We are not homeowners … yet. 

Reading back on my posts last week, you can tell I was a LITTLE over-eager.  Just a touch excited.  Let’s recap some of my quotes from last week:

“But I totes love the house.  (Don’t tell my realtor I said that.)”

“When we got home after stalking the house/neighborhood for a good half hour tonight…”

“I also just happened to find the house that we’re going to buy today.”

“I found our house.”

“I mean, we haven’t even been in it yet…”

“We drove by it tonight and we’re even more obsessed with it now.”

“It has everything we want.”

WOW!  I need to slow it down a bit.  Good thing I’m married; I would NOT be good at all those dating games people play where they have to wait 3 days to call or wait 2 days to return a call or whatever.

So, here’s what happened this weekend:

Friday: We looked at 6 houses, including our dream house that I drooled all over last week.

Four of the houses were beyond depressing (like, take down your disco ball and remove your TWO 100 gallon, dirty fish tanks that contain “creatures” and have sticky labels attached warning visitors not to “tap on the glass” – WTF people?).

One of those homes was brand-new and beautiful, but had an odd layout and ZERO backyard.

The last house was the one I’d been obsessed with all week.

We definitely liked the house (we’ll call it House #1).  It wasn’t as amazing in person as it seemed in the pictures, but when is that ever the case?

It meets most of our requirements (aside from a finished basement) and the backyard/deck/fenced yard/neighborhood ARE amazing.  We know we can’t change these things, but we can change everything inside.

Saturday: We talked about House #1 all weekend.  Our realtor sent us some comps in the same neighborhood.  (Comps are comparable houses that have sold in the last year or are on the market.)  In our opinion, the comps helped our situation in that many of them sold for way less than their listing price and a couple similar houses sold for less than House #1 is listed at.

Sunday: House #1 just happened to be hosting an open house on Sunday.  I invited my parents to come along with us to the open house since they know way more about this house-buying business than Adam or I do.

We spent a solid hour at the house looking it over with my parents.  I was happy because only 3 other lookers came during the 3-hour open house.  Most of them only stayed for 5-10 minutes, which is also a good sign that no one else is truly interested in it.

(The agents are trying to tell us that there is another interested buyer.  I would think that if there was another interested buyer, they would have been at the open house staking their claim just like we were.  Nope, it was just us.)

While we were in the unfinished basement, we started investigating some cracks in the basement floor.  Cracking in a concrete floor is natural over time, but this house is only 7 years old.  Plus, the cracks are wider than just the normal hairline cracks.

I pulled up the seller’s disclosure while we were there and they did say there were cracks and that they tried to fix these cracks by making perpendicular cuts into the basement floor (which we saw).  The floor also looks like it’s buckling slightly upward which hints to some pressure below the foundation – water possibly.

New homes are built on something called a vapor barrier, so there isn’t much of a chance of leaking (yet), but if there is water pressure under the house now, there is a chance in the future.

Obviously, this concerns us.

Today: We still really like the house, but this IS a buyer’s market.

Many more homes will start to pop up on the market as the weather gets warmer and I don’t want to feel forced into the first home we love just yet.

The seller’s are motivated and have already moved away for a new job (to Denver actually).  There’s a chance they could keep dropping their price.

If the house is still on the market and they drop their price, we might make our move.  But I want to see what homes come up over the next few weeks/months.

I’m still stalking the house online to see if an offer is made (our realtor will let us know that, too), but I’m not betting on it.  Homes in the price range that this house is in are just not selling right now.

Pictures: I am SO sorry I didn’t get any pictures for you guys!  I would post the ones from the listing on the Internet, but I don’t want to do that in case some creeper can trace the pictures back to their original location.  If we visit the house again, I will definitely get pictures for you.  AND, if we lose out on this house and continue our hunt, I’ll take more pictures of those houses, too.  (Trust me,  you didn’t want to see pictures of the other houses we saw last Friday – they were depressing.)

The house hunt continues!

What do you think about our decision to wait?  Any basement experts out there?

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Check out some of my writing on these fabulous blogs:

Seven Rules for Intentional Love (on Makeunder My Life)

The Tax-Document Checklist; A No-Stress Guide To Filing Your Taxes, Part 1 (on Money Under 30 – the first in a 6-part series on tax prep)

• Wait, so that monthly payment DOESN’T already included property taxes and insurance?
• Property taxes and insurance are going to add FIVE-HUNDRED DOLLARS to my monthly payment?!
• I love this house.
• I can’t afford this house.
• But I looooooove it.
• I have to pay $10,000 in bank fees?!
• No one ever told me about bank fees!
• So, bank fees are the same as closing costs?
• Okay, I totally knew about closing costs.
• Buutttt, I don’t really want to pay them.
• How do I get the seller to pay my closing costs?
• How do I get the lender to waive my closing costs?
• I can’t negotiate.
• I can’t concentrate on anything else.
• Do you want to drive by the house?
• Do you want to drive by?
• Let’s do a drive by.
• Their furniture is awful.
• Wallpaper?!
• I could TOTALLY see myself in this houseeeeeee!!!
• I can’t do it.  It’s too much money.
• Let’s do a mock budget.
• Okay, I feel better about our finances now.
• Wait, no, I don’t.
• But Dave Ramsey says…
• It’s our dream house.
• It’s just a little bit out of our price range.
• Do you really think there is another interested buyer?
• Is my real estate agent lying to me?
• Is the lender lying to me?
• Is the seller’s agent lying?!
• WHO ISN’T LYING TO ME?!
• I can’t do this.
• Let’s rent forever.

Today I submitted the paper work to get pre-approved for a loan on a home.

Crazy, right!?  I know people do this all the time, but it still felt monumental for me.

We reached our minimum savings goal in late December and we’re still adding to our house down payment savings account every week.  So, we’re totally ready.  We’re beyond ready.  I’m ready to get this party started and get OUT of this apartment!

I also just happened to find the house that we’re going to buy today.

Yep.  I found our house.

I mean, we haven’t even been in it yet, but I’ve looked at easily 500 houses over the past 6 months online and there have only been two that I’ve seriously considered.

One of those was taken off the market.  The other one is the one that we’re going to buy that I just mentioned. 

We drove by it tonight and we’re even more obsessed with it now.

It has everything we want.  It meets all of our MAJOR requirements:

• Convenient location (near our church, gym, and the highway that we use to commute to work)
• Private but not-so-private location (we wanted a house with a somewhat private backyard but one that was still in the city)
• Huge island in the middle of the kitchen (Below is an example from a MUCH nicer kitchen than the one in our potential first-home, but it gives you an idea of the big, flat island I’m looking for.)

• Fabulous outdoor area (this house has a fantastic deck, a HUGE yard – 1/3 of an acre to be exact – and it’s fenced to boot, which means we could buy a dog ASAP)
• Bada$$ master suite – ‘nuff said
• Four bedrooms plus an office
• Open concept –  the kitchen flows through the breakfast nook to the living room

The one thing it doesn’t have (I’m assuming, anyway, since it avoids this topic on the home description) is a finished basement.  Not a big deal since we’re planning to be in this house for many years, so we can always finish the basement at our leisure.

But, like I said, I haven’t even been inside the house yet.

After we get pre-approved, I’m going to talk to our realtor to see if we can get an appointment to take a looksie.

We went to four open houses this past weekend and I’m so happy we did because seeing other houses will give us an idea of how this house stacks up to others.  I’d also like to see a couple more houses this weekend just so I don’t jump in too fast.

But I totes love the house.  (Don’t tell my realtor I said that.)

When we got home after stalking the house/neighborhood for a good half hour tonight, I started to freak out because it’s starting to get real.

First, it started with paying off student loans and car loans.  After that, we began saving like a bunch of crazy people for a down payment (like, we saved more than half of all of our paychecks and a good chunk of my freelance income).  Now, some three or four years later, we’re FINALLY here! 

Since I was having a little mini freak-out session about spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a house, my husband and I talked about what our biggest fears were of actually taking the leap:

• My fear: Being locked into payments for 20-30 years.
• His fear: Buying a lemon, or just finding out something is wrong with it after we buy it.

Luckily, we have saved so much that our mortgage payment will be way under our budget.  One of us could even get fired or quit our jobs and we’d still be able to pay our mortgage payment.  And, when I told my mom what my husband’s fear was tonight, she said the seller has to sign something to say there isn’t anything wrong with the house that they know about and, of course, we’ll have an inspection. 

So, our fears are just silly.

Next step:  Get our pre-approval finalized (hopefully tomorrow or the next day) and then go visit the dream house!  I’d also like to visit 5-10 other houses this weekend just to see what else is out there.