Hey guys! I would love for you to join us on our new adventure! For about 3 years, off and on, we have been house hunting. When the hubbs decided he was going to retire last year we kinda backed off. I kept hearing these horror stories about how we should have all of this money saved up because it could be months before he got his retirement pay and we would be lucky if the VA would pay us at all. And good luck finding a job!
We were both so stressed, according to everyone we would be broke! I was totally prepared to live in a cardboard box!
My husband eventually went on his 90 days of terminal leave and we started searching everywhere for his next job, but nothing even came close to what he was making. We had to go to these retirement meetings and decide if I wanted survivor benefits. I told my husband, “If something happens to you, I’m going to live on a beach and become a beach bum!”. The survivor benefits were not worth the cost, it was actually cheaper to get life insurance.
After all of this, it was time for the retirement ceremony, but we were not celebrating. We were coming up on what we thought was our last paycheck for a while. Finally, the letter from VA came with my husbands disability rating. It sat on the kitchen table for a few days because my husband likes to neglect his mail and he didn’t realize what it was. I asked him about it and he told me to open it. As I’m reading through it, I realize what it is. Not understanding the numbers, I asked him what all of these percentages meant.
I said, “According to this, you’re like 200% disabled!”. Then he realized that it was the letter that we had been waiting for, with the date that we would receive his disability check. In a few days! Thank God! We didn’t miss a payday! We received his retirement pay and his disability pay at the same time and we could breathe again.
He still wanted to go back to work. If I remember correctly, that same week, he received a job offer from an amazing contracting company on base. We were truly blessed and so thankful to not be moving into a cardboard box!
This blessing allowed us to start our house search again!
I re-installed my Realtor.com app on my phone and we would go on the weekends and look at houses. We both agreed that the house had to have everything that we both want and that we would not settle.
Our plan was that if we found something that we absolutely loved that we would rent out our current house. No problem! We looked at a lot of houses. We found one that I absolutely loved because of the huge windows in the kitchen and the living room. The problem was that when you looked out those big, beautiful windows, you were looking at the side of your neighbors house about 20 feet away. Ummm, No!
So, I found another house with this beautiful wrap around porch and decided to drive out and look at it while the kids were at school and the hubbs was at work. The house was ok, the garage was small and the kitchen was too small, but I fell in love with the neighborhood. It was outside the city limits and it was so quiet.
That weekend the hubbs and I drove out to the neighborhood. There were a few other houses for sale further back in the neighborhood. So we parked the truck and took a walk. I didn’t like anything we looked at. The kitchens were too small, the garages were too small, with 4 bedrooms there was no mancave. I know, I know, 1st world problems! But we were not settling!
I was getting frustrated at this point because I absolutely loved the neighborhood. The last house we looked at, I walked in to what I thought was the master bedroom (I will never live this down, my husband loves this story), it was tiny for a master bedroom. Of course, the hubbs went straight for the garage. After, seeing the “master bedroom”, I threw up my hands, “I’m done! I’m leaving and I’m going home!”.
So, I headed for the door! The hubbs said, “Did you go upstairs?, come on, lets look upstairs before we leave.”
Being the dramatic person that I am, I trudged up the stairs. The hubbs was way ahead of me as I was having my temper tantrum. He said, “Babe! That was not the master bedroom downstairs!”. I perked up a little bit. “What do you mean?”.
This is the master bedroom!!!
How does a house have 2 master bedrooms?! My mind was blown! I went straight for the windows. I love windows, especially with a view like this!
All was right with the world again! Temper tantrum averted! We fell in love with the house and my husband has a lovely, embarrassing story to tell our visitors.
I called our Randi (a.k.a. our amazing realtor) to let her know that we finally found the one! And then we ran into a problem. We currently have a VA loan on our house, to purchase this house we would need to have $33,000 or sell our house to be able to use our full VA loan. Our house is not ready to be put on the market.
Ugh! We don’t have $30,000 laying around. “What can we do?, I want this house, in this neighborhood!”. We decided that we would pick a lot and build, by the time the house is built, ours will be ready and on the market. So, that Friday there were 3 lots available, by Monday they were all sold. This was horrible news!
Fortunately, our Randi called later in the week to say that they would be starting phase 2 soon and we would have first pick of the lots. Finally!
Now the fun part begins! Our Randi made an appointment for us to go look at the lots that would accommadate our floor plan. We chose a beautiful 1.5 acres at the beginning of a cul-de-sac. This is perfect for the kiddos and the dogs, we won’t have random cars driving by our house all the time.
Signing the contract was another pain in the rear. Phase 2 would go up in price by $10,000. But the good thing was, once we signed, our price was locked in. And I got a few extra goodies thrown in that would normally have an upgrade charge.
The great thing about building is that we get to choose everything. I’m not crazy about the colors in the original house. So the colors will be gray instead of the brown and pinkish color.
We started this adventure in August. We were supposed to have a road by early November, but with the yucky weather they are a bit behind.
Our Randi texted yesterday for us to make an appointment to pick out our selections. So, I wanted to get these pictures up so that you guys can come along on our adventure with us.
On with the tour of our floor plan:
Our Entryway…to the left is the fake master bedroom.
#1 is getting the Guest Suite…when she moves out, I’m turning it into a yoga studio!
#1’s Vanity
#1’s Bathtub
#2’s closet and bathroom
#3’s room…he is so excited about his little nook!
The hubb’s mancave
I call it a landing…I don’t know if that’s actually what its called!
If the hubbs gets a mancave and a 3 car garage, I get my own closet!
Our kitchen
Our living room
The laundry room
I almost forgot the Master bath
And I have to add this pic of #2 and #3 being goofy!
And that concludes the tour for now. Thank you for joining us on our new adventure. I should have more photos for you guys soon. Next: Selections!
To be continued…
Liz
My husband has PTSD from 4 deployments. He has developed this horrible anxiety and is overprotective and super vigilant. I love him to death, but it drives me crazy. I also have severe anxiety and today is one of those days, which reminds me, I need to take my meds.
Tired as a Mother 