Live to Dare: House Selling Update #2

We have been crazy busy lately because we are finally under contract on our house! Yay!! It was pretty crazy how it happened. After having our house on the market since July and having not that many showings, Steve and I were getting very antsy. ~~And also sort of depressed.~~ But all of a sudden we got a lot of requests for showings over MLK weekend. I think we had 4 or 5 that weekend. It was crazy! I think it might have to do with our agent took our 2013 listing off and put us on 2014 that first week in January so we showed up as a "new" listing...I have no idea. So anyway we had those showings that weekend and it was CRAZY! Juggling 2 kids and nap times and 3 dogs and trying to keep the house clean, it was just nuts. Luckily we have parents that are awesome and willing to help and our agent, Ellen (Steve's aunt) was awesome about helping too. She lives close and let us put our dogs at her house a few times so that's super nice.

Anyway, after those showings we really didn't hear anything. We heard back from one agent that they didn't really like our house, which is fine. But it got to be Wednesday of the next week and Steve and I were really disappointed that we hadn't even gotten good feedback. Then all of a sudden, we got a phone call from Ellen (who happened to be the Bahamas!) saying we got an offer!!! Steve and I were so excited!! After a tiny bit of negotiating, we had a contract! And we set the close date on March 6th which means we had to be OUT.

Steve and I looked at houses a bit when we put our house on the market but now it was ON. We really needed to find a place to live. We didn't want to rush it and wanted to make a really good long term decision and investment. But we also had about 6 weeks to find somewhere to live! Steve's parents offered to let us live there but about a week before we got the offer we found out Steve's brother Matt and his girlfriend, Ruty and her sons Eli and Micah would be coming to live with them for a while. So we really didn't want to move in there unless we had to. It would be super crazy.

So Steve and I spent the next 2 weekends looking all over for houses. The problem was we weren't sure where we wanted to even live. So that gave us way too many options! We eventually narrowed it down to St. Charles/St. Peters area (even though I super loved a house in Creve Coeur). It seemed that my parents would be moving that way and Steve's parents live that way(ish) and a lot of our friends as well. We also really loved the area and what we could get for the money there as well as the good school districts. So West we went!

We looked at a LOT of houses. Some were too far for me but were beautiful and cheap so that was a tough decision. Some Steve loved but I didn't and vice versa. I really wanted to find something that had it all, a good investment, great house and one that we both really loved. And we finally did find that house!

It was kind of crazy. Ellen and I were looking for houses on a Friday I was off work and Steve was working. Her best friend's daughter and her husband were selling their house in St. Charles. The husband got a job in Texas so they needed to move. Ellen was listing their house for them and she just asked me if we could stop by since we were in the area so she could put her sign in the yard. Of course I said ok. When we got there my jaw just dropped. It is BEAUTIFUL! It's an atrium ranch which means the entire back wall is windows. It sits up on a hill and the view is beautiful! They have a gorgeous deck that runs the entire back wall of the house. It has an open floor plan with a finished basement with lots and lots of room. It was really just perfect and I knew Steve would love it too.

While we were there, the homeowners were there and I tried to keep on my poker face but as soon as we got in the car, I said, "Ellen, get me in that house!!" I thought we could never afford it but turns out they wanted to list it for not too far from what we had expected to pay. So we took Steve there the next day and he fell in love too. I was getting so nervous because I really wanted him to like it but he super did. He just kept walking around saying, "wow!" It really is a neat house with a ton of cool features and SPACE. Which is something we are really lacking at our current house. So Steve and I considered all the options and decided to put in an offer on this house. Since Ellen would be the agent for both parties it was so easy. She talked to them and got an idea of a range they were hoping to get and what we were willing to pay. It was really so great to have her to help us. We put in an official offer Sunday and got a call back like 10 minutes later that they were going to accept! We were really surprised they didn't counter back but we weren't complaining!!

So Monday we had a signed contract on the new house and the ball was rolling! It is so crazy. What a whirlwind it has been since then. Inspections, appraisers, plumbers, electricians, contracts, title company, paperwork, ETC non stop! We are going to be able to do a simultaneous close on both houses on March 6th. So that's less than a month! OMG!

SO I guess you are wondering what this dream house looks like, eh?

Front of the house, Steven really wanted this brick front and the 3 car garage. I really liked the lot that this house is on, there is common ground to the right of it and no neighbor to the back so only really one neighbor. And the houses aren't super close together, which I liked.

This is the back of the house. As you can see, it is gorgeous! ha ha. It sits on top of this hill so you can really see forever. The deck is really amazing too. You can see on the bottom left a hot tub. Hollar! We do need to add a fence for our dogs (and kids). Hopefully we can do that quickly after we move.

This is the basement next to the stairs. Isn't it beautiful? You can get a glimpse of the view here. The current owners have this sort of weird plant feature next to the stairs that I'm not sure if we will keep or not. It screams, throwing rocks to me but we'll see. ha ha

This is the living room upstairs. Behind this picture is the kitchen, dining room, breakfast nook. You can see the railing for the stairs to the right of the picture. The master bedroom is behind those wooden doors. The hallway on the left has the boys bedrooms and a bathroom. I really loved the built in shelves, cool little architectural detail. I'm SO excited to have a fireplace and mantle too.