A yuck of a day

[JonInMiddleGA]

Today was day one of house hunting for us.
Yuck. OMG yuck.

It was a really simple plan, honest it was.
3 houses to see
House 1 - really a farm, not a house. Asking price out of our target price range by nearly 50%, this was more like browsing than seriously looking.
House 2 - Expected to be nice but eliminated quickly due to being located immediately next to a Georgia Power sub-station.
House 3 - A big-time potential winner, we're talking about the kind where you really think there's a pretty good chance that you'll take the tour & make an offer before you leave (based on the location, what you've seen in the printed & online info, etc).

So, House #1 is about what was expected. Aside from the price, it was really a lot more grounds & a lot less house than we would have wanted. But if anybody is looking for a nice place to have about 8 horses, let me know.

Well, the only gripe really at this point is that we ran a little long & in order to match up all the agents schedules & such, we needed to flip-flop the order that we visited #2 & #3. No biggie though, off we go.

So House 3 is next, very high expectations. We know the asking price is about 15%-20% over our target, but after 4 years on the market, there's a good chance that an offer would be taken. Walk in the back door, no problem. We know the kitchen is a complete tear out & remodel going in, so it's lack of appeal is no problem, plenty of space to do what we want in there anyway. Next up is the addition that would become my new "cave" - combo office & play room for me. Plenty of space, good lighting, even direct access to the back porch which I found surprisingly appealing ... and then it started.
Something catches my eye & I realize there's major league water damage to the ceiling, an obvious major leak problem. We revisit the kitchen area (also added on) ... same tell-tale signs of water damage & leaks. Start back across the foyer between the two & discover the first bad floorboards. We're not talking loose, not talking soft, we're talking about there's fucking holes rotted completely through, please-don't-step-on-me-unless-you-want-the-express-
elevator-to-the-crawlspace sort of rotted. From there, it was like a train wreck as we went from room to room.

Basically, this wonderful exterior & attractive at a distance interior had been neglected for the entire 22 years this family had owned the house. We're talking about a 1860 vintage house that's been neglected in even the simplest ways for at least the past two decades. The source of the leaks became obvious quick enough too, these fuckers were too lazy to clean the magnolia leaves out of the gutter (a 200+ year old magnolia towers over the house, certified as the oldest tree standing in the town). I hate gutters as much as the next person, but for crying out loud, there was literally open-the-window-
and-reach-outside access to the problem area. We leave shaking our heads, even our agent couldn't get out of there fast enough.

Incredibly deflated, we head for House #2. It's a raised cottage (think Charleston or New Orleans style) which I've always liked, but here's this damned electrical sub-station thing literally so close that if you reach over the back fence you're liable to get electrocuted. A constant & persistent hum is your nearest neighbor. Still, we go inside figuring we ought to at least look around. To our surprise, we found ourselves (me especially) liking a lot of what we saw.

Total opposite of the previous house, everything you can think of appeared to have been done in terms of regular maintenance & everything added/changed/altered had been done with as much workmanship & quality materials as you could dream about (for example, there's not just a fence, there's a $55,000 wrought-iron fence, those aren't just concrete "cannonballs" atop the fenceposts, those are hand-made-in-England $500 each single-piece construction (lead around a copper core, then covered with some sort of cement) cannonballs, about 200 lbs each, so they aren't going anywhere).
And for me, the piece de resistance -- a two-room structure out back, built for oversized office + "play area", basically like a dream come true.

But here comes the rub(s). The house is actually about 25% smaller than our current house. One of the big goals of the move was to gain space, not lose it. And yet we find ourselves looking for workarounds, ways to maximize the space. IF we could get the usual amount of negotiation savings, we could probably do the work needed to make it workable for us without busting our budget. The sub-station thing isn't optimal, but it actually produces significantly less noise than the traffic passing by House #3 (the uber-disappointing one) that we had been so high on.

But beyond the space & beyond the amount of interior remodeling we'd have to do, beyond the dollars is some pretty obvious truth: I really liked the house, and loved a lot of things about it (I could go on & on about stuff I liked, from the yard being the perfect size to me to the landscaping, etc, on & on I could go) ... but I'm 100% convinced that my wife would never really like the house. She was awfully game to try to find ways to make herself like it today, but it's virtually none of the things she was looking for. It's too small, not one of her preferred styles, etc. Once I said that straight out, she was still very "I don't know, with some work, I could ... etc" but I'm pretty sure she knows it's true.

And that all brings me to the really frustrating, downright damned depressing part of the scenario. We're very limited in the geography of where we can relocate, as we try to match the location of our major client AND the location of our preferred school(s) for our son. The town we looked at today is one of the very few places that works on both counts, and not working on either count really isn't an option. Unfortunately, all the houses currently on the market (and really, this could be said about 99% of the houses in the town regardless of their status) are either too expensive or too small or just totally out of synch with anything we want in a house. In short, we're looking very very fucked right now, and it's one hell of a bummer

[Joe]

fun day

[kcchief19]

I working the housing industry, and I don't think there is anything more frustrating than looking for a house.

I know you know this, but sleep on House #3 for a few nights. We were kind of in the same boat you were. We were locked into two specific areas and hamstrung by price and eventually ended up with a house because of pure exhaustion of the process; we desperately wanted out of where we were living and this house was the best option that hand come along in a while. But it wasn't what we really wanted, and now we're disappointed with the home's drawbacks and limitations.

I don't know if the power substation is something I could live with. There is sizable research that they can pose major health risks, especially for kids. And if you ever want to move, it's going to be just as big as an obstacle to other buyers as it was to you.

That said, unless you're specifically buying a home for resale investment and KNOW you're going to move within three to five years, I always say buy the home you want. If a home has charm to you, that's worth more than anything else.

Now go have a beer and a box of smokes and chill.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Thanks KC, at this moment, I really don't see us making an offer on it (but who knows on stuff like this).

We actually are in the odd position of knowing pretty much exactly how long we want to be in the house (whatever it turns out to be) -- 10 years minimum, 14 years max. That's how much time between Will graduating from HS (min) & college. Since it's kinda hard to predict where a 7 y/o will end up for college (and it will NOT be Athens, GA), not sure about years 11-14.

Once the school issue is over & done, I can't see us staying in this area at all, so we kinda know the time window we're shooting for.

In the meantime, she's surfing the MLS listings for the umpteenth time, I'm smoking, drinking coffee, & watching 'em beat & bang on each other at Bristol.
(Clearly, my wife & I deal with stress in much different ways )

[DaddyTorgo]

power substations=serious health risks. I don't even think there's much of a question of that anymore these days.

[Rizon]

House #3 have a mold and termite inspection yet?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Termite letter on file, we'll do mold inspection as part of an overall very thorough inspection if we get to a point that it matters to us. (when you're dealing with houses 100+ years old, inspections are a very big deal).

The mold issue was discussed a couple of times today, since the design of this particular house actually has the ground floor sitting about 2 feet below ground level.

[vex]

Good luck, Jon.

[HomerJSimpson]

Are you staying in Monticello, or you looking outside the area?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by HomerJSimpson

Are you staying in Monticello, or you looking outside the area?

Looking to move about a half hour closer to Athens (for school purposes).

[HomerJSimpson]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Looking to move about a half hour closer to Athens (for school purposes).

Closer to Madison? I've got friends going through what you are, except they are looking in Monroe.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by HomerJSimpson

Closer to Madison? I've got friends going through what you are, except they are looking in Monroe.

Yeah, Madison area is optimal because of the abundance of historic homes. Watkinsville area is another possibility, but that's our 2nd choice because there's just not a lot in Watkinsville.

After more than 10 years of trying to exist with only a DQ & a Hardee's for quick meals, only an Ingle's & a local-owned store for groceries, and virtually jack-shit for any other retail needs at all, the presence of a Wal-Mart makes a town look like Manhattan or London or something.

Only in Monticello do you:
Get a motel room from the Dairy Queen ... buy ice cream at the florist ... and find an engineer/surveyor at the funeral home. You also used to be able to arrange for funeral services at the furniture store but the furniture place closed several years back.

[HomerJSimpson]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Yeah, Madison area is optimal because of the abundance of historic homes. Watkinsville area is another possibility, but that's our 2nd choice because there's just not a lot in Watkinsville.

After more than 10 years of trying to exist with only a DQ & a Hardee's for quick meals, only an Ingle's & a local-owned store for groceries, and virtually jack-shit for any other retail needs at all, the presence of a Wal-Mart makes a town look like Manhattan or London or something.

Only in Monticello do you:
Get a motel room from the Dairy Queen ... buy ice cream at the florist ... and find an engineer/surveyor at the funeral home. You also used to be able to arrange for funeral services at the furniture store but the furniture place closed several years back.

Yup, true small backward town determined to remain so. Madison is a beautiful town. Convient to I-20, too. Lots of plusses.

[Dutch]

I had many such days when looking for a home here in Louisiana. The best moment was the house next to the railroad tracks. It was almost brand new, perfect condition, great kitchen, big back yard, well maintained.

Me - "So.....how's living next to a traintrack?"

Agent (who lives down the street) - "Oh, you get used to it, and actually, you hardly even hear it. There are 'no blow' area's that trains have to adhere too."

Me - "Cool."

....

Me - "Hey? What's that sound?"

Train Horn blarring. House starts to shake. Horns blowing some more.

Me - "You're right. I can't hear the train. But that horn will scare the crap out of me if it's 5 in the morning."

I bought a house about 5 blocks from the train tracks and I can still hear that thing. I am pretty glad I don't live right next to the tracks. You may get used to it, but to me, that would suck.

[Wolfpack]

Heh, if you go to college at NC State, getting a dorm room next to the railroad tracks is a foregone conclusion since the entire main campus is bisected by tracks. You CAN get used to it.

[JonInMiddleGA]

What frightens me a little is that Dutch brought up trains ... I don't think I had mentioned the realization that a rather large noisy freight train passes within 30 yards of House 3 4 times daily.

Meanwhile, as the train was becoming pretty much the final nail of the coffin of H3 in my mind, my wife had spent the morning scheming how to make use of the (currently) unimproved attic space in order to jump the house up by another 1,000 sf.