New Digs

Swede and I have been searching for a house for some time now. I think I mentioned it before in earlier posts. We may be close to a home now. We signed a contract and made an offer on a lovely 3/2/2 in west Houston. This house is just about everything we wanted and prayed for. There were little signs that this house could be ours when we first saw it. Swede noticed the big German Shepherd next door, the seller's email is Top Gun (Swede was wearing her Top Gun hat when we saw the house), and the meth lab down the street was recently busted. My parents' first home was across the street from a meth lab back in the day. The signs are there, and we are exploiting them.

Every house we've looked at either had foundation or roof problems. There isn't a house in Houston that doesn't have those problems to some degree. Even the newly built brick boxes get them shortly after being built. Most has to do with the soil composition and the rest is due to age. The house we want was built in '55 and just had its foundation repaired. The seller went to great expense to level the home. She also put a new roof on there as well. She took great pride in remodeling this home. Originally, it was bought and remodeled for her daughter to live in as a gift. Since daughter decided not to move, the house went on the market. Two months later, we made the offer to buy.

We went from one phase of stress to another in the home buying process. Now, we just have to get the inspection reports back and fix whatever faults need fixing. Oh, and have the seller pay for most of that. According to our agent's assistant, our problems are very minor and very few. She has seen inspections come back with 40 pages of problems. At most, we have four major problems and about 10 or so minor things to take care of. Plumbing and electrical are high on my list, and so is the backyard.

Lemme tellya about the backyard...it's a freakin' jungle. I may have to break out the machete and go to work now. There is a slab where the storage shed USED to be. That needs to come out. No real grass or landscaping to speak of. Just weeds and trees. Three of those trees are definitely coming out. I have plans for the fig trees, too. Once grass starts to take hold, we would like to even it out and rebuild the lawn. After that, landscaping and border work along the fence. There isn't much for us to do inside except furnish the whole place. We have 800 sq.ft. of furniture to move into a 2,000sq.ft. home. That doesn't include the 2 car garage. There's also the expense of getting a new fridge and washer/dryer (although, the seller commented that she'll buy us a new washer/dryer as a gift).

We have been through some high's and low's this past week with the offer, contract and inspections. The next round starts tomorrow when the reports come back. Hopefully, this will all go as planned for us. There are a couple of major issues with the electrical and plumbing that need to be addressed, but we're hoping the seller will pick that up. Other than that, we'll see what tomorrow brings...if I don't die from an ulcer first.

As everyone knows, the first home purchase is a nut cracker. Stress has been running high after our very first bout with a new home offer. That crazy realtor only spoke four words of English, "Offer not good enough." She was under the illusion that the home she was selling was worth more than we were offering. Now she has a contract on it, and I am tempted to hunt that party down and inform them they are bidding too high. Something tells me she suckered a couple into her asking price. Hope they speak her language.

I can't say enough about this seller. She is the owner/agent and has been more than gracious. I think a bit of that has to do with our realtor talking me and Swede up to her as a great couple. From what I gather, she likes us because we have done our homework and are good, decent people according to my agent. Something must have touched a good nerve, because she passed up on a couple of other offers that were closer to her asking price so she could deal with us. That gives me a warm fuzzy that I am taking to bed tonight. Hopefully it will be there when we ask her to fix the problems in the inspection report.

Wish us luck and I will let you know if we get to close at the end of the month.