We Bought A Zoo!

Technically, we bought a house, but as soon as we move in it will become a zoo.

After a really frustrating experience looking for houses in the city where Brandon is working, we decided to open ourselves to the idea of looking 15 minutes down the road where his parents and two siblings live. It's across the Washington/Idaho border, so we will be paying income tax in Idaho, but housing is significantly cheaper than Washington and we found an amazing house.

The first time we were looking for a house in Las Vegas, we both remember walking in the front door and having a feeling about the house...the 5th house we'd looked at. After months of searching here and seeing "meh" houses that we sold before we'd finished walking through them, I began to feel concerned that we wouldn't find that "perfect" house and we'd have to pay out the nose for something that was just okay.

 Enter my sister-in-law, who notified me at 10:00 on a Friday night early in March that a house I'd been coveting since moving here had come up for sale. Why would you covet it before it came on the market, you ask? Well, we walk by it nearly every day as it's on the same street we live on now. You may think me creepy, but I'd stroll a little slower whenever we passed it, in awe of how cool it was and how beautifully it was decorated. So, we looked up photos online and saw the parts of the house that no amount of creepy lingering would allow me to see and were in love. There was another house that looked great too and so Brandon called (a miracle in itself) to schedule appointments. We didn't have a realtor at this point because we'd decided earlier that day to look on this side of the state line, which requires a different license. Brandon left messages and heard back from the other house that it already had 3 offers on it - seriously, it's madness here this year! And the mailbox for THE house was full. Bummer. My sister-in-law then called us to see if we'd gotten in and we said we couldn't get through and sighed a big sigh. Ever so clever, she found another number for the listing agent and got us an appointment in the afternoon. So the three of us (and some friends from the ward who happened to be driving by and have also drooled over the house from afar - seriously, it's cool) went and looked and loved it. We found out that we were the 5th showing that day and there were more lined up for the next day. We had very little hope. We talked about and it prayed about it and decided to put in an offer. We called the agent Shawn & Annie had used to buy there house a few months ago and told her the situation. Must have been a nice surprise as a realtor to hear that you could skip the super annoying part of searching for a house and just get straight to the purchasing. She was wonderful and stayed up late writing an offer and coaching us on how to proceed. The next day she told us that she had clients looking at the house the next day and that they put in an offer as well. An idea had come to me (through the Spirit, I'm sure) to mention that our living arrangements were such that they could take their time and we could close in months instead of weeks. We knew they had children in school and thought they might like to finish out the school year in the house and wanted our offer to be appealing. A happy side effect is that the longer they take, the longer we live rent free ;) They accepted our offer and after just a little back and forth after the inspection, we reached a happy agreement and scheduled to close on May 4th. Star Wars Day of all days. The date ended up being the 1st instead, but it's still one we can remember. 

We signed our life away yesterday and spent almost all our money in one place. We were incredibly blessed to be able to sell our first home and without spending anything on improvements, come away with a profit. We bought at the right time and sold when the market was changing for the better. If we'd sold now instead, it would be have been more lucrative but not having a mortgage payment for the last 6 months has really helped us save. We're very grateful to Heavenly Father for His hand in our lives, guiding us to make these decisions and to have the timing work so much in our favour. And to Brandon's parents who've allowed us to turn their lives upside down for almost 10 months. Mason was a baby when we moved in and now he's an incredibly active toddler who can't keep his chubby hands out of anything. That being said, we haven't quite worn out our welcome here yet and will take a few weeks to clean, paint, fix, etc. Our situation couldn't be more ideal, as we can see the house from where we live now and can just pop over quickly to check on things and chip away at the to-do list a little at a time. (Yes, we are living 4 doors down from my in-laws, but it's a much better situation than Everybody Loves Raymond - trust me.) We are extremely excited to have a home that we can call and make our own and I can't wait to see our stuff again. It's going to be like Christmas! 

We signed at 9:00 in the morning in hopes that the loan would fund that day and we'd be able to get keys. We waited all day for a call - longest day ever - and of course, when I went to the bathroom at 4:00 I missed the call we'd been holding our breath for. We rushed to the office to pick up a key and took the kids right over to see it. Teagan was really excited. She was most excited about the pirate ship. In the neighbours' backyard. Great. And Mason was just beside himself with so much room to run around. The backyard is gigantic and has a sprawling field behind it - one of the main reasons we bought the place - but isn't fenced on either side. We tried to take the kids outside and they both ran in opposite directions. So we will be introducing ourselves to the neighbours and promptly erecting a fence. "Good fences make good neighbours" Annie quoted to me and I'm sure our new ones will agree.