Buying a House

Hey There,

There is no real way to do the five months we spent trying to buy a house justice in one blog post. I am going to try but I am sure to forget something.

Our journey started with us living in a problem ridden apartment. I won't go in to all the problems because there were many in the year plus we were there and I try not to concentrate on it since we don't live there anymore. We took a first time home buyers class and figured out our monthly budget. I will say this about our budget. While in most the country it would have bought us a fine home, in Washington it was a squeeze with our criteria.

What the Hubster (aka He who shall not be tagged) and I were looking for in a home:

• He wanted a yard, with grass, not a postage stamp cement block (That right there sliced a huge chuck of available homes)
• Three bedrooms, because we wanted an office and a guest room
• 1.75 or more bath, we wanted a master bath.
• More than 1000 square feet

Our original search area didn't help any. We work 30 miles apart, so we were trying to find somewhere in between. Preferably somewhere I could bus to work, but that wasn't necessary. We looked at quite a few homes (in the end 20+) in the south of Seattle. We saw homes where people remolded half the house before running out of funds. Homes where people where creating rooms out of garages and closets and basements. One of these had a ceiling so low the Hubster (who is 5'9'') couldn't stand in the room, with a ball cap on, and place a flat palm on his head. It was darn claustrophobic! We were getting very discouraged.

Then our amazing real estate agent convinced us to expand our search East and to townhome style condos. I am so glad she did! It made all the difference in the world. As we moved farther from Seattle the houses we could afford became nicer (yes, I know that shouldn't have surprised me but it did) We finally looked at several homes in the neighborhood me bought in. There is a park, people were out walking their dogs, and it was five minutes from a park and ride with a bus right to the university! In short the neighborhood was perfect! We put in several offers before we got our rambler style condo. With two bedrooms and a den, 1.75 bath, and a yard the size of three postage stamps.

So know we own a house and it is great. we live in a great development full of polite, nice, quiet people. We couldn't have asked for a better outcome to the ordeal of months of house hunting.

That is all for now.

Happy Reading,

Gretchen