We promised today that we’d come back with the story of our house hunting process — but we actually weren’t completely honest with you on Monday. It really isn’t our story to tell….
Tiny Bloggers here! Thanks, Sage and Naomi, for letting us take over your blog to share our story! We’re so excited about our new home but, frankly, also pretty terrified. This place is a major fixer upper (we’ll be back soon with the full “before” house tour). Wait until you see all the peeling wallpaper! Plus the floors need refinishing, there’s no plumbing, and half the roof is missing. We’ve literally never taken on a project of this size before.
We didn’t set out planning to buy a fixer upper. We were just looking for a nice, affordable home for our growing family. Aiden is an active kid, and we need more space for him to play (seriously, where do the small house people keep all the toys?!) and a yard for him to run around in. And Madison has been sleeping in a crib in our bedroom for far too long — it would be better for all of us if we could set up a nursery for her. But we had a lot of trouble finding the right house in our price range.
We want to be really honest about finances, so we don’t mind sharing our budget. The maximum mortgage we were approved for was $100, but those payments would be really high for our tiny salaries, so we set our budget at $80. We were mostly looking on craigslist – which is a pretty sketchy place to find real estate, for sure, but it’s the primary market for houses of our size.
But, MAN, the real estate market is tough these days! For example, this place is pretty much our dream home, but was far out of our price range at $400.
Look at that floor plan! Enough room for both kids to have their own room, a great master suite, AND an office/craft room. And, even though it seems to be built on a cliff, it has so much curb appeal… and just imagine the view from that height!
I mean, tiny bloggers can dream, but we have to be realistic about our means. Plus a house that size would probably cost an additional $2 a month just to heat through the winter, so I’m sure we dodged a bullet.
Unfortunately, even reasonable places were out of our price range. This is the kind of place that we thought we’d be able to get — cute and in a good neighborhood, move-in ready (just needing some fresh paint), and just big enough for us to each have our own space (if we finished the attic).
But $150!? That is nearly twice our budget! We saw a lot like this in this price range, and were getting pretty discouraged.
We were so discouraged that we almost jumped on this place when we saw it come on the market:
At only $30 it was WELL within our price range. But we would have compromised too many of our “must-haves.” For example, it didn’t have a bathroom, which is something that we think is pretty important for our family.
It was also very shiny.
Some people like the the 70s-glam vibe, but it just isn’t our style! We’re way more into the shabby-chic, MCM, chevron, sheepskin, vintage eclectic look, and that would have really clashed with a house of this style. I’m not sure we could ever have been happy here.
And, I know it seems vain, but even though the exterior is really ornate and some people would probably love it, it isn’t my style. It also seemed to be in a questionable neighborhood — I mean, our neighbor would have been a pot!
And then, there is the one that got away. Totally within our budget, and such a cute house! Just look at the curb appeal, and colonial details, like shutters and multi-pane windows.
You can definitely tell this place was from the 70s (just look at that wall paper!) but it was great quality with a lot of architectural interest and a lay-out that was two rooms deep — which is pretty uncommon for tiny houses.
It also had the unique ability to bring in a lot of natural light with its lift-up roof — so quirky and fun!
You better believe that we made an aggressive offer! But unfortunately others must have seen the same potential that we did, because this place was off the market fast. We were so bummed we didn’t get it. But I guess that happens a lot!
At this point we’d been house hunting for days, so we were pretty discouraged. But then we found it!
It’s the sort of place that we totally wouldn’t have appreciated if we saw it on our first day of house hunting. But by Week 2 (okay maybe I’m exaggerating, but it definitely felt like a week!) we had a much better sense of what was out there at our price point — you live and learn, I guess! It’s got a lot of space for our family and even though it needs a lot of work, at only half of our budget we can afford to make the changes that we need. It’s definitely overwhelming, but it gives us the chance to customize something just for us, which is also pretty exciting!
Even though we can hardly wait for you to see it in all of its 1950s glory, we won’t share too much now and will wait to do a full “before” post. We have SO many ideas for how to make this a unique and special place for our family. I’m excited to see if we’ll be able to salvage the original wood floors, and we may even keep some of the wallpaper!
Home buying is definitely a stressful process, and this was a roller-coaster. There were whole hours when we were convinced we’d never find the right place for us — but after a tough two weeks, we’re finally home. Thanks for letting us share our story with you, and we can’t wait to be back with more soon!
– Tiny Bloggers
P.S. We’re sorry for cruelly tricking you all, but we needed a “we’ve been keeping a big secret” post in order to feel like real DIY bloggers. Thank you for all your encouraging and supportive words, though we hope next time someone will speak up and tell us we’d be absolutely crazy to add a gut-job fixer upper to our lives right now…I mean do none of you care about our sanity? Anyway, we hope you’ll forgive us and keep reading Plaster & Disaster. Oh, and to our astute commenter who noted that the stairs don’t appear attached to the wall, you’re right: they’re most definitely not. Those tiny bloggers really have their hands full with this one.
P.P.S., You can follow the ongoing story of these intrepid tiny bloggers on our series page, Tiny House, Tiny Bloggers. Enjoy!
Sharing at Create It Thursday, Home Matters, Two Uses Tuesday, The Creative Gallery, and Idea Box.
