We Decided on a House

Finally, after going in and out of what seems like 10 million houses, we decided on one. It's a little more than I'd originally wanted to spend, but both my DH and my dad agree that we're getting a lot of house for the price and it's a darn good investment. I hadn't realized what a cheap-ass I've been until I've heard it from my husband, our mortgage broker, and now my Dad. I guess I'm just kind of chicken in this economy - I've seen enough layoffs affect friends and family (myself included), that I just want to save as much as possible.

Anyway, back to our future home. It's a new rambler - the builder had too many spec homes on the market and had to give some back to the bank. So, we're buying it from the bank. We've been working on getting the price down - we've got it down $80k from it's appraisal price - hopefully Monday will result in still a little more reduced. It still needs gutters, a central air unit, appliances, and a yard. But the main floor is finished with 3 bedrooms/2 bathrooms and nice-sized rooms all around. All the hardware is oil-rubbed bronze, which we also put in the house we built and sold this spring. The woodwork is beautiful and the home has slate tile. Plus, there's a full walk-out basement for DH to finish, so we won't have to worry about him getting bored too quickly.

We've been nicknaming homes as we've been remembering them. There was Clean as a Whistle. The Sinkless Foreclosure. The Victory Home. Terra Bronze. 420. The House with the Sliding Hill. The one we're buying is The Pretty House. It has a pond with geese in the backyard and is in a great location. The neighborhood is great - lots of other pretty homes with beautiful yards - and supposedly lots of families.

My only drawbacks are goose poop and a new neighborhood - which means trees are few and far between. I guess that just means we have some planting to do this fall.

I had my third oil change in 6 weeks on Thursday as I prepared for another trip home to Fargo for the weekend. I'm here, the kids are in bed, and DH went out to pick up a movie. I can't even fathom the last time we sat down a watched a movie. I'm really looking forward to it. I have about 4 loads of laundry to fold, so I won't be a total waste of space. When I suggested we consider packing tonight instead of lounging, DH quickly talked me into some much-needed and much-missed R&R.

Now that my evenings won't consist of drive-through dinners while perusing neighborhoods, desperately looking for FSBO signs (our Realtor has been taking care of monitoring the MLS changes), I will finally get some down time. What a relief! I look forward to the weeks ahead - lots happening, but at least the one biggie is out of the way. Finally.