If You Haven't Heard... We Bought a House!

It's true! After about 5 months we finally were able to close on our house! Here is our House Story:

In October 2012, we decided to start looking for houses.  Now, October is a terrible time to start looking for houses, as we soon found out! Nobody wants to sell and move during the holidays so most people like to list in the Spring.  We didn't care, we were just excited to start looking! We were looking for something old (built before 1940), at least 3BR, 2BR, Garage, Basement, Good location, etc.. But we soon found out that with homes that are older..... sing it with me, "you can't always get what you wahahahnt."

1. Loved it, had a great yard, great garage, great woodwork, but the neighborhood was getting into the sketchy zone, and for the amount of work that the house needed, they were asking too much!
2. Loved it too.  So much charm! But it had radiator heating and therefore it was not feasible to put in Central Air.  No AC, along with having a questionable basement, kept us from making a move on it.
3. Great yard and barn but other than than, it just did not apeal to us.
4. Was the -one that got away- but eventually led us to our current home! This beauty was on the river, it was huge, so much character, great yard and location.  IT. HAD. IT. ALL. But as we sat down to dinner, right after returning home from seeing it, we got a call from our realtor saying that there was an offer on it.  Unfortunately/Fortunately we did not move fast enough and, well, it got away.  But looking back now, we know it was a blessing we missed out on that house.
5. Forclosure....It was just a big N.O.
6. Adorable, but no yard, no garage.
7. Cute Cute Cute house.  A location that just did not apeal to us and a price we just couldn't justify with the work we wanted to do to it.
8. Yikes.  No.
9.  The Winner!!

We had been praying that God would lead us through this process and allow us to find the right home for us and, boy, did He deliver! After losing out on house #4, we felt like no other house would ever be able to give us all the things that house could have.  So come December, after only 2 months of looking, we were feeling kind of disheartened.  We were even discussing the idea of building, which was something we had always been apposed to!
Enter my parents.
My parents were in the process of buying some land and on that land there was a house.  This house:

Oooooh this house.  There had been renters living in it for quite some time now (10ish years) so when the whole family (literally: mom, dad, brothers, sisters, spouses, and babies) went to see what my parents were buying, we did not have the highest of expectations.  We just went for moral support.  But when we got there, all we could see was potential. My parents didn't want to deal with the house, so when they saw our interestest, they happily allowed us to take over that part of the purchase.

We had always been OK with the idea of doing some work to a house in order to get it to where we would be proud to call it home. But Michael, more than myself, was concerned about getting in over our heads with a reno.  Well, I guess it has happened anyway.  :-) This house is a HUGE renovation.  Pretty much completely, it's a "everything must go" kind of reno.   But we see so much potential in the house and can see ourselves living here for many many many years to come.  Don't get me wrong, if we were going to live here only 5 years, buying this house would have been a terrible mistake! But because we can put in the long term work this house needs, I think it was meant to be ours, to give it the love it needs, to be a wonderful home.

I want to share with you some the potential that we saw in the house:

The main reason the house is worth all the time, sweat, debt, and tears, is the property. The property is on the river, on approximately 1 acre of land, and on the edge of my parent's land.  This is the view from the front porch:

 

Our view of the river

 

View over the creek and onto my parent's property

The house has two fireplaces!

 

One in the living room

One in the basement

The main living area has the potential to open up walls and make it more of an open concept layout.

 

The kitchen is going to get a whole new look! 

Say Goodbye to those walls! 

Hardwood floors throughout the main floor, which includes 2 Bedrooms! 

 The master bathroom is going to get a facelift as well.

 Yikes!

More potential in the basement and in the attic.  These renos will come later.  We aren't crazy... or made of money!

 Basement includes room for a family room, game area, bathroom, and bedroom

Attic includes room for 2 bedrooms with built-in storage and 1 bathroom.

Yep its happening in phases! Phase 1= main floor renovations (kitchen, master bath, windows, siding, garage). Phase 2= basement.  Phase 3=Front porch and landscaping.  Phase 4=Finishing attic.

There is so much more to this house and so many plans we have up in our little brains about what we are going to do with the house (i.e. fire-pits, mudrooms, piers, front porch, kayaks, four-wheelers, etc..)! I hope you enjoy the ride as much as we do! Stay tuned! The demolition has already started!