July 2010 Weddings
saisongbird
member
RIP Dr. Irving Fishman - 10/1/19-7/25/10 - thank you for holding on for me.
You made my wedding day complete.
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
House Hunting
It's difficult and frustrating! We are in a position where if I lose my job, we can't afford the rent without dipping into savings, but because we have an insanely large amount squirreled away, and more coming with the inheritance money that is due, we can afford a house, so long as we put down a large down payment.
Those of you who own a home, how long did it take you to find it? What about the process did you not know to ask that you need to know to ask about, (for example, today we learned to ask about amps), and what were the biggest shockers along the way?
RIP Dr. Irving Fishman - 10/1/19-7/25/10 - thank you for holding on for me.
You made my wedding day complete.
Re: House Hunting
We looked in two suburbs last January (shortly after getting engaged) and we found houses we both liked in both burbs. Then we decided to put everything on hold- and then looked again as soon as I got my job, and we ended up looking even further west. We looked once in August, had two that we really liked, then looked again after we accepted an offer on the sale of the condo. I think we looked at 4 more that night that we hadn't seen previously, and our top two again. And we went with one of the new 4...
Ask your realtor exactly what the process is in your state. We learned that it is insane in Illinois! Since you are only buying and not selling, that should make things a little easier. Our buyer's attorney was a royal pain and dragged everything out as long as possible.
Our house is far our "dream home"... but we chose to buy something we could afford and still afford to have a life outside of the house. We could have moved a little further outside of our "mile radius from the train" and gotten something bigger/newer/etc.. but being within walking distance of the train part was important to us. We also wanted to be within walking distance of things. We can walk to our little town square, the Y, the schools, a church, grocery store, etc. They are all within a mile of us.
We passed up a house that was already completely renovated b/c there was no room for improvement. They had just done the kitchen... but then what, when we go to sell in 5, 10, 20 years, it would be dated already. Our plan is to do our kitchen in the next 5-10 years.
Amps are important, but if you know an electrician, they could do it for not that much money (my brother is updating our electrical at some point this year). We knew we would need new windows, so we factored that into the price we offered. We knew we could do minor repairs, but didn't want to do anything major in the near future.
Make sure the layout is good. I like that our house is a ranch (I am a total klutz... and I was thinking to the future of carrying an infant down the steps
). I don't like that our kitchen window looks out at our next door neighbors, and not the backyard. But that's ok for now.
Check for water damage etc. I had no idea most people in the burbs here have/need sump pumps until we started looking. Our house happens to be on a the top of a slight hill, and there is no need for that.
Check out the houses on the street. One of our three top houses was next to a McMansion. Not even a tasteful McMansion (there are plenty of nice ones here). But the house was literally double the size of the house we looked out. That was definitely a negative for us.
And look for weird things- like the fact that both of our bathrooms did not have towel rods/hooks/or anything! Look closely at the paint jobs. I thought painting the bedrooms would be a piece of cake, but it's taken me two weekends to do one room b/c of all the holes/chips/drips/poor patch jobs that previous owners did that I had to fix (and I am probably way too much of a perfectionist, too).
Good luck!! It is a great time to buy. We bought our house for close to 80k less than what the guy bought it for 3 years ago! We took a hit on the condo- but nothing close to that big of a hit! Plus the interest rates are awesome.
We house hunted in the fall and moved in January. It is a fun, stressful, long, and tedious process but so worth it in the end. It was kind of like wedding planning, fun at first and then felt like a job later. Be sure you are ready to buy and you know the location you want. Also, get a realtor you trust...that is important.
We probably looked at about 25-30 houses including open houses. Be sure to ask about the age of the roof and if there has ever been water damage. Also look for signs of water damage. Bring a flashlight along and check dark areas. Also be careful of houses that have made many many (too good) updates. We had one we liked and they had made many updates but then had siding they had got a settlement on and hadn't fixed the siding. That is why they updated it so much. Check siding for holes. Check for cracks in walls and foundations. When you do buy, make sure and get an inspection. It was a law here but I don't know if it is in every state. We love our house!!! DH got frustrated a few times b.c. we were not finding what we wanted but be patient. As DH's friend's says, do not settle on a house!!! Good luck!!!
Good luck with the house hunting! It definitely is an experience filled with many emotions. We started looking casually this summer and got more serious in late august. We found our now home in mid November. All in all we looked at hundreds of houses online and visited probably about 30.
If I could offer suggestions I would say to 1. Find a good Realtor, we went through 2 b/c our first one was awful and having a good Realtor makes such a different. 2. make a priority list of what is most important to you and DH in a house (location, neighborhood, sq footage, number of rooms....) 3. when you look at the houses keep an open mind about cosmetic things, you can always change paint, cabinets etc, but you can't change the location or yard. 4. Follow your gut and don't compromise just to get a house, find one you will be happy in for awhile (even if you only plan for it to be a "starter" home if for some reason you can't sell you want it to be something you can live with).
Lastly, just enjoy the process, I know it can be stressful, but you will know when you find the perfect house! GL and let me know if you have any questions.
(formerly SAHM711)
I like to equate house hunting to dating. You'll look at a lot of houses hoping they're "the one", but in the end they just aren't quite right. When you find the right one for you you'll just "know", but try to not overlook the flaws in the excitement. If you have time, try to have someone you trust without the "emotional attachment" come back to look at the house you're considering and go through it with a critical eye before you commit to an offer (my parents and brother saw things I had overlooked initially in my "starry-eyed" view of the house) . Get a thorough inspection, and if the inspector makes any recommendations for repairs or other types of inspections, do it - it's worth the upfront money. If you can get the sellers to make necessary repairs, do that. Good luck with everything!
I definitely agree with the PP that said that it's like wedding planning, it's so much fun at first and then it becomes like a job.
We started looking in the winter of '08 and ended up moving in june '08. It was a roller coaster ride but it was definitely worth it in the end.
My biggest piece of advice is what our realtor told us "You want to live IN the house, not FOR the house". Make sure you know exactly what your budget is and do not get in over your head. Because once you start looking and find out the reality of what you can afford and the reality of what you would LOVE to have, it can be tempting to stretch it.
We saw probably about 15 houses and browsed through so many more online. We put an offer in on our "dream" house and it got accepted, but later were crushed because there were foundation problems in the inspection, and we knew we couldn't afford to get them fixed. We then put an offer in on a short sale (our house we ended up in) and had to wait and wait and wait for the banks to ok it. They finally did, and I am so glad we ended up in this house and not the first one. It was at the lower end of our price range so we had money to paint, re-carpet, buy some furniture, etc.