Adventures in House Hunting...

The first time home buyer tax credit ends in a little over a week...and somehow, last week I got it in my brain that I wanted to start looking for houses. Yep, I'm a genius.


Given the oddities that I've seen in the past week, I decided that I should share my housing chuckles and horrors as I go through the process. :-)

I got the name of a good real estate agent from my friend last Thursday and Saturday I looked at my first two houses.

House 1: Cute house, fairly good condition, great location. Plus, the back yard is already fenced in and ready for the pups!!

This house had been on the market for 3 days when I went to the open house. I got there, and there were 50-60 people outside waiting for the seller's agent to arrive. We all wait our turn to wander through and the house pretty much looked as good as the online pictures. However, the seller didn't clean her house. At all. To the point where everyone had to hop over trash. The seller also stayed in the house - with her dogs while everyone was wandering through. I've never heard of that happening! Then I realize that one of the doors to the house goes through the bathroom. Yep, you heard that right... the bathroom has a door that leads to the backyard and driveway. I'd be afraid that someone was going to come visit me and walk in while I was peeing!! Then, the selling agent announces that they are only accepting offers submitted that day! Um, I like the house (despite it's oddities), but you want an offer now? Like now, now?

Bye-bye cute little house. If only I had started this whole process a month ago, you could have been mine!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

House 2: Big house. I was charmed by the prospect of owning an antique farmhouse....

Where to start? OK. This house had been unoccupied for a year and a half, which didn't do it any favors. There is sooo much potential for this house. Great corner lot, new carpeting & water tank. However, there was a lot wrong too. As in, it would need to be fixed before I could inhabit the house. The roof needs work, the electric isn't up to code, all the windows (ahem - 21 of them) need to be replaced, the back yard needs to be fenced in. And theres a bunch of fixes that would need to happen in the next few years too. The kitchen needs to be re-done (the refridgerator is in front of the window because there are three heating registers that prevent it from being anywhere else), you can see through the floor slats in the barn straight down to the basement, there's tons of over-growth in the yard to be cleared.

Bye-bye antique farm house. Unless the seller cuts the price by $50K, I can't buy the house AND do the repairs.

Fingers crossed, I see a few more houses this weekend.  :-)