Drivebys and the Green Rambler & MCM houses

I drove by about 10 houses tonight.  It's always interesting to do drive bys.  You learn a lot about the neighborhood.  My poor dog, Charlie, was super patient and didn't budge from his curled up ball on the seat for hours.  I have a great and patient Golden Retriever that can't live with us until we get a house.  I actually kept about 6+ houses on my list, although a few were out of our price range.  I can hope that the bank would take less right?  Our Realtor said the average house is going for 3% less.  I'm shooting for about 10%+ less at this point.

There is a house that I'm really excited (the Green Rambler) about but unfortunately, it is set back a bit from the road and people were standing in the driveway.  I decided I liked the neighborhood.  The house is on a street that dead-ends into a cul-de-sac.  We both grew up on cul-de-sacs and we're big fans.  I decided it could wait until Saturday to see the actual house in person.  I did do a lot of satellite stalking and Google Maps stalking.  Also, that house is technically 15,000 over our budget but there's always a slim bit of hope right?  I was driving by all these houses and would see additional ones that didn't show up on my searches.  I wrote down the addresses for several houses but after researching, I see that they are all about 100,000 out of my price range and the bulk of those were Short Sales.  We have decided that Short Sales do not work with our schedule and financing situation, so we're sticking with bank-owned and owner sellers.

There are a lot of questions of this house.  Our Realtor knows the listing agent and he said the bank was going back and forth with a buyer but we could go see it on Saturday.  He did tell her that there was some water damage and that is why this house was on the market for such an extreme difference of the other houses.

You can see in the picture of the bedroom that there are lot so of holes in the wall, I think it might have had copper wiring and pipes - so someone went through the house and stole those elements to sell.



These are the other houses I drove by:

This one is the Gardener's Delight (all dead now of course)This house, I saw in the dark so it was okay.  It obviously had a huge ornamental garden at one point.  Even the garage is turned into a green house.  It might be too big of a project for one (me) who really only wants a low maintenance yard.  

This house is MCM - meaning Mid-Century Modern.  It was built in 1956 and it "needs tlc"  When I drove by, I think it's pretty good.  It's in a good neighborhood on the street that it's on.  Houses on it's street are going for about double what we'd want to get this house for.  My one complaint was that people drove by me on the street going really fast.  It's not necessarily a dead-end street but it just goes into neighborhood so I was surprised by how fast they were driving.  

This is a HUD home in an area that we'd love to live in.  There have been 3 foreclosures in our price range in the last 6 months - that is a good thing!  It makes the competition stiff, so while this house looks odd and is smaller than we like, it's in an area we really like.  I didn't drive by it because it was completely the opposite direction for everything else I was looking at.  So, it's on the list and we'll see if we can go see it on Saturday with the Realtor.  

I eliminated this blue house.  I wrote "Cars".  Literally, there were about 10 cars per house - people were parked on the yard, driveways, sidewalks and side of roads.  It's claustrophobia to me and I don't like it.  So, this house is off the list.  

This house has no pictures of the inside.  I've kept it on the list.  Unfortunately, it was after driving through this super great neighborhood so I think it looks worst than it would have if I had come directly from the blue house above instead of the nice house below.  

This house was great!  It was on a cul-de-sac.  It had a path to a park from the circle.  I'd love this house but the reality is, it's currently listed at 50k more than our max budget.  There is no way it will come down to our budget.  

This Red Farmhouse is only 1000 square feet.  There is an unfinished basement, but it seriously was in a rural area and would be a pain to get to for any visitors and family.

TIP: Evaluate how important family is to you.  We currently live 30-45 minutes away from our family. Most of the houses on the list are even farther away.  We really have to figure out the balance of this with what we do everyday.  

So just based on the pictures and the little I've said to describe the neighborhoods - which one would you go for?  I'm excited to finally go see the houses on Saturday so we can move forward to making a decision.  

Sadness and Madness

Today, we heard back from the Realtor - it's never a good sign when she can't get a hold of the listing agent.  At least, that is what I've decided.  The house that we wanted to bid on (and we were going to low ball offer on in hopes we'd end up at our max) had multiple offers and the bank accepted one on Monday.  So, we missed out.  I'm mad - I had already started making lists in my head and figuring out steps of things to do when we got the house.  It's disheartening.  I'm thinking this might be a regular cycle for the next couple months as we try to find a house and get a steal of a deal...  please pray for us, cross your fingers and send up thoughts of hope.  We're back on the hunt...
Lesson learned: Jump when you find the house and be ready to be disappointed.  

Graffitti, foreclosures and anger

It's interesting to see what an angry homeowner will do when they leave their home.  Today, we visited two houses.  1.  A foreclosure that has been on the market since 2009.  We had about 10 minutes to look through windows and walk around it before the Realtor got there.  The funny things we found were drip-dried paint on the front porch and windows; green spray paint on the glass front door and through the window, we saw that someone wrote, "I Love Vaginas" in green spray paint on the kitchen floor. Later, when we walked through the house, we found more poured paint on the carpets in the bedrooms.  None of these things really bothered us.  We know whatever house we buy will be a fixer-upper.  The damaged carpet isn't a big deal because we want hardwoods in every room anyway.  

I Googled some images and found the following examples of other foreclosure vandalism.

 

You can find some fun pictures of houses at http://uglyhousephotos.com.  Do you have any pictures of houses you've visited?  What would you do to your house if you had to foreclose?  What did you do?  Why?

TPT Home

I am in California for a couple days to visit the Headquarters of the company I work for.  Yesterday, I went with my boss to find a house-warming present for a mutual coworker.  Neither one of us had been in her home so it was very difficult.  In the meantime, we found some great things that we would love for ourselves.  TPT Home is a fun store.  It reminds me of a similar store - and I'm still not sure if they are the same store: Tai Pan Trading.  I've posted some pictures of the store from their site.  If you love vintage, fun, color, decorations - this is a HUGE store for you!.  (And I'm not getting paid to say this - I just truly love this store).

In fact, I think I'm heading back over there now to buy a 50% off Christmas Nativity set that was beautiful!  (I know, not upcycling but it is on sale!).

HGTV Dream Home

Do you know about HGTV's dream home?  I've really decided that it's the answer to all our prayers.  My parents don't know where to retire - they've moved around so much and their three kids (me being the youngest) aren't permanently in one state, so where should they retire?  I've decided they should win the HGTV dream home.  Since the beginning of January, I've entered my mom and I everyday. Mike has also entered on a regular basis.   The hope is that they win the house in Park City, Utah.  They win $500,000 in cash and a GMC SUV.  So, if you are willing to sacrifice some prayers on my families behalf, would love some that we win this house in a few weeks.  (or, enter for yourself at HGTV.com and we wish you all the luck - sincerely).  Let me know if you win, I'll celebrate in your good fortune (and be a little jealous).  

Option 2 for financing - down the hole...

Well, we pursued another option for financing and it has turned out, 3 days later, that option has fallen through. Due to some short-sales and pre-foreclosures in our past, we're having to involve other people in our financing option.  It's a huge ask!  I'm not offended that this last option fell through.  The family member called me last night and said that they did a risk analysis - if something catastrophic happened to Mike or I, then they would become liable.  It is a huge ask when they have a family and are responsible for their own housing expenses and everything.  Now, Mike and I don't ever plan on this falling back on the responsibility of the family member but the reality is, we don't know the future.  Something catastrophic could happen.  So, we're on to our next option - a new family member. This will be our last ask. If it doesn't work out, then we will have to rent and pursue buying a house in a year or so.  We did learn that with several foreclosures put on hold last year, we will only see an increase this year.  If that is the case, our options of a great house can only increase as we wait for the right financing options (or the stars to align).

This is hard for us.  We started this marriage saying we wouldn't intertwine family and money.  And yet, we're breaking that rule.  

Can I goosh a little?

Skip this post if you don't want to hear me goosh about my husband.  I was just thinking about how I need a haircut - haven't gone since the wedding in May 2011 (I know, unhealthy for my hair right).  Then, that string of thought led me to think about my husband.  Before we got married, he would go to get his haircut from the same girl every two weeks.  My husband is balding and so he shaves his head very short.  Since we got married, we bought a $30 hair shaver and we shave his hair every two weeks at home.  It's little things but he has really stepped up on saving money. I feel like he has done so more than I have.  He takes his lunch everyday: a salad, chicken and cottage cheese or left overs from the previous night's dinner.  I really do have a great husband.

Okay, gooshing done but I don't think I tell him enough how great he is so I had to set it in stone (aka the blogosphere).

Broken Celebrations

I don't really have a housing post to make this week.  Tonight, I broke a bowl - which just adds to the list of glasses I've broken.  They are all Mike's dishes.  Do you think I'm subliminally trying to say something?  I'm really not.  Every time something breaks, I might be sad but the reality is... it's one less thing to move when Moving day comes :).

That's my tip - celebrate the broken things.