In the last two weeks, it seems that my entire world has been turned completely upside down and it is entirely my fault!  

I always do this.  We get comfortable, things are going really well.  Life is good, great even.  Then I get some crazy idea and it totally throws us for a loop.  It’s what I do, I guess I should just own it.

A few weeks ago, I pointed out that there is a new subdivision under development in our neighborhood.  It’s the first time in a few years that we’ve had new construction in our immediate area, so it was fun to see.  Then I noticed on the sign that the builder was the same builder developing a community not too far from our house.  I told Adam we should go look at the model because I’d never heard of the builder and I was curious.  Totally innocent, promise.  We all like looking at model homes, right?  Right.

We both loved the model and walked out with a packet of information on the new community.  We were surprised that the houses weren’t crazy expensive, we could even afford them - crazy!  I left the packet on the counter and didn’t think much about it until some friends came over for dinner.  They noticed it and all kind of laughed at us.  One told Adam “You know you’re selling your house and buying a new one, right?  You pretty much always give Kristin what she wants.”  I assured them that wasn’t happening, we love our house, it’s our forever home.  We are staying put.

Fast forward two weeks and here’s the house that we love so much:

How did this happen?!  I swear, I just wanted to look at a pretty model and maybe get some decorating ideas!

Here’s the thing though.  While we do love our house and planned to stay here forever, there are some things in it that just don’t work well for us anymore.  We want to put in a pool and there isn’t a bathroom on the back of the house, so we’d have to traipse all over the hardwood floors to get to the bathroom.  Not a deal breaker, but not ideal.  We’re also at the very front of our neighborhood on a corner lot.  We loved it when we bought the house, it means we have a big yard.  The drawback?  Nowhere for the kids to ride their bikes and play out front.  We play in the backyard or have to go out to the main road and sidewalks for bike rides.  It would be really nice to be on a not-so-busy street, maybe in a cul-de-sac, so that the kids could play out front.  We also really want to upgrade our kitchen, but if we do it in this neighborhood, we’d price ourselves out of it.  Our house already has a lot of upgrades that others in our neighborhood don’t so we’re having a really hard time justifying the expense.  We also hate having a two-story house.  I love having the bedrooms/private areas upstairs, but hauling laundry baskets up and down the stairs is a pain.  Gating the stairs off is a pain.  Worrying that we forgot the gate and the kids will get hurt is scary.  And you don’t want to know how many times I’ve fallen down those stairs.  Graceful, I am not.

So we contacted the realtor that we bought our house from eight years ago and started talking to the sales rep in the new community and a mortgage broker.  It took some convincing, but we finally decided that we could make this work and we’d be able to buy the house of our dreams on a fabulous lot with a lot of really great upgrades.  We spent a week getting a few minor things fixed around the house, repainting the trim on the outside, touching up paint inside, decluttering, repainting baseboards.. a lot of little things that took a long time but had a really big impact.  It was a long week with a LOT of trips to Home Depot.  I’d mark one thing off of the list, then think of two or three more to add.  We were up until after midnight and worked through an entire weekend (thanks for the help dad & mom!) but we finally got it ready!  

The house is officially on the market as of yesterday and we have our fingers crossed that the process is relatively quick and easy.  We know the market isn’t great right now, but it seems to be turning around a bit in our area.  The realtor said that homes priced under $300k are selling quickly, while those over the $300k mark are staying on the market a bit longer.  She’s pretty confident that we should have a contract within three or four months.  The realtor hired a really fabulous guy to come out and shoot a virtual tour and pictures of the house.  I’m trying to figure out how to embed it in a post without my address showing, hopefully I’ll be back with a house tour post soon!

For now, I’m trying to stay calm and relaxed about the whole thing, but I am freaking out just a bit.  We were pre-approved to buy the new home while carrying the mortgage on this one, so if we had to we could rent this one out when the new one is built.  That’s not really ideal though and we’d really prefer not to carry two mortgages if at all possible.  Lots of wishful thinking and crossed fingers around here!  If you don’t mind, send some house selling vibes our way!  It’s no fun sitting here staring at my cell phone waiting for the realtors office to call to schedule a showing!