I know is seems like everyone in America does it, and we're even a little old to be entering the game, but that doesn't make this any less jaw-dropping for me, personally. We bought a house. Or, at least, we signed a deal :) Closing in a month...
How do I feel? Oy, where to begin. So very, very glad to wake up this weekend and not schlep around to houses :) Immensely excited at all of the possibilities. Completely freaked that we bought a house in a place we've barely spent any time and will now be tied to with a hundred year old chain. Dreamy and gut seizing all at once.
But enough about me. The house. Honestly, I think I would be less overwhelmed/stressed (and also less dreamy and joyful) if it was just a house. No. This is... an adventure. As I've sat up nights with Z this week, fretting over this decision amidst her hacking, that has been my realization. We looked at lots and lots of houses. We even looked at one other Adventure, but it was in the wrong location, and too big of an adventure at this point ;) Barring unforeseen disasters (and with houses this old, there are Always unforeseen disasters, no?), this will be a doable adventure. I hope :)
Enough with the drama, I know ;) So, here' the story, for the future me, in case I am slamming my head into crumbling walls screaming "Why?!? Why did you choose THIS house???" in a few years...
We looked all over Portland. I think my hand is permanently crippled from gripping my iPhone and using the Zillow app with such frequency. We're a pretty opinionated crowd and our lives, schooling and work are all in our home, so this will house more than our shit. The home we would choose would have to house possibility.
We pretty quickly nixed most residential neighborhoods. We rode around a lot of beauties, for sure, but none of us can fathom popping into the car to do everything. Just personal preference. Fortunately, there are a lot of walkable nabes here. Those were narrowed down by price (downtown is too pricy!) and options (Hollywood has a killer Whole Foods and great houses, but not much else.) The areas we were left with are all old, turn of the century housing stock. Lovely for those of us that prefer plaster walls and glass doorknobs but difficult for open floor plans! Brand new builds are popping up in these areas, so we checked those out too and... honestly, I could not get past the word Soul-less. Its not that I don't love people that love living in their beautiful and convenient new homes or that their homes aren't drop dead gorgeous (and did I mention convenient and non-drafty?) Its that I finally realized that I value character over convenience, quirk over quartz. E begged a bit for one - it even had a garage door opener!!! - but I just couldn't do it. I know that sounds positively ridiculous to a lot of people, but my home is an extension of my very being, my living space, my piece of peace, and the new ones felt like an ill fitting wool coat. Fortunately, Superman understands me :)
As soon as we walked into this house, our house, I was at home. The rough, water-stained wood floors, worn on the turning stairway up whispered it to me. The quirky cabinet at the top of the stairs promised me I'd find my children there during hide and seek, someday soon. The attic loft made me sigh so loudly I almost woke the baby. It makes absolutely no sense to me, but I knew it was home for us when we stepped in the rickety old front door.
Then I had to get my logical side on board. Fortunately, Superman sways with my breeze, so he's been a dream ride. The Little Man had hoped for a crazy, labyrinth like building since reading the Spiderwick Chronicles, so this Gothic behemoth wasn't too hard of a sell there. But he did mention he wished it wasn't quite so dumpy...
The walls are cracked. The kitchen is unbelievably ugly and lacking in modern accoutrements. There was a fire in the basement (before the city started record keeping!) The windows, the gorgeous make me swoon windows, will be drafty, to say the least. Some of the floors are painted, scratched, repainted and re-scratched. The beadboard lined stairways that lead different directions are partially painted, partially not... And that's just the obvious! I had my (serious) doubts about the plumbing and the electrical.
Then, to top it off, its a duplex. No joke. Actually, a triplex, but the top floor isn't a legal dwelling unit, so, duplex. As I lay, over the last month, dreaming of this house (every night) I had to wonder... In what Universe would this Ever be considered a good purchase??? Those rules that tell you to buy the best house you can in the best neighborhood you can afford, but not the best house on the block, the worst house on the best block, blah blah blah. Well, those rules couldn't even bend to fit this situation.
But it is in our favorite neighborhood. Infinitely walkable. One block from a playground. Three blocks from the library. Three blocks to a gorgeous park. Just down the street from an extinct volcano. Two blocks to a grocer, eight blocks to our health food store. Restaurants (that, granted, we cannot eat in:) and cafes abound. Bus stops galore and an easy bike to the river or downtown. It has a vibrant feel that we love. But at least half of the homes are rental homes, so you can imagine that it lacks the well swept facade of a more residential area. And that was really hard for me to get past in this decision. Usually, you look for homes that have great looking neighbors. Here, its an every other one sorta thing. Its just so urban that different rules apply. And while we've lived urban for the better part of the last decade, we've never bought urban. This process certainly brought out the little Midwestern girl in me :)
Finally, we came to terms with location. We love it, and despite the high rental rate here, it is one of the most established nabes in the city, raw looks or not. As a commitment-phobe, knowing it is possible to get out of a situation is always important :)
Funnily enough, the duplex bit was actually a huge selling point for us. (Another spot where my Midwestern mentality and my years in Brooklyn kept bonking heads.) We'd always envied our landlord's brilliance. Buy a brownstone, let your tenants help you pay your mortgage! But!!! But, said my midwestern side. A DUPLEX? Not a lot of post-college renting going on in Kansas ;) That word has heady connotations there. Fortunately, as the inner me's duked it out, the selling point prevailed. We just happened to know the most amazing tenants a person could ever get, and we just happened to be luring them all the way across the country. Our dream of raising our babies beside family (the same reason for spending months in Kansas every year) could come true...year round! So before we even looked at the house, we called Seth and Alicia. I mean, just because we would kill to live by them doesn't mean they feel the same way ;)
Fortunately, they were willing. Now my heart was even more sold. Bam. Duplex dilemma solved. And when they forsake us for their own home (sob) I can have my dream of international visitors. This is a Hot market for vacation rentals and Phoenix is So Excited that we could have someone speaking Spanish staying downstairs for a week that he could just pee :)
So we took a professional contractor through the place to tell us if we were nutso. He seemed to think (of course, he's a contractor..) that its all very doable. A little paint, a few shingles, a heater and we're off and running. (I have his name bookmarked for future hateful thoughts should we find ourselves re-enacting The Money Pit.)
The purchasing process was long and stressful, but we have now signed things that make us future home owners, disaster barring, so the dreams are really amping up. Superman is figuring out an entire aquaculture situation for food growing (a closed cycle that sounds brilliant!) The cavernous unfinished basement already has huge canvases filled with children's art in my mind. And an indoor sand pit for the long winter. And a deep freezer for our now possible cow share. And shelves filled with canned goods, garnered from our future small, but sweet, urban oasis.
Because its the possibilities that sold us this house. With crack strewn walls and colorful floorboards, without granite counters and fancy cabinets, its a blank canvas, waiting for our dreams. It isn't too precious for small children and their messes. Its all tumbled up and ready to support their adventures. Which is exactly why I love it so, so much.
Here's hoping I feel the same way a year from now :)
No comments:
Post a Comment