Signed and sealed!

We are under contract!

Finally, after much back and forth and quite a bit of limbo dancing, we are now officially under contract for the house we have affectionately dubbed the "Ugly Duckling".

Let me 'splain -that- : our possibly future house is the outmost right house of a set of three nearly identical houses. House 1 and House 3 ("our" house) are almost identical and House 2 appears to be a mirror image of House 1 and 3. While House 1 and 2 feature fresh bright exterior paint jobs, however, House 3 boasts a muted grey-blue exterior offset against a darker grey-blue around the windows making it appear smaller and droopier than its 2 siblings in their Sunday best. The color itself isn't bad bad, but it could definitely use some sprucing up. A little paint, some fresh blooms in the front yard and a good scrubbing.

We're so stinking excited!

After submitting it to all our newly acquired knowledge and having a contractor poke at it in regard to our desired before-move-in projects, we are fairly confident it won't surprise us too much during the inspection. Yes, it is a fixer-upper, but one with reeeally nice potential and as far as we know good bones.

Right now it is chopped up into an upstairs and a downstairs apartment which we plan on rectifying immediately turning it back into a modest single-family-home of a nice 2185 sqft (that's 203 square meters for you European type readers) with an entry hall, livingroom, diningroom, library, kitchen, half bath and laundry/mudroom downstairs and a hallway, 2 bedrooms, a bathroom and a master suite with walk-in closet and its own bathroom upstairs. And there will be a yard :o)

Please please, all mighty Inspection Gods, please be good to us this time!

Nomen est Omen

Within days of taking up the house hunting torch I was scouring the internet for promising listings. Frankly, I was kind of like this:

"I'll find those (listings) stairs. I'll whip their butt too. These (listings) stairs won't know which way they're going ... Take drastic steps. Kick it to the curb. Don't mess wit' me. I'm the (listings) Stair Master. I've mastered the (listings) stairs. I wish I had a (listing) step right here, right now. I'd step all over it ...?"

I've gotten so familiar with properties on the market that I can take you on a drive around the 'hood and point at for sale signs, giving you listing price, number of bed and bathrooms and probably other tidbits of househunting trivia. Pre-occupied, remember? And a little obsessing, I guess ... heh. All for a good cause though! Pinky Promise!

Anyways, I learned quickly that telling husband about the "house on 59th" (yes, yes, we did look outside of the 'hood, shame on us!) or the "4-bedroom on Walnut St" didn't help a lot. Addresses didn't mean anything to him unless I connected them to some stand-out feature of the property. That day the idea for nicknames was born.

Instead of referring to each listing by its address we ended up touring

- the "stinky pink"

- the "80s wonder"

- the "english country cottage with a pool"

- the "blue house"

- the "triplex"

- the "exploded cottage"

- the "Termite Temple"

- the "grey barn"

and many more.

So, tell me, which funky properties did you tour? Did you use nicknames to keep track of houses? Or are we just weird that way ...?

Our first offer: The Triplex

The house hunt continues ...

After looking at a number of different houses we finally felt comfortable and excited to put in an actual offer on "The Triplex".
Then a single family home, now chopped up into 3 apartments we were excited about the vast potential we saw: turning it back into a single family home we could keep the smallest of the three apartments (the one that came with its own entry at the side of the house) as convenient in-law-suite or possible rental suite to help pay our mortgage of more quickly.

It came complete with original fireplaces, gorgeous gleaming pine floors and simply massive closet space.

The fact that some scumbags came and tore out the ac compressors even worked in our favor as the seller dropped the purchase price to make up for us having to buy new ones. Every morning on our way to the bus stop we would wave good morning to our house.

Until the inspection ...

What a sad day in (the) history (of our house hunting endeavors). The inspection revealed a staggering list of issues. Serious issues, not just peeling paint or clashing color schemes. Ever seen the movie "The Money Pit"? Well, that's what the inspector called the triplex.

However, we didn't bail right away. We knew we're in for a ride buying a historic home, a house that could easily be our grandparent. You know, topped with that whole deferred maintenance issue when considering buying a REO. But this, this was just too much. Too many big ticket items, not to mention any secret surprises it might harbor, that even with our rehab loan we just didn't feel up to.

So we walked. With a heavy heart.

Would we ever find a little old house to have and to hold?

The House to haunt me

Here's the baby that started it all, back in April. Ain't she pretty (all solid oomph on the outside and sunny brightness on the inside)?

It had everything we could have asked for: charm, wood floors, porches upstairs and downstairs, plenty of bedrooms and enough yard to keep us busy.

So what went wrong? Why - in all those months - have we never ever gotten even close to putting in an actual offer? (Shocking, I know!) And why is it always coming back to flaunt its assets, teasing and tempting, before walking off with the other guy again?

When we first stumbled across it we were charmed, swept off of our feet and madly in love with it (for my husband, it was a first time kind of thing even). Yet, before we could nail down funds, figure out paperwork involved it went to auction and appeared to have been auctioned off right from under our nose. Oh the sadness! Meh :o(

Encouraged that there might indeed a small historic house out there in our fabulicious neighborhood that we could actually afford we teamed up with the bestest real estate agent Mrs T and kept looking. And looking. And looking. 3 months passed and while we'd finally found a property to move to our No 1 spot we hadn't yet committed to it. You know, that whole property virgin "there's got to be The One out there" feeling was holding us back from putting our money where our mouth was.

Then, one morning, there it was: the house! THE house. The house that started it all, it was back on the market at an even better price. I literally bounced from computer (I'd been browsing MLS listings when it showed up as a new listing again) to husband's side babbling like crazy. The excitement! Maybe we had another shot at it!

Yeah ... this lasted for all of an hour before we were told it was already under contract.

Bleah.

Thee houzz, eet sold again.

To an investor. Who is renovating it. So he can put it on the market again.

Gah! I can't help but wonder just how many more times it will come back to haunt me? Somebody should tell it it's bad form to tease like that. Seriously.

Anyways, we have moved on even if we occasionally drive by with wistful sighs and bittersweet smiles. It did set us on our path and we still love it, but it's quite obviously not meant to become our house.

Right?