House 4

House 4 was listed by the same agent as the 3rd house and was right around the corner. Both of these houses were right in the middle of our ideal area. This house was 2100 sq ft, 4 bedroom, 3 bathroom, pool, 1/3 acre lot, and needed a ton of work. According to the agent the bank had spent $24k fixing it up. The only evidence of “fixing up” we could see was paint and carpet, and last time I checked that usually doesn’t cost $24k. I think she may have been confusing the two houses.

It’s funny when you look at as many houses as we have throughout the past few years you see the same floor plan a few times. Most houses around here were built in the late 70’s, early 80’s and we had previously seen this same floor plan a few other times, plus I knew a few people who grew up in the same house.

As with all houses we have seen it was lacking curb appeal. The roof was near the end of it’s life, and the fence was falling apart.


The kitchen and all bathrooms were outdated and we knew our first project would have to be the kitchen.



The patio was HUGE, but the pool was in terrible condition. Pretty much everything in this house was in terrible condition.




All photos from MLS listing

We were looking at basically a gut job with this one, so of course I loved it. The tile and kitchen were on my plans as the first to go. I hoped the roof would pass inspection so I could put it of for a few years, and the bathrooms would be a one at a time project.

Houses 3 and 4 both came on the market on Monday, we saw them on Thursday, Friday we got our financing together, and called our realtor on Saturday to put an offer in on the 4th house. He was getting ready to come over to our house to write up the offer, when he checked online to see it had a contract on it as of Friday. I also had him check on House 3, also under contract as of Friday. We were a little disappointed. I had already made over the whole house in my head, as I do with every house. Murphy was so close to almost having a big yard.

You hear so much about it being a buyers market, but I am here to tell you from experience, that if you see a house you like you have to move fast. Sure in the previously $1,000,000 range where houses are now selling for $500,000 it is a buyers market. But for all of us with normal price ranges you need to act fast.
We had this happen to us so many times in our last house hunt, which is why we gave up and bought our current house. I dread having to go through this all again, but for our sanity we need to get a house with a yard! So for now the house hunt continues.