House of Destiny/House of Horrors

So I know I say that I am trying not to get attached to particular houses, but sometimes I just can’t help it. So far, I have had very bad luck in my choice of dream home. Here are a few stories.

Back in the fall Kendal and I would randomly browse house listings just to get a feel for what was out there. We ran into this particular house, which was way over priced and promised upgrades that hadn’t been made. I thought it would be interesting to take on a fixer-upper like that, if we could get it at the right price. Even though we weren’t ready to buy a house yet, I had so much fun thinking about how I would make the house beautiful that after a while I had the whole thing remodeled in my head. In December though, the house went off the market, and that was that; we moved on to other houses. Every once in a while though I would think about the house on Ames, and remember its wonderful potential. After having no success with other houses, I thought that maybe I should pursue the Ames house a little further. I got the owner’s name from the old listing, and looked him up. I got his ex-wife, who said she would have him call me. He never did. So once again I resolved to let it go. Then, a few days ago I started to think about the house again, and decided to see if it came on the market again. Friday night, low and behold, it was there, and at a significantly lower price. It had been foreclosed on, and it was just waiting for me. Kendal joked that it was our house of destiny (a term he has used in the past for sports teams that won against all odds). Saturday we went to see it, and got wrapped up in dreams of fixing it up. But, inevitably, problems wormed their way into my dream. Besides needing a complete overhaul in the kitchen, living room, basement, and yard, the furnace needed to be replaced, the electrical needed updating, and I am 6 months pregnant and completely unable to help with anything. We talked for a while of putting in an offer, but by Sunday night the weight of it all was just too much. I finally admitted I didn’t think we could take it on. Oh, the sighs of relief I heard. My grandpa literally looked like he had just taken off a 50 pound pack. I was far more emotionally attached than anyone else due to my long-time semi-obsession. So, it is a testament to my far more level-headed husband that he was willing to take that house on for his wife. He was very relieved that I was able to come around to reality. All I can say is that I finally have complete and utter closure with this house. I let go of my idealized dream house that just wasn’t to be. However, I think I will be interested in what happens to this house for a while. I really want to know how much it sells for, and how the new owner fixes it up. I think I will even be able to restrain myself from asking if I can trim the overgrown trees and bushes, just as long as I find a house of my own to direct all of my beautifying energies.

Last week we found a listing for a three-bedroom ranch that was really cheap (now I know that is code for “has huge problems”), so we decided to drive over real quick and look at it. I am getting very familiar with all of the neighborhoods in this area, by the way, and very familiar with their problems. The house looked really cool. It was newer, with a huge yard and nice rooms. There was no landscaping to speak of, just a field, but this we could handle. I started to get excited, and told Kendal I wanted this house, he just said “don’t get too excited, we need to look into it. There is a reason this house is so cheep.” I should have known better. When we got home I asked grandpa about the house, and he looked it up for me. I am learning that they leave a lot of details out of realitor.com. There was a list of problems, water damage, mold, “possible” structural damage (meaning definite structure damage)—I start considering how much of this I could handle. The next day my grandpa called so see if we could go see the house, and they said “yes, just don’t go into the basement because you could fall through.” Come to find out it had a wood floor in the basement so the soil could expand, and it had rotted so bad it was no longer safe. Yeah, we didn’t go see the house. That is just not my kind of fixer-upper. We realized later there were signs we should have seen, like the fact that the back yard was all sorts of rolling with 5-foot elevation differences between parts of the yard. I can definitely say this whole experience has been very informative.