Corey’s Green Home Project: Meet The House

We had been looking for a new home for months.

Despite the economic downturn and sliding real estate prices, we couldn’t find our house.

Our house was always $100,000 overpriced, 100 miles in the wrong direction, or would require $100,000 and 100 licensed professionals to fix up.

You get the picture.

In May, the house we’d lived in was about to close, and the urgency with which we were looking for a new place became, well, even more urgent. I began sending my realtor MLS numbers for homes that didn’t look all that great online, hoping that we might stumble upon something that when we saw it in person, might be the one. At the very least, we’d become experts in “what’s out there” in our price range and location. And I’m always open to some good market research, much to my hubby’s chagrin.

So on that May day, we set out with our realtor, not expecting to find much, but hoping we would, when we pulled onto a little street just blocks from a serene lake my family loved. I had been on this street years before, lost (please don’t snicker, this was pre-GPS) on the way to a playdate for my daughters. I had fallen in love with this street in the kind of way you fall in love with Brad Pitt. You don’t have a chance; but, it’s sure fun to dream.

This was when home prices in Seattle were through the roof. When we bought our first home here, there was such a buying frenzy that it was risky for a buyer to ask for an inspection contingency. If you offered to buy a house for asking price, the sellers agent wouldn’t even breathe in your direction. Bidding wars were the norm. So back then, homes on this quaint little street were well over our budget. I didn’t see any for sale signs, and we were not in the market, but I just knew. I mean, they were picket-lined-farm-and-Victorian- style homes in cottage colors. Hello.

“Honey!” I shouted “This is that street that I told you I wanted to live on one day!” ”

Steve!” I shook my realtor’s arm, nearly causing him to swerve into a rhododendron, “THERE’S A HOUSE IN OUR BUDGET FOR SALE ON THIS STREET? Where? WHERE???”

I admit it, I was freaking out. I’m the one who found all the houses we would look at that day, but I didn’t recall any country home-worthy houses.

Steve turned onto a cul-de-sac and then into a driveway leading up to a detached two car garage. A detached two car garage! I’ve always wanted one of those. But wait - that’s not the good part. The garage was attached to the house by a BREEZEWAY. Yippee! But wait, there’s more! The breezeway led to a full WRAP AROUND PORCH that hugged the adorable home, a two story 2200 sq foot four bedroom, painted a light blue, trimmed in almost-white.

Excuse me, is that Brad Pitt calling?

“Gimme the keys, Steve,” I joked. “They’re ours. Call the agent; this house is sold.” (Not a joke.)

Ryan was equally impressed, although much less so about the house’s cuteness factor. A wrap around porch is fine. No trees to fall on your house or mess up your pristine gutters makes it a home run!

Where do we sign?

Turns out, we were the first people to see the house on the first day it was on the market. I didn’t recognize the house from the online listing because the photos posted weren’t that good. They just didn’t capture this home’s character. Lucky us, this would mean other potential buys might pass it by. Or maybe, they wouldn’t. What if some other market-analysis-loving woman like me dragged her husband away from football to compare and contrast MLS listings in person? What if she got lost on this street once, fell in love and then stumbled across this very same home? Gasp! We couldn’t wait for that. So we made the offer, a fair one, quickly. I know, I know, that’s not wise negotiating, but we didn’t want to lose the house.

We just knew it was the one.

I won’t bore you with the next stuff. The legal stuff. The inspection stuff. The important thing here is that our home-to-be was in “OK” condition. Truth be told, I was hoping it would be in at least “above average” condition, but our inspector ripped the rose colored glasses from our noses, stomped on them, and proceeded to point out some real issues. Not insurmountable issues, but issues, nonetheless. In addition, aside from brand-new carpet, everything in the house was 30 year-old original. Everything. There were some things we’d need to do (given the home’s age, this was expected), but we’d be buying a home that needed some major updates.

Updates-shmupdates! The house has a wrap around porch!

We closed on the 27th of June.