Last Ditch Effort

Tonight, Mike and I are seeing 11 houses, a huge amount for a weekend day, let along a week night.

This is our last chance to try for the tax credit, as we will be in Door County for my half marathon this weekend (yay!).  So, if we aren't successful in finding something today, we won't be back out until the second weekend in May.

Keep your fingers crossed!
♥H

Whirlwind? More like tornado.

My goodness.  So much, so fast.  We have literally been so busy this past week that this is the first moment I've found to really sit down and tell everyone what's been going on.
♥H

So, here's a complete and concise look at the past 10 days in our homebuying adventure:

Friday, April 16th:  Peruse MLS site and find a house in Evanston that came on the market Thursday (4/15), decide to see the house on Saturday before a gaggle of people fall in love with it at the Sunday open house.

Saturday, April 17th:  See the house in Evanston, fall madly in love.  Decide to give up on the Lake Forest offer and put offer in on this house.  Realtor recommends repeat showing in the morning.

Sunday, April 18th: See the Evanston house again first thing Sunday morning.  Sign offer papers.  See about 8 more houses.  Hannah's ability to judge houses is completely compromised by intoxicating love for aforementioned Evanston house.  Give offer papers to realtor to submit asap.  Go back to Evanston house for open house at noon to ask a couple questions of the listing agent.  Find out house went under contract 9:00 PM Saturday.  (Hannah) cries in car.  Contemplate offering list price to see if other buyers can be beat.  Can't believe list price offer is being considered.

Monday, April 19th:  Find out Evanston deal is solid, hearts and minds move on to another house in Highland Park seen Sunday that is also only a few days on the market.  Discussion and reevaluation occur, decide love for this house is just as strong as Evanston house.  Sign more offer papers.  Feel extremely positive about new love in Highland Park.

Tuesday, April 20th:  Early morning find out there are multiple offers in on Highland Park house, biggest and best offers must be in by 5 PM Tuesday.  Write heartfelt note to sellers about our love for house.  Find out we lost out to non-first time homebuyers and possible investors/rehabbers.  Many more tears and angry, non-Christian thoughts fill head.  Decide to put in offer as backup in case financing falls through for Mr. & Mrs. Satan.

Thursday, April 22nd:  Go out in evening to see several more properties.  Nothing floats boats.

Saturday, April 24th:  Go out from 9-1, nothing thrilling.  Hannah loves one house in Deerfield, Mike explains that houses that need foundation work are not quite in the budget.  Hannah understands, grumpily.

Sunday, April 25th:  Take break from househunting.  Come to accept that house will likely be found mere days after the homebuyer tax credit expires 4/30. 

Wish us luck.  We sure do need it.

And for those of you interested in the houses we lost:
Evanston House
Highland Park House
And the house in Deerfield we loved but has structural issues.

A bit like a pregnancy test...

I imagine this waiting for the counter offer is quite like waiting for the result of a pregnancy test. 

Except we have to wait waaaaaaay longer.

Oh well.  I'm trying to keep my my focused on anything and everything else.  But I'll let you all know as soon as the news comes in.

♥H

So, clearly, my blogging skills leave something to be desired.

Okay, okay, I know.  I have been a rotten blogger the past month.  I won't even make excuses, but I will vow (for the second time I believe) to not be neglectful of the blog!
♥H

So now for an update.

The weekend of March 20-21, we saw 10 houses and weren't particularly thrilled by any of them (except one in Vernon Hills that quickly went under contract).  We still really had our minds lingering on the house in Lake Forest, so we scheduled an appointment to see it again (along with a couple other LF homes) on Thursday, March 25th.  Lo and behold, we still loved it just as much and on Friday, March 26th, Mike & I put our first offer down on the house.

While waiting to see if we would get a counter offer, we ventured out again the weekend of March 27-28.  We didn't like anything we saw, except for one.  I fell in LOVE with an adorable older house in Evanston (with a full attic like my parents--which I absolutely adore) but after taking off the rose-colored glasses, I realized that the fact that there was no yard, no garage and a conveniently located ComEd transformer right outside the front door made it a no-go (Mike of course had immediately ruled it out for these reasons, which was impressive considering the massive amount of oohing and ahhing on my part).  The positive part of the whole deal was that I found out what it's like to "just know" about a house.  If only we could move that house... :)

On Monday, March 29th we heard word from our realtor that unfortunately the seller of the Lake Forest home would be trying for refinancing instead of going into short sale (at the request of the bank).  It was pretty disheartening to hear, but we decided to keep the offer in...just in case.

We spent a wonderful weekend with my parents and my little brother, Caleb, in Door County for Easter and came back feeling positive and refreshed.  So once again, we compiled a list and ventured onwards this past weekend.  After seeing about 6 houses, we ended at a house in Highland Park that Mike absolutely adored (he felt the way I felt about Optimus Prime...aka the house in Evanston with the full attic).  There is some work to be done, including a pretty expensive structural fix, but we both loved the feel of the house.

Late last night as we were discussing the HP house, we got an email from Lisa, our realtor, telling us that the Lake Forest seller had resurfaced and we should be expecting a counteroffer late Sunday or Monday. 

So, my friends, we come full circle, as we anxiously await a counteroffer on the 2nd house we ever saw...that we hadn't even picked out.  Just another reminder of how great Lisa is.  We are SO happy to have her guiding us on this topsy-turvy journey.

So, keep your fingers crossed.  I hope to have an update on the counteroffer by this evening!  Who knows? Maybe we'll get lucky enough to squeek in before the first time homebuyer tax credit expires on April 30th!

Love you all...thanks for reading!

Day One, Part Two: O.v.e.r.w.h.e.l.m.e.d.

I know, I know--it took me FOREVER to put this post up.  In my defense, I have been transitioning from my job working as the Events & Volunteer Manager at the Trinity Booster Club to being an Andrologist and Clinical Research Assistant and the Fertility Centers of Illinois.  So, the past week I've been working 10 hour days and I haven't been very good about getting this one finished.  But here it is and I will be better from here on out! 
♥H  

After discovering that Mike’s hockey practice was actually Sunday the 7th, not Saturday the 6th, and I got to relish in a rare moment of imperfection in his life, we decided to head up to Lake Forest around 10 AM even though our first showing wasn’t until 1:30. We were blessed with an absolutely beautiful day so we figured it would be nice to walk around and check the “downtown” area (and perhaps have Mike treat me to a guilt-induced breakfast for waking me up so early for nothing).

Once we arrived in Lake Forest, which was an easy 20 minute drive up 41 from Evanston, we parked the car and went on a search for some good, fairly inexpensive breakfast fare. As we walked through the downtown, where we encountered several gaggles of girl scouts hocking their cookies on roller blades and scooters, we were both amazed by how quiet and charming Lake Forest is.  We stumbled across The Egg Harbor Cafe which turned out to be everything we wanted in a breakfast joint and more.  There were tons of people there but we only had to wait about 5 minutes for a table.  We both had fantastic meals and we left feeling satisfied and ready for some hunting.

We met up with Lisa, our realtor, at the Lake Forest Baird & Warner office.  Right off the bat, we knew we had a winner.  She is funny and outgoing but also direct and can get down to business.  We had intended to talk to a few realtors, but once we were done with her, I looked at Mike and said, "I think we've found a winner."  We went through some paperwork and talked about the basics.  She also set us up with a daily MLS search that gets sent to my inbox each morning.

She took us to this house in Lake Forest we had wanted to see.  It became quickly clear why they hadn't posted pictures of the bedrooms.  They were so small and the ceilings so low, there was absolutely no chance we could be in a place like that.  I actually hadn't really realized that we'd need to take Mike's 6'5" bigness into account--he couldn't stand up the basement!  I just assume all houses are big enough for him! There was also some seriously HIDEOUS wood paneling that covered every inch of every bedroom. We'd never rule a place out because of wood paneling, but we just were NOT feeling it.  Needless to say, it was a bit of a disappointment but was exciting to see our first place.

Next, Lisa took us to a place she thought we'd like.  It's a short sale, so we weren't allowed to take pictures and there aren't any on MLS listing, but we LOVE, LOVE, LOVED it.  In all honestly, the place was such a mess, we wouldn't have wanted to take pictures--but we were able see past all of that.  From the front, it looks like a single level ranch, but it was built on a hill, so the "basement" is completely finished and has a door that leads out to the backyard.  And oh, what a backyard it is.  It looks over a ravine and has a fantastic deck on the second level (which we would definitely want to build stairs up to so it could be accessed from the yard).  Unfortunately, it was a bit over our price range...though we have continued to talk about it all week.  We are definitely going to keep our eye on it.

Last, we met up with a different realtor to look at this house.  It was one that I had found and really liked from the pictures.  We both liked it a lot, but in the end, the fact that it had practically no yard made us rule it out.  We just enjoy being outside, hanging out, throwing a lacrosse ball around, grilling...you name it, we want to be outside doing it.  And if there isn't a yard, it isn't for us.

We ventured back home, feeling exhausted and fairly overwhelmed.  We really started to realize how much this whole house hunting thing can take out of you. 

But we've begun the process and we couldn't be more excited.

Day One, Part One: Dressed to Impressed

When I woke up Saturday morning, I spent several minutes in bed fretting about what to wear for the showings. And should I straighten my hair? How much makeup? Knowing that we were seriously starting this house hunting adventure, I thought perhaps it might be a good idea to show up looking at least marginally classy.

And then there was Mike. Sporting jeans he’d probably worn the past 2 days, an faded “Evergreen State” t-shirt from a trip to Washington we took a few years ago and the scrubbiest, nastiest hoodie in his collection, he was ready to go. Granted, he was on his way to coach hockey before we went to our showings, but I was astounded that he wasn’t at least bringing a nice shirt to change into.

After about the sixth time I asked him “Are you sure you don’t want to bring anything to change into,” he looked at me and said, “Hannah, being dressed like I can afford a $500,000 house doesn’t mean I can afford a $500,000 house. If they don’t want to sell us a house because I’m wearing this sweatshirt, then screw them.”

And you know what? He’s totally right. Wearing fancy, designer shoes or clothes or accessories, in the end, is not going to buy you a house. I think this is a mistake that a lot of homebuyers (especially young ones) make—they think that no one will take them seriously (or people will take them more seriously) unless they are dressed to the nines. Ladies, should you wash your hair and slap a little lipstick on? Yes. Guys, should you shave that five o’clock from two days ago shadow and make sure you have some deodorant on? Yes. But do you need to make yourself out to be something you’re not? Absolutely not.

Which leads me to another in my series of HTFACUIP.

Tip #2: Expensive, designer clothes ≠ expensive, designer home. Sure, there are people out there who will undoubtedly have both. But keep dreaming if you think that strolling in with your Gucci sunglasses, Jimmy Choos and Louis Vuitton bag is going to buy you that half million dollar house. While what you wear to meet an agent or see a house should be a reflection of you, it should, above all other things, be comfortable. If this means your nicest, designer clothes, then by all means go ahead and wear them. But I’m guessing for most of you a comfy pair of jeans, your favorite sneakers and fun t-shirt accurately represents you. In the end, only one type of money talks—the money a bank is willing to lend you for a mortgage. And last time I checked, they don’t send a banker to check out your closet before approving you.

So wear what you want and remember that the only thing that really matters when it comes to buying a house is whether or not you have the money to back up the offer. Mike may have been strolling around looking a bit scrubby, but in the end his checkbook can back up a purchase like this far better than I could on even my most fabulously stylish day.

…but I still wore heels and trendy spring scarf (sticking out of my coat in this über mature picture below taken in the front porch of house #3...more info in the next post).

♥H

Truth Time

So I'll be honest, when I say that Mike & I are looking for a house to buy together, I really mean that Mike is looking for a house to buy and I'll essentially being paying him rent.  And slooooowly paying off half the down payment.

But seriously, the man is 26 years old and I can say with full confidence that I have never met someone more financially responsible than him.  And the time for that skill is now, especially because we frequently have conversations that go like this:

Me: Mike, I found a great listing.  Check it out.
Mike: Hannah, that is $55,000 over our budget.  What is wrong with you?
Me:  Oh, well, I don't know....it's just....it's just so pretty!  And I love it and it's great!  Please can we look at it?  Maybe they'll like us a lot and give us a great deal!
Mike:  Absolutely not.  Seriously, are you crazy?  Do you understand that $55,000 represents a year's salary for people?  Sometimes, Hannah...sometimes.  (Shakes his head.)
Me:  Oh okay...um, sorry.  Of course.  You're right. (Sad face.)

We have this conversation several times a day.  And with this, I bring you the first in my series of "Homebuying Tips from A Completely Unqualified, Inexperienced Person."  Also known as HTFACUIP...I know, so much easier to remember.

Tip #1:  If one (or neither) of the parties involved in the homebuying experience is capable of sticking to the budget, it's not the right time to buy.  When it comes down to it, if both parties can't pick an acceptable, reasonable budget and agree to only look at houses in that price range, the only thing waiting for you at the end of the house hunting experience is deep, deep disappointment.

So, while I am sure I will continue to send Mike the occasional outrageous listing, in my heart I know our budget and only schedule showings for houses in that budget.

But one can always dream.
♥H

The Hunt is On

So as much as I absolutely loathe the word "blog" and many bloggers (not you, Pastor J-man--your blogs are great, which everyone can enjoy at DrJ's WISN Blog) I thought that in this economy, Mike & I might have a different take on the whole house hunting experience.

So tomorrow, March 6th, exactly 2 months after my 22nd birthday, Miguel and I will be heading out to look at houses.

Wish us luck!
♥H