New House Week

"We have a house!"  Words that forever changed our lives.  May 4,2012, the sellers of our new dream house accepted our offer.  We were under contract. 

Only two months prior, we looked at this house.  Not ten steps down the hall and The Agent decided this was not ours.  While house hunting with my Agent fiance, I vowed to remain the optimist.  And extremely patient.  After all, I've never house hunted.  But he knew immediately if a house would be "ours".  I wanted to give this house the benefit of the doubt.  I loved it from the moment we pulled in the drive.  "It smells" he said.  I thought he was crazy.  "It's too expensive".  I knew he could negotiate down.  "The living room is PINK" he'd exclaim.  Paint.  Duh.  All the while, I kept thinking it's gorgeous.  The hardwoods are in excellent condition, paint would do wonders, it's on a beautiful cul-de-sac in one of my top three neighborhoods and it is the floor plan we l-o-v-e LOVE.  We wanted the traditional two story.  Well, we were standing in the traditional two story.  Regardless of my fight, it was no longer at the top of our list.  The Agent won.  Five minutes later (and after a quick sweep of the rest of the house), we were walking out.  As we backed down the drive, he stopped the car, looked at the house and gave it one last comment.  "Man.  It sure has great curb appeal."  It wasn't discussed again.

A couple of months later (and after a terrific reduction in price), the man who wrote this house off as "smelly" wanted to go back for a second look.  I didn't object.

The second time we walked into "Kensington" he saw this house in a new light.  The smell wasn't as bad, the pink could be painted, it did have a large finished basement, the rooms were a nice size, there's the large formal dining and eat in kitchen, we could stay here for 20+ years.  "Imagine what it will be like at Christmas" he'd say, envisioning the decor, family gathered and memories we'd make.  "My family and yours could both fit in this house" he told me with a small grin.  "But we'll need more furniture" he teased.  "It backs to Switzer" I reminded him, a little concerned.  I was thinking of baseballs and Frisbees flying into the poor folks just driving to Starbucks.  What if a gate came unlocked and  the dog/kid/cat escaped.  What if we had a Spiderman wannabe and he scaled the back fence?  Plus, that was always one of his two rules... "don't back to a busy street and avoid power lines".  Well, The Agent was breaking his own rule.  "It's far enough off of the street"... "come see" he persuaded. The second time around, we were there for close to half an hour.  With The Agent, that means something. 

The next day, we wrote an offer.  The day after that, they accepted.  We were thrilled.  I, more so than my Real Estate Agent fiance.  He knew we had a long road ahead... inspections, negotiations, mortgage underwriting, insurance.  All I could think about was making it ours.  Decorating the banister for Christmas, Halloween pumpkins on the front porch, Fall wreath on the door, 4th of July bar-be-ques, toddlers running through the sprinklers, kiddos careening their bikes down the steep drive, teenagers coming home after long practices...

Fast forward another 52 days.  We've now reached New House Week.  Tomorrow is our final walk through.  We close the day after that.  Friday we take possession.  

Holy. Moly.  I've never felt more like an adult than I do right now.  We skipped the starter house.  We have three stories of potential problems.  We have a house that was built for a family of 5 (and we aren't even married yet!).  We have a mortgage, a yard, HOA fees and bylaws, pipes that could burst, a basement that could flood, carbon monoxide to think about.  Don't even get me started about decorating.  Or our fire exit plan.  We have a house that's a zillion times larger than our apartment.  How am I going to keep it all CLEAN?! 

Above all worry and fear of what could go wrong, we have four walls that will hold every one of our memories.  We have a place to call "ours" for at least the next quarter of a century.  Hopefully longer.  We have bedrooms where our precious babies will sleep, a basement waiting for countless K-State & Chiefs games/races/sleepovers, our very own backyard for play, a fireplace waiting for snowy days...

Above all worry and fear, we have a home.