This New House

We seem to have managed to come to an agreement with the sellers on the items found in the home inspection. Compromises were made, but we were able to have the most important items addressed — some damage caused by leaky seals on the circulating pump for the heating system (damage is purely superficial, but I want the seals redone), and a certification of the chimneys, flues and fireplaces. The seller had the chimney work done recently, and supplied appropriate paperwork showing the results of the inspections, and I had a telephone conversation with someone at the company that performed the work, and they were happy to answer any and all of the questions I had.

There were a couple of other items on the inspection report that will need to be dealt with at some point, but they’re not structural issues or safety related, so I can get to them when I get around to it.

In other positive news, the house appraised for more than what we’re paying for it, and all of our loan paperwork has been moved along to the underwriters. Our final confirmation on the financing should arrive on Monday.

Now, if the sellers would just stop yelling at the folks from the title company….

After a couple of false starts, we finally closed the sale on our Columbia town home last night. There were still a couple of minor hiccups, but in the end, we walked out with our check and the buyers walked out with the keys. Now, we can set our sites on the purchase of our new home. In the mean time, we’re “camping out” in an efficiency at an extended-stay hotel.

We know that there are going to be a few challenges with the purchase — we’ve already opted to pay a little more than we had originally intended. Now, there are some items that came up in the home inspection that we would like done, and the seller is balking. Time for negotiations. I’m sure it will all work out in the end.

The full bath in the new house (our! new house!) is on lilac overload. I’m sure it’s quite lovely, but we’re just not purple people. Unfortunately, we won’t have money for a complete re-do right away.

In the meantime, thanks to retrorenovation.com, I’ve found an acceptable fabric that’s got purple in it but isn’t floral. Check this out from Melinamade. It’s mostly teals & white, with just enough purple to make it and the lilac tiles look “on-purpose” while being vintage-looking so it fits the age of the house. A pinch-pleat valance atop a set of blinds will look great. Paired with a simple white shower curtain (or a s.c. made of the fabric again!), the room will have new look that helps us live with the lilac tiles until we are able to replace them.

701 Franklin Avenue

We learned today that the sellers have accepted our counter offer to their counter offer as written, except that the snowblower won’t convey — it doesn’t belong to the seller. But, this means that we got the house that we really like. The one that meets 99.9% of our druthers. Inspection is set up for Thursday afternoon. We had to pay a little bit more than we wanted to, but at the end of the day, we still did just fine.

Now, some fun begins. More later….

Remember Rod Stewart’s song Maggie Mae? In particular, the line “The morning light when it’s in your face really shows your age.” That’s sort of the way we wound up feeling about the house on Margaret Avenue. It was relatively expensive, didn’t have a few of our “druthers,” and had a less-than-desireable living area floor plan.

To put it simply, Margaret is not the house on Franklin, which truly set the bar.

For only a little bit more, we can have a home that, once the original owner’s “personality” is removed, can be 99.9% of the home we’re looking for. The only thing missing is a 2-car garage (it does have a 1-car garage). Some of you may remember that this is the home we made an offer on that was countered, and we decided to pass. In the end, we figured out how to give the sellers what they want, while getting what we need, and not having it cost us a huge amount more. There are two parties involved in the sale, and one has verbally agreed to the basic terms. We should know in the next day or so if we’ve managed to work this out.

In the mean time, we’ve still go to get our tootsies out of here, and find someplace to land for the three weeks — and a place for our stuff. I think the cats are going to live in the city, while the birds will move on out to the country ahead of us.