Home Sweet {NEW} Home

Happy Wednesday, friends. I always have mixed feelings about Wednesdays. When I wake up, I feel like “Wow! It’s Wednesday already?!” Then, by about 10:00, I start thinking, “Oh man. Its only Wednesday?!”

I’m sure you’ve noticed a few photos of our new house floating around the blog and if you follow me on Instagram. We decided to buy in July (!) and life has just been so crazy busy that I haven’t gotten around to posting about it. I know, I’m ashamed of myself for being such a slacker.

Anyway, Corey and I started getting the house itch when we were still living in Hoboken. I totally loved the city lifestyle and living in a highrise in the Manhattan area but there were some things I didn’t love, too. Like the fact that my closet doors barely closed and that all my off-season clothes were literally busting out of vacuum storage bags under our bed. And that when our guests came to visit, they had to sleep on an air mattress in the living room. And the fact that we didn’t have a dining room table. And that we were literally throwing away $25k a year in rent. So, Corey and I started browsing at some homes more in the suburbs. I was so in love with my job and knew I was willing to commit staying in the area long-term unless by some miracle we got transferred back South.

Then, that miracle happened. We packed up our teeny tiny apartment and signed a short-term lease in Charlotte while we got settled. We knew we wanted to start looking for homes around the Holidays as we’d need to close by February but we weren’t in a rush when we first got here. We needed to just get acclimated to being back in the Charlotte area again. Then, the day we had friends coming into town for a July 4th get-together, I saw a flier for a new housing development in the Southpark area. The pictures online looked pretty appealing so I hung the flier up on the refrigerator for Corey to see when he got home from work.

When he got home, we still had several hours before our guests would arrive so he suggested we take a ride over. I dreamt about this closet for days after our tour.

I had my heart set on a single family home because I wanted a fenced-in backyard. But I didn’t want to take care of the yard…and neither did Corey. We also wanted something we could rent out easily if we were to get transferred again in the near future. As we talked more about the property, I became more and more interested in getting some additional information. We headed over on a Saturday and stopped by the pool and clubhouse to chat with and “interview” current homeowners and get a feel for the community.

This is the model. Our outside will be a different color scheme. 

Buying new construction sounded appealing because we would be able to choose all the inside finishings. It was also nerve-wracking because even though we did a lot of research on the builder, the specific community, and talked with current residents, as soon as we decided to buy new construction, people started telling us stories about their grandmother’s second cousin whose hot water heater exploded and the builder wouldn’t fix it or of someone’s neighbor’s step-dad whose drywall literally fell off the wall and deteriorated a year after being built. In the end, all the positives outweighed those freak warning stories we’d heard.

We purchased an end unit three-bedroom townhome. Our unit actually doesn’t have the massive walk-in closet but it does have two smaller ones, which is much better for Corey and my needs. We are super excited to move into our new home in December and to start decorating.

We are making some exciting progress!!