How Our Home Came to Be Ours
We mention to each other how unreal it is that we live in this house almost weekly. There hasn't been an ounce of buyer's remorse with this home--even with a busted pipe the week before we moved in and no central air during a 90-degree summer. We are grateful to be living here. And it's just the perfect home for us.
The home search wasn't a giddy adventure for us because it started as a reaction to bad news. We started looking for homes in February 2017. We didn't have a downpayment saved up. I had only been freelancing for a year so my income wouldn't even count to the bankers. We just knew that our 3rd story walk-up in a century old building wasn't going to work if I in fact had Multiple Sclerosis and that my pain and problems were just going to get worse. We looked at about 10 homes that early spring before realizing that any place we could afford would need a major structural overhaul and not in a fun way.
Thankfully, in May we got some precious news. I don't have MS. Just a demyelinating, auto-immune form of a B12 deficiency. The outlook was and is good. And we stopped trying to force ourselves into houses that would be too small or too unstable and just live happily in our apartment.
Then in late-October, while we were not looking at houses at all, a friend on social media posted an eccentric home completely with angel statues and cathedral style murals. It was intense. But it was really close to our photography studio, had hardwood floors and was super cheap. We figured we should drive by and see what the house was really like.
The yard was teeny and needed a million lawn ornaments and cement footings to be torn out and the exterior of the house showed that it was going to need some foundational work too. We went home and debated on if it was worth calling our realtor to show it to us. At home, I pulled up the listing and noticed that another listing was being promoted below it with a major price reduction.
The siding was rotting. The interior pictures were of corners of rooms instead of the whole spaces. The bathrooms were noticeably 50 years old and damages. And there wasn't a single picture of the kitchen. But what was also noticeable was the large bay window on the front of the house, the original hardwood doors and beautiful floors. It came with a half-acre yard in town. And best of all, it was on our absolute dream street just blocks from our church. I begged Austin to let us go see it.
We were expecting a total pit. And some rooms were absolutely unloveable. But the photos did this beautiful house such a disservice. The kitchen was quaint but clean for the most part. And the foundation was straight and secure. Austin had been preparing before we even got there to let me down early and as we left the house to go think about it, Austin surprised me and said we needed to try to buy it. Still without much saved and still without me having the 2 full years under my belt for the bank. Money came at just the right time and a messy FHA Rehab loan writing process delayed closing until January when I could be put on the loan and we could switch to a more conventional loan option. So yes, we are grateful. Grateful that we didn't buy a house we didn't want because we were scared of the unknown. Grateful that this diamond in the rough on the prettiest boulevard in town somehow was accessible to us. And grateful for the opportunity to use our gifts in a way we've always wanted to while we fix up this gem.
photo by our very talented friend and fellow photographer, Logan Clement.