fairyrune | House Hunting Update (Reply)

We ended up seeing three houses today instead of four. Apparently one of the ones we were supposed to see got an accepted offer.

The first one is definitely off the table. The yard was gorgeous, but that was about the only thing we liked. The interior layout was awful, the ceiling was patched (badly) in places, and the kitchen needed some serious love. Also, there were no closets.

For the "Why would you do that?" files: This particular property had a garage that had been converted into a storage area. (They took down the garage door and put up a wall with a regular door.) The *only* access to the basement is in the garage, and through a small doorway, which was covered with a Sponge Bob Square Pants blanket (terrifying!). The basement is just tall enough for me to stand in, and it's where the laundry machines are located. The dryer, might I add, is vented into the not-garage.

To do the laundry, I would have to take the dirty clothes out of the house, down the slate steps, around the corner, into the garage, and through the hole in the wall. In what universe does THAT make sense?

We liked the second house a bit better, but it needs a TON of work. It's a short sale, and was reduced by 30k back in June. There's plenty of room, and the layout is much better than the first house we saw. It even has a secret trap door to the basement! However, the heat and electric are not currently on in the home, and I am concerned about the pipes. I'm also not entirely comfortable with the amount of work it would need. The house is priced so that we'd be able to afford it, but I'm just not sure if I want to deal with a complete kitchen (re)model right off the bat. It would need to be done, though, since there isn't really anything resembling a functioning kitchen there now. We're leaving it on the list, but hoping to find something better.

I like the third house we saw best, but Rich likes the second. The third house has almost an acre of land, and backs up onto some woods. Where the second house's deck looks into the neighbor's place, the third just looks out into the trees. It's quite lovely. The interior layout is decent, though the kitchen is at one end of the house all by its lonesome. It's a fairly huge kitchen, with a really nice dining area. There's also a formal living room, and a family room. The bedrooms are a decent size, and while the bathroom needs some love it's pretty functional. There's a lovely front entrance with benches.

The problems with that house are mostly structural. We didn't get to see the main basement, because the steps appear to be made out of stacked cinder blocks. There wasn't a hand rail, so we didn't go down there. We saw a second basement, which just has a door to the back yard and isn't connected to the main house. For some reason, the washer's in there. I REALLY don't get this "You have to take your laundry outside then back inside," thing. There appeared to be a bit of mold in the family room, which would be a deal-breaker if it was bad enough. The roof also looked like it might need some work.

Our agents (we have two!) are going to find some more listings for us to look at. Hopefully we'll be doing that next Saturday morning.

This is very exciting!