House News

After 13 days on the market our house sold!!!! I still can't believe it. We had a showing one night, our realtor called that evening to give us our offer, he came over the next night so we could write up our counter offer, he called an hour later saying we just sold our house. They had the home inspection last week, the buyer signed off on it this week, all we are waiting on is the appraisal to come back and for closing which should be sometime by the end of May. Now I realize none of this is 100% certain until we walk out of closing, but it's looking good so far. I have a funny picture to show you guys. When they did the inspection they also did a radon test. It had to be set up in our living room from a Wednesday afternoon till Saturday afternoon. We weren't allowed to touch, move, or bump into it. Three minutes before they knocked on the door to pick it up, Cameron got within about an inch from knocking it over. Somehow my two children managed to stay away from this for 3 full days.Here is where things got a little tricky for a few days. Remember the house I told you about, we will call it house A? We wrote up an offer on it the night we wrote our counter offer. Our realtor called us the next morning, which was a Friday, to let me know there was an issue with taxes. It was new construction and hadn't been lived in, but since it sat completed all of 2010 it had a tax bill of $3400/year. The deal was off, there was no way we could swing that. Then there was house B. This was a house Steve and I had always admired. It's in a neighborhood close to us now so we have driven past it many times. At one point it was priced higher than house A, then it was reduced to the same price as house A. We had been inside both houses and house A did have three things going for it; a front porch, an awesome kitchen, and a finished family room in the basement. Something was calling me to house B though. So when I got the news on the taxes I asked about house B. Would you believe the day we sold our house the price got reduced again, now it was lower. Our realtor set up a meeting between us and the builder for that Monday so we could see about finishing the basement now that we had more room to wiggle on the price. In the meantime, I took my mom out to see both houses during the open house. Yes, house A had the porch and kitchen but once again there was something about house B. So on that Monday we met with the builder, I only had intentions on seeing about finishing the family room. After seeing his costs we walked away putting in an offer to finish the entire basement. There is no way he could finish it on our own for that price. We got a call the next day, the builder accepted!!! We drove past later that week and noticed this awesome sale pending sign!

I still can't believe we are moving in about 7 weeks. If all goes at it should, we will close on our house at the end of May, then on the new house about two weeks later. Our buyer is giving us 30 days to get out and we get possession immediately on the new house, so we will have about two weeks to move. We have to give the builder a deposit next week and then they will start on the basement. Once it's done we get to meet with the decorator to pick out paint colors.

A few fun facts we are excited about. Our backyard is tiny, it's going to take Steve about half the time to mow our yard now. To make up for not having a yard, we will live on a roundabout, and across the street is a huge circle of grass and soon to be shrubs that anyone can use for playing, a picnic, whatever you want. We get the advantage of a big yard without having to mow. And the best news? We have a clubhouse and pool, and it's pretty much across the street. We do have to pay a pricey homeowner fee for this, but no more than what it would cost to maintain your own pool, once again without the work. We have a built in fire pit in the backyard. I guess they decided if we can't give them a yard we should give them a fire pit. Cooper keeps asking when we can move into the house with the marshmallow pit. Oh and one more. Our neighbors, for now... there is an empty lot between us, are my best friend from high schools parent. Did I say that right? Anyway, she lives in Colorado now and only comes in once or twice a year. It's hard to get together when she does because it's usually during the holidays and things get so busy. Well now there will be no excuse, she will be staying next door to me.

That's it for now, sorry it's long winded. I'll be sure to update you when I know more as well. I'll also cry to you guys if something goes south.