House Woes

 The saga of houses continues. Our second accepted offer on our old house did not take terribly long to receive, and it came in at asking price, slightly above what the first accepted offer had been. However, they did not waive inspections and the inspections results came back with many more items in need of repair than we expected. We've been working on getting quotes for the repairs, but it's likely to cost us multiple thousands of dollars at this point In good news, it appraised high enough and we are scheduled to close a week from Friday. Perhaps this will be the last roadblock in a long series of road blocks? (ha!)

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Meanwhile, we've put an offer on a house here in Minnesota and have had it approved too, contingent on many things including the sale of our old house and the sellers' ability to find a new house themselves (apparently the house they had been set to buy also fell through). This house is about double the size of our old one; four bedrooms, three bathrooms, a dining room, etc. The rooms are small, and it's not a perfect house or the house of our dreams, but we think it will serve our young family well for a number of years. The biggest selling point is that it comes with a half acre lot, giving us ample room for gardening and playing outside. Seeing as the kids and I spend so much time outside, it matters less that the rooms of the house are small, since we can spend lots of the day outside for most of the year. It doesn't have the design features that I love (lots of hardwood floors and wood work, sun room, huge kitchen, built in shelves, fireplace), but as Paul Hollywood likes to remind us, "style over substance" is no good. There is lots of potential in this house, lots of things we can do to improve it and make it more our own, without it being a fixer-upper (and let's face it, we don't have the chops for a fixer-upper). 

Of course, after the whole fiasco of trying to sell our house to the first buyer, we know that nothing is set in stone until the money has been paid and the keys handed over. Either or both of these sales could still fall through and leave us back at square one. But despite the worry that we'll have to start over again, I can't help arranging and decorating and planning for the new house in my head. I find myself scrolling through pinterest, looking for ideas to lay out a small living room, or how to decorate a play room. I read articles about creating a whole house color palette that flows together but isn't just one color throughout the entire thing. We dream of backyard days, with a huge play set built for the kids, a vegetable and herb garden that provides us with fresh produce throughout the growing months and a long row of strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries to provide us with fruit throughout the summer.

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The quotes on repairs come back a few thousand dollars lower than we expect. The buyers accept our offer to line up the work and pay for it, but not necessarily complete it by closing. Closing is now only a little longer than a week away. What a relief it will be if and when it closes. The inspections on the new house go well, and nothing surprising comes up. We start to prepare our response to the sellers for the inspections on their house.

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The evening of Pippa's birthday we get a message from our realtor in Minnesota. "Awful news. Should I call now or tomorrow?" Of course, we already know what it must be. "You can call now." 

The sellers have decided to back out. They have put offers on two other houses and neither has been accepted, and they've had a death in the family that has made them reconsider selling and moving at all. We've already seen that contracts essentially mean nothing, but here is proof once again. They can back out a week in and we have nothing to show for it. In one fell swoop, the backyard dreams and paint colors and layout plans I've been passing my time with are wiped clean. It feels more like a joke than anything else.

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The buyers on our IN house get a clear to close, and ask if they can bump closing up two days early. We are just as eager for closing as they, and agree to do it as soon as possible. The hiccups still aren't over (the title company sends the wrong papers to our notary), but they're smaller and quickly fixed, and we successfully sign our closing papers. The next day, three months after listing, we finally close on our house. One big step towards owning a house in MN. 

Meanwhile, we are house shopping again. We go look at a couple houses that look potentially good. The one I am most excited for has already sold by the time we schedule a showing, so we cross it off the list. We take the girls along, stop at Caribou for some treats, and then look at the remaining two houses. The first, which we almost overlooked do to it's less-than-beautiful exterior, is quickly a favorite. It has an amazing kitchen; double ovens, range hood, two fridges, double apron sink, real tile. The dining room is beautiful, with big windows and beautiful tile. It's been completely redone, and looks like great quality throughout, and is somehow priced cheaper than the first house we put an offer on. It's got a smaller yard, but fully fenced and still enough room to do many of the things we want to do outside. The ceilings are low, the rooms are small, but we leave and decide we want to put an offer in. We are told they have two other offers and will decide by the next day. We put in ours and go to bed. 

Next day, no news comes. As the hours go by, we wait and wonder, knowing that every hour that goes by is a lower chance that we got it. By the time we go to bed, we've still heard nothing. Next morning our realtor calls. Our offer was highest, but because it was contingent on the sale of our IN house, they went with another offer. 

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It takes a few days to even feel up to scrolling through listings again. When we do, nothing looks promising. They're smaller, have no character, have no yard, or are priced way above what we can afford. It's hard to know where to settle, where to lower expectations, especially when the current listings don't hold up to the ones we already put offers on. The market moves fast, so something could come up any day, but at the same time, we could be waiting a long time if we are waiting on a dream house.