’s not fun), the stucco and the roof (both dangerous). Anywho, we started in December of 2015 and moved in August of 2015. Not bad for the size of house we have and we did almost all of it ourselves. Anyway, it cost us about $180k to build, with the land and we owe less than $60k on it. We saved up over the years and do a lot of DIY. 🙂 Building is definitely better than just buying. I still have a long ways to go on my home as far as decorating goes. I’m not as creative as you… But I’m confident I’ll get my home to look the way I want it too.
We are in the exact same boat right now. It’s so exhausting. And trust me, AZ is no better with the ‘beige everything situation’. Barf. I’m convinced that timing is everything; when it’s right it’ll all work out. Good luck with your search!
Anything and everything you want to share, I want to read! I know the internet is tricky but it surprised me to read how worried you felt – all I know is you are amazing and it feels like a privilege to get to share in your experiences so do whatever feels right and exciting and creative for you and we will keep showing up to share in all that!
I’m so excited to read about your journey, struggles, excitement, etc! We recently sold our house in salt lake and looking to make the move it Southern Utah, which has always been a dream of ours. Being new to the area with no friends or family, I’m a little nervous but we love the area and it is so beautiful! Any insight and tips or tricks you have I am excited to read about!
Oh my I can relate. We’ve put 3 offers on 3 different houses in the last 2 years. So much excitement and disappointment.
Finally got one! Good luck
#1 piece of advice, find a great Realtor! So many DIYer’s want to try the buying/selling on their own because they’re used to doing that with their home renovations. Bad idea! There is just so very much involved that buyers/sellers are really doing themselves a disservice trying to go it alone. Your Realtor will guide you through the process, point you in the right direction with financing & ensure it’s all as seamless and painless as possible.
I concur. It was painful to pay the realtor fee, but honestly given the special circumstances of our last house. (Very steep driveway.) We needed someone completely on our side who could “sell” our house and the benefits. She was invaluable to our move and was able to help us find the perfect buyer.
So, obviously we just moved. Not because we have to but because I fell in love with a house that needed lots of love and wanted to start over just one more time. It has been stressful, but not overwhelmingly so, because I know we are creating a home we love.
We have built a house and had new construction a couple times and I must admit that I kind of like the reno better. Everything happens much more quickly with a build and there are so many constraints. We loved the new houses but in comparison,working with quirky elements in an existing house make it much more unique.
Either way, I know what you do will be awesome! Best of Luck.
We are all your friends. The once that are snarky, delete them and unfriend them. I have some definite ideas about buying houses since am will be 70 in 3 weeks. I will think about this all and make a list. You can always change the house, but not the location and usually not the land. You don’t buy a house because you envision your furniture in it. You are now mature enough (yah, yah, I knew you when.) that You are ready to make some really good hard choices. And who the heck cares what some readers think. It is your house and your life and you will attract the people you want. I’m not clear about the depressions, if you mentioned it or not, but I could have helped. I am an expert in that department, having suffered a long, long, time.
Wishy washy is part of life! We made 3 offers on 3 houses and had 3 home inspections before settling on a house. Talk about feeling amateurish each time we cancelled the loan or told friends we weren’t getting that house after all. Can’t wait to watch your journey unfold!
I want to hear it all! We’re considering moving soon. I live in northern Utah and the options up here aren’t any better. Beige. Beige as far as the eye can see!
We currently live in one of those quick-build “custom” homes where you get to choose your layout, finishes, etc from a couple pre-set options (we ended up going this route because, again, all existing options were beige beige beige!). A tip I have for anyone building is to walk through your house as if it’s pitch black and think of where you need light switches. We never even gave them a thought until we moved in and realized when going down the stairs, there’s no light switch to turn on for the main floor unless you go down the hallway or around the corner! So you have to grope around for it in the dark. It sucks and seems like a no brainer to have a switch there but we didn’t think of it and apparently neither did the builder!
As a recently retired Realtor (20+ years), I can give you some very important Points
1. Before you even start looking, talk to a lender and go through the process of getting pre-qualified. You need to know from the beginning just what you can afford and what you may be willing to pay. When you find a home you love, you will know that it is in your price range and the seller will know you have done your homework. Sellers need to know that the potential buyer can afford the property and that the deal will not fall through because of financing. Win-win.
2. Pick the area you want to live in that fits your finances and find a Realtor that works in that particular area and knows a lot about it. Check with the local police and find out what the crime rate is in that area. Contact the school district to make sure your kids will be in a good district. (Don’t just ask somebody – do your own research.) Drive the neighborhood in the morning, noon and night to know how the traffic flows.
3. Picking a Realtor – don’t just pick one off a sign you see. Check the websites and choose an agent that has experience and education. When I retired and we moved to another part of Texas, I checked with the local Realtor Board and found a person that was awarded Top Sales agent in the area. And she was definitely awesome.
There are more steps than this, of course, but these should point you in the right direction for a good start. If you find the right agent, he/she should be able to guide you. I’m open to help answer any other questions you may have. And Happy Hunting!!
I’m excited for this series!! We currently live in our starter home but would like to sell and upgrade to a larger home in 1-2 years, so I would definitely love any advice about prepping your home for sale and getting it on the market!
I am ALLL about numbers and planning, so I’m totally open to hearing about money most of the time. If it’s budgeted in, and you want to spend $1000 on tile for one room and budget on something else, then I would love to hear about that, cost of paint labor vs. doing it yourself. Also, I love to hear more about if you do decide to build, why you chose to put a cabinet here, or a shelf there, lighting (natural and artificial), and all that good stuff! Love you blog and how real you are, we all have something in our lives that isn’t perfect and I think it’s SUPER brave of you to share that with so many people, you ROCK! On a side note, I have been BEGGGGGING my husband to let me get a little trailer to overhaul becuase of the nugget and how much I loved that series.
As someone in their mid 20’s and completely home/decor obsessed I would love to see your entire journey. I’ve never done it and I love your voice, reading about your experience (however you choose to share it) will be such a joy.
Will be good reading through your journey! I’m currently undergoing a deep, all out reno in a 30-ish year old apartment. We could not afford building and also not justify it – so many places already built, I keep thinking about the waste of resources. Also I like things with a history to them. So we’re happily going crazy mix-matching my man’s desires and mine while planning everything to not need to re-do anything for as long as we stay in the same place…
When we decided to move, we went from Minnesota to Missouri. I searched on the internet for almost 4 yrs, then my husband got on the phone to talk with a realtor about one property, it was sold. He talked my hubby into coming down to look at another that ‘was priced right’. Server always other trips had been made down here prior to this on weekends only. Well, needless to say, we bought this ‘priced right’ acreage. We decided to go with an out of the box type home. It’s a pole barn that was used as a shop. Some of the transformation was done when we seen it so that gave us a vision. The price was crazy reasonable, 7 acres with a double story work shed (2400sq ft each level) a useable chicken ‘ house’ and our 2400 sq ft shouse for under $40,000.We haven’t gotten a whole lot done with it yet as we wanted to pay it off quickly (16 mos), yay! We’ve decided to save cash and do what we can when we can rather than borrow money. We don’t have much for money so it’ll take time but we’re very happy here! My best advice to anyone is not to over extend yourselves, be sure to be able to live without as much as you earn now, you never know how the economy will be in the future.
Be happy, enjoy life and enjoy your new adventure!
Ps, I love your blog!
Can’t wait to keep reading!!! Love your guts!
I love hearing these conversations. Buying a home is weird and tricky. We got pre-approved, flew 3000 miles, looked at close to 25 homes in 2 days, picked one that we thought we could live with for 3 years, and flew back. 5 weeks later we moved across the country (literally coast to coast) and picked up the keys. It was crazy-pants. And there was no “we’ll work on it for a bit before we move in” deal. We stayed in a hotel for 3 nights while finalized paperwork, then ripped out carpet, installed flooring ourselves, and painted as fast as we could. We are probably set to sell this house in the next year and it’s nerve-wracking. Tell as much as you want! But some level of privacy can be a good thing. (I totally understand why other bloggers have done the “surprise new house” deal- the whole thing is so complex and uncertain until the last moment)
About your concern: if you had decided to sell your house, buy a new one, remodel it entirely and than move just for the blog, it would have meant that you expected to earn enough from it to compensate the hard work, the time and the money invested. It is called having a (non conventional) job. Honestly, it wouldn’t be something to be ashamed of!!
We had a basic 1700 square foot house built for us and moved in a year ago. We needed to get in a house as soon as we could as we had outgrown our little rental. Hubbie is now adding on so house will be 2500.. at same time we are doing 2 timber frame porches on it. He also put in a plank wood wall and fireplace etc. By doing it this way it was affordable..and now we are making it uniquely ours. Good luck on your house hunt/plans!
We just bought a house and we were casually hunting for at least a year. I agree with you about always feeling so wishy washy and would want to purchase one house but then it’s pending and then we find something else we kind of like and the same thing over and over. Can’t wait to see where this journey takes you
I love your story! You have inspired me and given me courage. Thank you.
I want to know ALL.OF.IT! I am looking at the same slew of options and want to build or buy or who knows so I would love the whole enchilada!
I had been thinking you’d been inserting some distance between yourself and us for the past several months. I’m glad you’re feeling like you’ve got your zest back and I love hearing what you’re up to. It’s inspiring and in turn reminds me of my potential. Best to you and your family!
Most of us love being flies on the wall while someone goes through a life changing process, and even share input on occasion…but that being said, bottom line–you have to do what’s right for you and your family. We all have unique situations and to pass judgment on other’s circumstances is not OK. Good luck! My husband and I are building a house. If you go that route, pick an awesome builder and it will be the experience of a lifetime!
We just moved into our 2nd home in April of this year. It was a builder spec home, so it wasn’t what I would have wanted or picked if I was building it, but I think that’s the majority of our situations. We don’t have what we want, so we are looking for ways to make it what we want (hence reading all your fabulous posts and ideas!!!!). I like that you don’t have the perfect spaces, so you make it work, just like we all do. It keeps you real, likable, and relatable (did I just make that word up?). But, no matter what your decision is, we’ll still be excited to share the journey with you. Personally, I think it’s more fun to see how you’ve become creative with space that is already there, but watching the process would be cool as well…just not something I think the majority of people will ever get to experience.
Thank you for always sharing and being real!!
Move to Prescott. The end. There are some killer craftsman dreams that you’d love! I’m just gonna start sending you listings til you move here. I love your face and finding/buying our house was the biggest emotional roller coaster of my life. Blllaaaahhhh…. You’ve got this.
We’ve been meaning to get rid of our beige walls, ceilings, baseboards everything for 4 years and finally just did it. It is life changing! And it was so completely exhausting. I’m glad my husband didn’t leave me. But seriously brown ceilings????
First, thank you for your candor. Too many fall into everything is wonderful and that is fine-sometimes but to be transparent is to offer a unique perspective that no one else can do. Money talk is touchy so I say speak of terms of three types of budgets. Offer input as to options for each tier. Give stage ideas i.e.; smalls changes now vs. total remodels from the beginning. Where lenders/lending are concerned give options for what is out there and types of things to avoid like overextended yourself based on gross income vs what really comes home. Lenders are guilty here. I saved for two years and really focused on what we wanted vs what we could afford. If we found something and knew we would have to overextend ourselves we passed on it. It’s a hard choice when you think you’re missing out on a good thing but in the long run if you can’t afford to personalize it then all the fun goes out the window. We did finally a house that met our requirements and we LOVE it. It’s 116 yr old farmhouse! We’ve done small remodeling for today and are saving for a big kitchen remodel as soon as we have enough to do it the way we want it. I love your posts and I admire you for being willing to share the whole process! Best of luck to you! ❤️
So excited to see your journey!!!
& You can totally talk about money! We are looking into similar sq footage also & the price ranges out there are wide! Can’t wait to see what you find!
I love your stories! I agree with the contributor who mentioned privacy. Organize yourself and prepare every needful thing… you know… but don’t run faster… that is the trick with building. It can be such a marathon. We built our last house…not the one we live in now. I am glad I got to pick what I picked but it was A. LOT. of picking. It was exhausting with small babies. My babies are not so small now and when we moved across three states my good friend gave me the best advice. Buy a Neighborhood. And so we did. We bought a neighborhood we loved but not exactly a dream house. It is small but price wise, manageable. We have met so many amazing people in our neighborhood. The people have made it all worth the while. I have to say my neighbors are dear friends and that has made all the difference. I still have yet to paint over the basement’s colonial, nineties blue… and rip up the similar shade of carpet. So the pros of building the house is NONE O’ That.
Hi ! Just a quick word : do talk about money, please. It’s just irritating to me when well-known bloggers fail to mention that, yes, they did DIY their hearts out to get custom shelving at a portion of the retail cost etc etc BUT before that they spent a million to get the tall ceilings and the hardwood floors and the huge windows that they wanted… It just makes me hate my normal-sized windows and walls when I’m not told clearly what the dream house pictured on the blog costs. So please don’t be self conscious. You’re a hard working, talented family, whatever money you’re able to spend on a house, you’ve deserved it.
I used to work on the foreclosure side of Mortgage Default and honestly I love when somebody takes an old abused forclosed home and makes it beautiful. When we were searching about 3 yrs ago (and 4 years ago, it takes soooo long) we primarily only looked at foreclosures and short sales. You get more bang for your buck which is especially great when you have upper middle class wants on a middle class budget lol. I sincerely hope your search for your diamond isn’t as long and painful as ours was. I was thankfully prepared for all the unaccepted offers, outbiddings, and heartbreak, but I see so many people get discouraged and lost after losing out on just one or two offers. We lost out on 10!! In approximately an 8 month period! If I had allowed my fiancé to give up when he wanted we would still be renting an overpriced and poorly built townhouse.