House Hunting 7.31.11

My momma and I were busy this Sunday! 5 houses! Good times, good times.

I won't mention all of them, just the 2 that were the most........ memorable.

The first house we looked at is now officially my "I could really live here" house.  I know I said that about this house on this post but this time I mean it even MORE.  This house was well within our budget and was totally move in ready.  It had everything we want on our list.  It was great!


Oh, lookie there.  I made the picture bigger.  That's nice.

I mean, look how cute this little home is!  Can you say curb appeal? And look at that covered porch.


When I saw this house the first time online I was a little concerned about that wrought iron gate lookin' thing.  But when we got to the showing it was gone.  I guess it was a baby gate or some such thing.  Also, I would lose the navy blue counter tops.  But that flooring! I am a sucker for hardwoods (hehehehehehe) and that's pretty floor is throughout the house, even in the basement.



The dinning room is right next to the kitchen but it's not an eat in kitchen, which I do not like.  And look at how pretty the view is into the backyard!

The house has 3 nice sized bedrooms (they would have to be repainted.  One of them is little girly with flowers and purple walls.  Cute, but not for me.)  and 2 full baths; one on the main floor and one in the basement.  And please, check out this basement:





The hubby gets the whole basement, man cave, what have you. Except for the laundry room.  I'm sure that will be my domain.  This is the basement bath.



It's freaking HUGE!  The whole basement is so so well done.  I have seen some that are not that great but this one is super nice.

You know what else is super nice?


This huge back yard!  The 2 car garage!



It has a fish pond for crying out loud!

The 411:
Total square feet: 2208
Finished: 1644
Unfinished: 504 (laundry room and storage in basement)
Brick; built in 1960
Asking price: $145,000

Plus, remember how I looked at the house that I could walk to work from?  Well, at this house my hubby could walk to work.  It's just down the street and take a left!  Plus, this place is just down the street from where we live now, and we love the central location.  If it was 2012 I would so buy this house!


Now, on to another house.  This one memorable for different reasons.


Let's start with this AWESOME Photoshop job by the realtor:


HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  And he put in a BMW and maybe some sort of Porsche?  It's hard to say.
Oh, this makes me laugh.

Now, the floors are nice (you know how I feel about hardwoods).





Let me tell you a little secret about this bathroom.........


It was DISGUSTING!  I mean, the toilet bowl was brown and dirty (TMI?) and so was the sink.  It was just gross gross gross.

And apparently something else was gross.  The realtor's breath! HA!  As we were leaving my mom said he might have had the worst breath she has ever smelled.  And my mom would not just say that!  The realtor was not a winner.  He tried to pressure me into buying or leasing the house (ummm, no) and he was wearing shorts.  Now, I know it's been in the high 90s here for weeks but really, the house was air conditioned.  Be professional and put on some pants man!  He also said he would love to work with me.  I politely declined.  If the man will show a house with a nasty bathroom I just can't trust his judgement.  And you shouldn't wear shorts to work.


So there you have it! It was a great Sunday and I cannot wait till this weekend to do it all again!

Photos courtesy of this site.

The One That Got Away

And no, I'm not talking about a trout!

So that house that I looked at last weekend? It’s already off the market.  Looks like someone got the deal of the century.

That house was in excellent shape. And remember that picture of the hardwood floors that I didn’t know where they came from?  The sellers ripped up the carpet and that beautiful flooring was throughout the house!

All the rooms were a good size, the basement showed no signs of water damage or leaking and there was a great spot in the basement to put in an additional full bath.  The backyard was kinda small, but we could have put a pool in back there (for the hubby).  The sellers had a carport and there was probably room to add another so both our cars could be under cover. (Gah! I hate cleaning snow off my car in the winter.)

The street was SO quite and as momma and I left we went out a different way than we came in and the neighborhood behind the house? Wowsers.  Super nice.  With that house on the market for 125k and a few upgrades; extra bath, finish the basement, update the kitchen & current bath it would easily resell for at LEAST 175k, if not more.  Even in this market.

But alas, we are not QUITE ready to make a purchase.  I just know that when we are the PERFECT house will be out there, waiting for us. 

On another note, with the weather being so BEASTLY, momma and I passed on house hunting this week and I slept until 3 on Sunday.  What a life!

What about you? Any houses you’ve seen that were a steal? Or maybe you were lazy like me this weekend? Whatever your story, I’d love to hear it!

I could walk to work!

Tomorrow my momma and I are going to look at this house!

It is in a NICE part of town.  The fancy, nice part of town where they only thing I could ever do out there is work....... and I have for the past 5 years.  So this would be great, location wise, for me.  Not so much for the hubby who now works less than 5 minutes from home to his workplace.  It takes him more time to walk from his car to his office on the 5th floor than it does to drive!   I, on the other hand, have to drive 15-30 minutes on 2 expressways to get to the office and when we more offices  (posts to come, I'm sure!)  I'll be 20-30 minutes away. Therein lies the major beauty of this house....... I could walk to our new office from here!

I seriously can not believe that a house in that area could be in our price range.  And so much in our price range that we would have money left to finish the basement, add a  full bath and update the full bath already in the home.  We might have to do those upgrades over the course of a year but they would be done.  And then we would have a great house in a great part of town.

Some of the places needing a little TLC:

It looks like just the flooring and tile would have to be replaces.  I can handle the vanity and toilet and the tub will certainly do.  I like that it looks so clean!

The basement already has walls.  Granted, they are wood paneled walls, but thanks to younghouselove, I know how to get those dated knotty pines to look new and fresh.  (How about them Petersik's...... what CAN'T they do?!)  My husband is going to have his "man cave" down here so I want it to be a great space for him.  We'd also need to put a 3/4 bath own here.  I think that would go in first and then we would work on the painting and flooring issues for the rest of the space.

Isn't this flooring loverly?  I'm not exactly sure where it IS, exactly, but I know it looks nice.  I totally prefer hardwood floors over carpeting.  I had them in my house growing up and in my first apartment and I think they add much more character to a home than carpeting does.

Do you prefer hardwood flooring or soft, comfy carpet? 

I'll post a follow up next week about how this home showed!

Photos curtesy of Family Realty

House Hunting 7.10.11

Eventually I'll make a post about my specific house requirements, what requirements need to be met before we buy and our savings thus far.  But for now I'm just gonna focus on this GREAT house.

My momma and I go house hunting almost every Sunday. She was out of town this week so I went by myself to look at a few. The first one is a bit out of my comfort zone, price-wise, but it really is the first house I could actually see myself in. I love it! but it might be TOO much house for just the husband and myself.

Ain't it a beaut?

Photo courtsey of  Family Realty 

It has all our needs and wants covered. 2.5 baths, FOUR bedrooms, a formal dining room, mostly hardwood floors and a full finished basement.  Some of my favorite features are

• the 2 sets of stairs! One set is in the living room and the other is just off the kitchen. The 2 meet at a landing and then you follow a new stairway up to the 2nd floor. It's so cute! And the stairs aren't directly in front of the front door. I do not like the way that looks.  Plus, I think it's a no no in regard to fung shei. We must respect all cultures!
• that the main living area consists of the large living room, dining room and kitchen; it also has a half bath off the kithcen, which is GREAT for entertaining.  There is a full bath on the top and bottom floors, but your guests don't need to be all up in your bathroom bid'ness.  They can just use the properly named "guest bathroom" with its rarely used towels and nice smelling soap.  Plus, it's easy to keep a bathroom you never use clean!
• the hardwood floors on the main level that are beautiful, the carpet upstairs which is nice and plush and the basement because it doesn't feel all basement-y.  It's really nicely done with the block windows that let in a bunch of light. Perfect for my husband because that's where he's gonna have all his movie/comic book/regular book/sports randomness.  And he will love it!  He will.  
• I also like that there isn't much to do to it (and for the price there better not be) before you moved in.  Some new paint in the bedrooms, natually. I am personally not a fan of Peyton Manning (it steams from my college years spent just miles away from where he played college ball) and the little girl motif is really not my style but I could deal with the paint color in the main floor for a while.  And even though that half bath isn't very impressive it would certainly do for the time being.

The yard is very small but it does have a large garage and plenty of off street parking.  It's in a great neighborhood, centerally located and I am pretty sure I could get that house for less than the asking price. But alas, we won't be ready to buy til at least next year. 

But that's okay. For now, I just love going window shopping for houses!

What about you? Are you thinking of buying in this buyers market? Or have you been burned by the housing crisis? I'd love to hear your story!