We could have waited another year as the interest rates lowered even more but I'm glad we had made the decision to buy this year. We couldn't afford much but we knew what we wanted. 3 bed, 2 bath, basement, preferably an attached garage and most importantly, a nice big open kitchen.
We knew since Joshua had recently gotten the head chef job at Coachman's near Stoughton/Edgerton that we would want to be near there, considering he works 60 hours/week and needs to be there quickly in case of an emergency. So, our realtor took us to see some houses in Stoughton, Deerfield and Edgerton.
All the houses we saw in the beginning were cute but either too small or the 3rd bedroom was away from the other bedrooms. We knew that if we wanted to start a family or even resell the house in the future that it would be nice to have all three bedrooms on the same level in the same area.
Finally, we saw an extremely cute older house in Edgerton. Wood floors from top to bottom, a finished basement, an open but slightly small kitchen, 3 bed, 2 bath, detached garage with a bonus workout room. We really liked it. However, the process with the bank was very slow so at that point we were only pre-approved and not officially approved of a loan so we lost that house to someone else that put on offer on it. Since we couldn't, we had to let it go. We weren't extremely sad since it was a detached garage, a small kitchen and the 3rd bedroom was away from the rest so even though we wanted it, we weren't sad that we lost it.
Couple weeks went by as we continued to look and get officially approved of our loan. Then we found another house in Edgerton. Corner lot, huge yard, attached garage with a basketball hoop already installed (hey, we're sports people and hopefully our kids will be too), large living room with wood floors, big open kitchen with up to date appliances in the kitchen, tiled kitchen and dining room, 3 bedrooms on the same floor although with very ugly carpet, 2 1/2 baths and an unfinished basement.
The thing that really turned us off about the place was that the 1/2 bath/laundry room on the main level was next to the garage. So when you walked in from the garage, you walked into the bathroom then into the dining room area. Not exactly appealing. But we kept that house at the top of the list and continued looking.
Our realtor must have relayed that to the seller's realtor because we soon got a phone call from our realtor saying that the owners were willing to work with us to make it a private bathroom. We instantly through up a bid.
Offers, counter-offers, more counter-offers, inspection, and finally it all went through. All we could do now was wait for the loan to come through for us. And what a headache that was. I'll spare the details but let's just say we got the okay from the bank at 4:30pm when we had to close the next morning at 9:00 away. Talk about last minute!
Closing was the best relief. Even though from the moment the offer was finally accepted, everyone said we had a house but deep down in my heart, I knew it wasn't ours until we closed.
Since we closed at the end of June and our lease wasn't up until July 31, we took our time moving in. The first thing we did was repaint every room. Then we tore up the carpet from the stairs to all the bedrooms on the 2nd floor and put in bamboo flooring to match the living room floor. Finally, we slowly moved everything in.
It's so great to say we finally have our first home. We may move, we may stay but whatever happens, this will always be our first home.
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