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The Tale of Two Houses

two houses

True to our culture, Facebook was first to hear the news flash about our new house. My faithful readers deserve more. Enter: The Tale of Two Houses.

One house has served our family well for 17 years. We’ve stockpiled memories in this place, but it doesn’t fit our needs as we’re growing older. Major downfall: stairs.

House number two has yet to be born. It’s nothing more than an architectural drawing at the moment. Give it time, and it will host the snapshots of our future.

Old House

If you’ve been following me for any time at all, you know my husband and I have had our house on the market for more than a year. We just listed with a Realtor in September, and we expected to sell it within a month or two.

Entering month three: we have at least one couple seriously interested and another couple who has included our house on their short list of possibilities.

New House

The new house wasn’t our first choice. Alas, financial considerations dropkicked the large private lot with room for a shop from my husband’s top spot. Location frustration erased the custom built from its place as number one on my wish list.

All things considered, this house is roughly the same size as the other plan we chose. It has everything we MUST have in a house.

Best of all, my husband’s commute will be reduced to 20 minutes. (Should I add that I can walk to Fred Meyer’s One-Stop Shopping in under five minutes?)

Brown House

Both of the homes we wanted are located in subdivisions with enormous lists of regulations. Both require membership in a Homeowner’s Association (to the tune of $24/month).

The one we bought is little more than a spec house. We chose from four different interior design packages. They told us the color of the outside.

“They haven’t even broke ground, but they know what color it’s going to be.”IMG_0434

Oh, yes. They have ten different palettes of browns and grays. Selection of colors is based on keeping any two houses from being exact twins.

Right, because the house next to us isn’t going to be the exact same inside. Oh, but the outside will be a different color (and a slightly different design, but let’s not go there since it disappoints my husband).

They estimate the house will be complete and ready to move into on March 30, 2015, which means…

Blue House

Old blue needs to sell before then.

As much as I’d like the security of having an offer on our home right away, there are a few reasons why I’m not in a huge hurry:

  • I despise, detest and abhor moving.
  • If someone buys our house soon we will have to move TWICE, as well as find another place to stay for a few months.
  • We will have to pay to store all our furniture and boxes.
  • I abhor, detest and despise moving.
  • Things will be in an upheaval for a longer amount of time, keeping me from focusing on my writing goals (a book in readers’ hands in April or May).
  • The bank says we can afford to keep this place for a rental (more on this later).
  • I detest…have I said this already?

Bottom line: we have two houses. We want to sell one but not until the other one is nearly finished.

Will this Tale of Two Houses have a happy ending? To be continued…

6 thoughts on “The Tale of Two Houses”

    1. I’m trying not to think about it. That’s one good thing about writing out my thoughts in a blog post, it works as a purge of sorts.
      The fact that I’m leaving for a vacation in six days also helps.

  1. This is probably hard on you. I’ve been through it myself — several times. What I found astounding when I’ve been moving, at the end, everything seems to fall into place and I wonder why I was so anxious about all of it.

    Suggestion: Take a cleansing breath, sit with a cup of herbal tea and let it roll off of you.

    1. My husband is more anxious about it than I am at the moment. I have plenty of other things to focus my attention on…and we still have nearly four months.
      Thanks for stopping by and joining the conversation.

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