House Hunt

A little while ago, the house next door to us was abandoned and eventually went up for auction at nearly twice what it was now worth. (Hey, you can't blame the bank for at least TRYING to recoup the loss, can you? Ha ha!)

I absolutely ADORE the floor plan, but we decided if we were going to keep and rent out our current home, tenants next door would just really be too close for comfort. There were other draw backs, but that one really stopped me from considering this house.

Obviously, at the auction, nobody placed a bid, so I figured it would just sit vacant for more months while "we" (America) all figure out WTF is going on. Amazingly though, someone showed up and cleaned up all the weeds and junk in the back yard, and presumably straightened up the interior. The electricity is back on (evidenced by the AC unit running again and the malibu lights on in the back yard again) and there is a lock box on the front door now. Maybe we'll get new neighbors after all.

I'm sad that we won't be getting the bigger house, but this one just wasn't right.

Fast forward to last night. Marti called and asked me to look up an address on Zillow for him and told me one of his regulars was fixing it up for sale and would sell it to us for a great price. I checked it out and was quite impressed with the satellite picture of the land as well as the street view. It looked very promising!

This morning before work I drove by and went inside. I was so unimpressed with almost everything about it. :( It was SO dated! The light fixture in the dining room was HUGE (too huge for the room even!) and should be preserved in a museum of the 80s.

There were technically 4 different levels to the home, so that was a drawback as well. It looks like the carpet and tile were recently replaced, but some of the tiles were higher than others, so I could feel the edges under my shoes. YUCK! That would drive me NUTS!!!

The kitchen was completely secluded from the rest of the house except for the TINY breakfast nook and the passageway to the boxy dining room. That is exactly what I am trying to get away from in our current home, and this prospect was even WORSE! At least I have a big open "window" in the wall that blocks off our current kitchen.

I thought for a moment that we could lose the little breakfast nook and completely redo the kitchen, as well as lose the wall between the kitchen and the living room, but the living room is like 4 inches lower than the rest of the house.

What was it about the 70s and 80s that people thought that was a good idea???? My in-laws have that little step down into their living room as well as a bedroom and again to the kitchen/dining room/hall to the rest of the house. What's UP (or rather, DOWN) with that???? I wonder how many old ladies have broken hips when visiting friends and family with random steps in their homes?

ANYWAY, back to the house... The back yard was HUGE and there was a pool. Marti said when he looked out at the pool pump he had flashbacks to another house he lived in with a pool and all he could see was a money pit. I did notice the massive assortment of roses, even though they were pruned back to nearly nothing at the moment. There were two HUGE grass areas on each side of the pool, so I told Marti we'd need to buy a lawn tractor! The little push reel mower we used to use wasn't going to cut it on that yard! And, of course, we'd need, uh, a POOL FENCE installed before I'd set foot in there with Abby!

In some ways I could see us making a life there -- enjoying the extra space and relaxing in the yard over the years. We got married in my mom and dad's back yard which isn't quite THAT big, but sort of set up in two halves like this one was, so there was a little "wishful thinking" that we could have another few parties like that and reminisce to the one that started it all.

But, in reality, we'd have to do some SERIOUS renovations on the house before it would be home, and really we're just not up to it. I hate to lose an opportunity to have a nice big yard like that, but then again, do I really want to set us up for months of messy and expensive house remodeling, ALL that grass to mow and that pool to tend to? Uh, not really. Not really.

So, we're passing on it. It's sad to say, but there will probably be better deals coming up soon as this mortgage crisis plays out. It's bad to say, "at least I hope so." I don't really wish it on anyone, but I do hope to find a deal if there is one to be had. I'm just disappointed that this one didn't pan out.