As my sister would say, just a couple of kids. Dumb kids at that! Ben knew it, he wasn't even opening his eyes.
We bought our little house in August 2005. Pretty much the worst possible time in the past 30 years to buy a house, you might say. Like many in our generation, we figured we'd buy a house, stay there for a few years, the value would go up, we'd sell it and move onward and upward. How I laugh at my 23 year old self! Full disclosure - we also bought our house with no down payment and had a 5 year ARM. Luckily for us, we were able to pay off the 20% 2nd mortgage we had, refinance and are pretty aggressively paying down the rest of our mortgage. Very thankfully, our poor decisions in the past didn't bite us in the butt like they did some. Our home value has gone down significantly, it varies depending on where you look - thankfully we aren't upside down on our mortgage, but it's not a pretty picture nonetheless.
When we bought our house, we had already looked at probably 20 houses. I'll be honest and say we kind of settled on our house. It was meant to be a starter house that we'd MAYBE have one kid in, didn't need to really think about the schools or anything, so it wasn't a big deal. When I think about what our house was when we bought it, I really can't believe we actually wanted it. I only WISH I'd taken pictures of it the way it was when we first saw it at the showing... Wall to wall carpet (shag) in the entire downstairs, our upstairs was basically a makeshift shack and an attic, no shower in the ONE bathroom, linoleum and paneling in the kitchen. Man oh man. I guess we were just blinded by the beautiful built in buffet and woodwork or something...
We did a TON of work in the first 3 years we were here bringing our house to 21st century standards, and I don't even want to add up how much money we've spent because the thought is depressing and it all really was necessary for us to like living here. Before we even moved in we ripped out the carpet and linoleum, refinished the hardwood floors, painted the office and living/dining room, and added a shower. Quickly after that, we upgraded the electrical from a fuse box to a circuit breaker, and changed out a bunch of other electrical things like light fixtures and additional outlets. We also painted the cabinets, walls and paneling in the kitchen, added a cabinet over the stove, and got a new counter top and sink. Then came the new roof, new furnace and air conditioner, and the upstairs remodel. Oh, and some pretty significant landscaping that consisted of just tearing almost everything up. Since then we've pretty much been resting on our laurels, which has been fine by me.
One of two layers of linoleum and some stunning cabinets...
The kitchen after
Oh my god, I had forgotten just how bad this was...
Our house has some... limitations, shall we say. It's maybe 1100 square feet after all. The biggest one facing us right now is - where the heck do we put our hypothetical as yet unconceived 2nd kid? We have an office, but for some strange reason the office is the only entryway to the stairs to the upstairs, our room, and I don't really want to have to tiptoe through a kid's bedroom every night to go to bed, and every morning to get ready for work. Annie's current room is 10x10, and would fit 2 kids in bunk beds, but you can't put a baby in a bunk bed. Although I did just see quite the creative solution to a similar problem, so I guess that is an option. Right now there is just no space for a crib and a bed in there unless we take out the dresser. Which is where all the clothes are since the closet is the size of a door, that's it. Which leaves us with..... putting the kids upstairs. As in, our awesome upstairs bedroom with the walk in closet that we spent so much time and energy on. I love Annie and all, but I want that room for MYSELF! The drawback to putting kids up there is that there really is NO space for clothes storage downstairs. Oh the joys of a 1920s home.
The other things that bother me about our house are the tiny kitchen with no dishwasher or space to install one, only one very small living area, only one not that great bathroom, no space to entertain even a moderate sized group (although we sure do try our darndest), while our street and the nearby park is obviously awesome, the neighborhood as a whole is borderline sketchy. Hindsight is of course 20/20, and while I could never say I regret our decision to buy our house because we've had some awesome times here, and met some amazing people because of it... but... we will need to move someday.
So comes the conundrum of how much more do we put into our current house? What improvements will mean the most for us as we live here but will also help us when we decide to sell? And finally, how long do we have to live here before we can sell? A lot depends on the housing market, obviously, but I'm really just not banking on that ever going back up to the level it was at in the next 10 years. I also have no interest in renting our current house out - when we're done, I want to be DONE. We are putting money away in a "next house" fund (Ben is big into earmarking savings for specific purposes in our ING accounts...) so we have that going for us, but it's just not going to happen for at least 5 more years. Thus we need to learn to love what we've got - I did part of the apartment therapy 20/20 home cure a few months ago and that DID help make me feel better about our current living situation, but we also need to make some other changes to keep things fresh. Unfortunately, I'm not big into decor or crafty things, it all just tires me out. I just want someone to tell me what to do to make my house look good. For free, of course.
We've toyed with the idea of adding a living space and bathroom in the basement before, and that is what we've decided would make the biggest difference both to us and when selling since it would add another full bathroom and 200-300sq feet of square footage. My dad is cringing right now, I just know it :) So now we start to look into how much all that would cost, what we are able to do within the physical limitations of our basement (all the posts and appliances down there) and what family members we can con into helping us (I'm guessing none... right Pops?!? :) Our neighbors did a very similar project a few years ago, so we'll be borrowing wisdom from them, but if any of you have any experience with a project of this scale, I'd love to know how much it cost and what you learned!
I'd also love to hear from people who are in similar situations, and how you've learned to love the house you've got.
Thus ends my ramble of the evening :)
10 comments:
Sorry, but our neighborhood is not borderline sketchy.
If you get any good advice, please send it our way!!! We're looking to do the same thing either this summer or next. Ugh.
I'm going to have to agree with Ben, coming from Brooklyn, your neighborhood is NOT borderline sketchy. :-)
Finishing a basement room in an old house is always tricky. I've seen amazing remodels that cost a ton of money, and I've seen DIY type jobs that look like it. Talking to a realtor first might be a good idea, they generally know what value would be added by making changes.
I'm on my second house, so when my wife and I started looking, we were definitely thinking of a family first when it came to a new house. And thankfully we'll be able to stay in our house for a long time.
Oh, and the house next door will be on the market soon if you want a house that needs some work, but is on a double lot with a huge yard :)
We have a newer home, so it's not so much about it needing updates. But, we do eventually want a yard (we live in a townhome) and we're not thrilled with the school system. But like you, we figured we'd be on to the next place by the time our first child was in school. Now, I'm with you, we'll probably be where we are 5 more years... We don't want to rent either. And if we were to try and sell, 1) it wouldn't sell or 2) it'd sell for A LOT less.
Sucks for people like us who are responsible and just want the best for our families and then we got screwed over in this market. Boo.
Oh man, we are in a very similar situation (bought our house in 2006 so it has lost a fair amount of value, but we've put considerable work/money into updating it and have one kid with plans for more eventually). It sucks that our original "plan" is not going to work out after all, but, like you said, we keep reminding ourselves that these are not terrible problems. We can certainly make do with the space we have, it's just upsetting to think how we could have done things differently if only we had known the future.
I don't really have any advice, but just wanted to say I (and so many others right now) know how you feel!
Horse shower FTW!
I will help with the basement, I think it has amazing potential, at least compared to mine. You are always welcome to my surplus day lillies as well, I know planting stuff is not your favorite thing, but the offer is on the table.
man, I feel like I shouldn't complain at all since we probably have at least 500sq ft more than you do. but I want out of our house too, even though it isn't really feasible right now.
we're at the point where we need a new roof, driveway, ac unit, windows, doors... all of the not fun stuff. I want to just sell it instead.
I wish I had a great solution for you!! sorry :o(
Wow, our house is REALLY similar! The upstairs isn't in as rough shape but otherwise, many similarities.
One thing I would say if you are thinking about resale value, is you don't really want to have the nicest house on the block, bc the comps are going to drag your price down. Do just enough to make it nice to live in, and almost as nice as the nicest house on the block.
We're kind of in the same boat. We bought a townhome in 2003 and didn't plan on living here for more than 5-7 years. With the market in the tank, especially for townhomes, I don't know when we will ever be able to sell and break even.
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