It's Like That

You know how it is when you have a plan and you are determined to stick with it because you know you don’t have any other feasible option? And then something comes along and turns the whole thing on its ear and you end up doing something else entirely?

Ya. It’s like that.

When we got our second house in NM, we still had the one we had been living in for 7 years. Before we could put it on the market, we had to repaint inside and replace the carpet. None of that could even begin before we got moved out.

Moving took about 2 weeks, before I was able to get in to paint. Then it took about another several weeks before we could carpet. All told, it was about a month after we had moved out before we got it on the market. And then, it took another 45 days to sell; this in the midst of the inclining housing market.

Did I mention I very nearly went insane? Yep. For reals.

The baby at the time (#3) was 14 months old, and that was the last year the oldest went to school. He was in 1^st grade. So I was driving back and forth to school 2 times a day in addition to having a baby and a toddler and trying to keep them entertained while I was painting and moving all the stuff I could move into the other house.

That wasn’t what was making me crazy. Nope.

What made me bonkers was the stress of having 2 houses and 2 house payments. I could see our financial future swirling down the drain.

I swore at the time- and for the subsequent 10 years- that I would never, ever, EVER do that again. Never, ever, ever, EVER again would I buy a new house without having the other one sold; I would never, ever, EVER again have 2 house payments.

Apparently, I lied. And I’m totally, completely nuts.

When we got here, I went and saw 5 houses I had seen online that seemed to meet our space requirements; had some acreage, and as best as I knew, would allow us to have chickens.

In that group of houses was a house that I had only seen online a few times. The few pictures I had seen left me really confused. And, it was a foreclosure, which I didn’t want to touch with a ten-foot pole.

To get a feel for the market, though, I put it on my list of houses to look at initially. I’m pretty sure it was the last house we looked at that one day.

I remember saying out loud when I got into the master bedroom and saw the fireplace that we had a winner. I really was joking, of course, but told my realtor that the house went on the really short list. I mean, after all, it was missing a Jacuzzi in the bathroom and it needed *a ton* of work- work that we had decided we’d rather not have to do if we didn’t have to.

It didn’t have a garage, either, which was a major strike. I had 2 freezers, an extra fridge, and all of our tools in the garage. We really needed a garage, even if it wasn’t tall enough for Hunny’s truck to get inside. Otherwise, the space was good, but it wasn’t perfect.

The next few weeks brought a lot of other houses. I think I looked at somewhere around 20, which for this area, is not a huge amount, but one of the defining “must haves” was the ability to have chickens.

I’ll say, I was really surprised at the number of houses that had acreage but didn’t allow chickens. One house that really fit the bill only allowed a total of two pets- even though the current owners had 3. The other knock against a lot of the houses was location.

I’ve been spoiled for forever, because Hunny has been coming home for lunch nearly every day since we moved to NM. One of our ‘most desired’ wishes was that the new house be close enough to work that he could continue to do so, but we realized going in that this was going to be a very slim possibility.

Over the course of the last few weeks, I learned a few things. I learned that the bulk of the houses that we looked at all needed the same amount of work, yet cost around $100,000 more.  I also learned that the market here, unlike where the other house is, is still moving quite nicely.

The other thing I learned was that interest rates had hit another, new low. It baffles me, honestly, that people are not jumping all over this, since the housing market in many locations has slowed, as I understand it, due to the impending presidential election.

This makes absolutely no sense to me. It won’t matter WHO is in the White House if your mortgage rate is locked in. Could jobs be lost? Sure. That possibility is not going to change from where it’s at now, imo, regardless of who is sitting in the big chair.

What *could* change, however, are mortgage rates. And it’s my supposition that with as low as they are now, they are most likely only going to go up. NOW is a fabulous time to buy a house and get locked into a stunningly low interest rate. Just sayin’.

You’ve probably figured out by now that we did actually do the thing we swore we’d not do.

The day I went in with the offer, I was having a hard time keeping my stomach contents in. Too much was unknown, but the only way to get actual numbers was to make an offer and see where things were going to land.

We’ve also figured out that long-term with 2 parents, 4 kids, 2 dogs and a cat in an RV really of any size leads to a whole other kind of stress.

The kids are crabby. The dogs are crabby {well, not little dog so much, but big dog has been going after her, and it really is a matter of time before little dog gets injured} There is a substantial increase in the cost of food for buying smaller amounts and not being able to shop sales, in addition a HUGE increase in gas when you have to drive 50 miles round trip every few days to get food. It became apparent that something needed to change, because this situation was absolutely not sustainable.

This basically left us with two options: either I would need to go back to NM and take a few kids with me, or we needed to buy something here.

The other end of this was the knowledge of knowing you’d found the right house, and knowing it would not be there come spring, because of the moving market. Surely, someone else would see the value and know they needed to snatch it up.

As scared as I/both of us was/were, I have maintained from the beginning that this whole thing has been divine providence- if the house was meant to be ours, it would be. It wouldn’t be, though, if we didn’t DO anything to make it happen, and we needed to seriously look at all of our options.

So. We’re closing on November 8.

Interestingly, I am not stressing over the financial end of this. We’re still hoping the NM house will sell soon, but the back-up plan is to rent, which we absolutely did not want to do. We have never aspired to be landlords, but with the property management group, it’s going to be better than if we had to deal with everything ourselves. If we get folks in for the short-term, we can get the house listed back on the market come spring, when things pick back up.

I had hoped to close a little sooner, but there is a load of stuff that needs to happen, like getting my move settled. I’ve also got to get the new carpet arranged, and get the floors refinished, if it’s in the budget. I have to get utilities arranged, and hopefully get better internet out there than we get here. {I’m not holding my breath, though}

Here’s the short list of why we love this house:

• The space. The main house is 3603 sq ft and 3 stories. The top floor is the bonus room with attic that we’ll completely finish down the road. It actually has all the right spaces- 4 bedrooms, plus office, eat-in kitchen and dining room. It has a large living room, which we much prefer over a smaller ‘great room’ and formal living room. The office is actually an office space, which we love.
• Fireplaces. It has 3 in the main house. 2 of them have gas inserts. I think we might leave the one in the dining room alone, but the one upstairs we’ll change back to wood-burning like the one in the living room.
• It’s got gas for the cooktop. As I was looking, that was one thing that was next to impossible to find out here. All told, there were a total of 2 houses I looked at that had gas.
• It’s got the floors that I absolutely adore.
• The porch/balconies are awesome! We have our own door off the master bedroom.
• Great storage space.
• Property. Have I mentioned HOW MUCH I adore this location? ♥♥♥ We’re working on getting the surrounding acreage. It was chopped up when it went into foreclosure, and when/if the other acres get taken back by the bank, we’re going to snap them up. Both surrounding pastures are being leased, as we understand it, to someone who has horses. I love seeing the horses- I’ve seen 3, including a baby.

And then there’s Moo. Moo is the cow that lives across the street. The rest of the surrounding plots are active hay fields. You simply cannot beat the location and the view, imo.

• It’s about 2.5 miles from the campground. That means it’s absolutely no problem for Hunny to come home for lunch.
• And, one of the main selling points was the guest house. Yep. It has a whole second house. It needs some work {like getting rid of the acoustic ceiling, painting, and repairing the deck}, but getting a second 1,084 sq ft house wasn’t even on the radar, so it’s a huge bonus.

It has the same reclaimed floors {from some ‘historical’ building- probably a barn is what I’m thinking}; full kitchen, large master bedroom, etc. The walk-in closet in the little house is bigger than the one in the big house.

There’s also a loft for short people up top, and another fireplace that has been plumbed for gas. Apparently, the folks who built the big house lived in the little one while they were building. It has a fully functioning kitchen including a dishwasher {which needs to be replaced} and utility hook-ups,

Obviously, I could go on a good long while about this house.   I’ll be sure to take before and after pictures, because this house needs a *ton* of work love.

But- and this goes without saying- I am ESPECIALLY excited to get in and get to work on getting more chickens. We’re going to try and get the bulk of the other stuff done first, so that may well put us at springtime for chicks, but that’s great motivation to get {and then stay!} crackin’.

For the first time in a really, really long time, I am looking forward to decorating for Christmas. I am looking forward to going all out and doing the big holiday meal for Thanksgiving, too. There is always plenty to give thanks for, but this year, we’re feeling especially blessed.

Here are some pictures to share my excitement. 

Because life is a soundtrack, I leave you with Defying Gravity, from the Broadway show, Wicked. I quite feel like this at the moment.