So……..we’re buying a house! We started talking about buying earlier in the year, because throwing away money on rent each month is NOT fun – especially when you live in one of the most expensive parts of Hampton Roads! We had been hesitant at first to buy, for fear of being stuck in this area if we decided we wanted to move. That all changed, however, when I got a new job and fell in love with the company that I work for! Not to mention, although we had talked about moving far away in the past, we both would miss our families too much.
Not only are we buying a house, but we are buying a house in our hometown! We’re moving back to Suffolk, y’all. Never thought I’d say those words…
We’re really excited though, and we strategically searched for a home in the northern part of the city so we wouldn’t have a horrible commute like we used to. We did a lot of searching on Homes.com (I have to show my brand love!) and the MLS, just checking out different types of homes and townhouses in the area. We “hired” a buyer broker for our search – hired in quotations because we are luckily still in a buyer’s market, and our broker’s commission is coming out of the seller’s pocket! If you have the opportunity to work with a buyer broker, I HIGHLY recommend it. They are there for you, always in your best interest, and they have the authority to show you any property listed by any Realtor. We chose a list of homes we were interested in touring, and we went last weekend to check them out. We started with an older “flipped” house, which we quickly realized wasn’t really our style. We saw a nicely renovated home that just needed slight cosmetic work on the inside, and that one was at the top of our list – the only issue was the area around it wasn’t our favorite. We transitioned over to newer townhomes at that point, and quickly realized that we actually preferred brand new construction. The crazy thing about new construction is that it can actually provide you with a better value than an older, renovated home would.
As it turns out, we ended up preferring townhomes to single-family homes, too. We liked the opportunity of having a small yard with landscaping included and a community pool & fitness center available for a bearable HOA fee instead of all of the maintenance that a single-family home requires. After living in an apartment with NO yard and no outside responsibility, it’ll be a nice little transition into having a small yard of our own without the responsibility of upkeep. Plus, with a teacup Yorkie, we don’t exactly need a huge yard right now. 🙂
Our new home-to-be was one of the last homes we toured, and both my husband and I instantly fell in love with it. I don’t think we even realized how much we liked it until a little while later that evening, and we called our broker the very same night. The next day, we signed the contract. The day after that, our offer was accepted. All of this happened since Sunday! #crazy
Sometimes it’s hard to wrap my mind around the fact that I’m only 24, married, great job, and now buying a house…did NOT see that coming a few years ago. 🙂 Our closing date is September 20th, so I’m officially in stress-cleaning-organizing-packing mode until then. Did I mention our beach vacation is coming up in two weeks? Yikes – it’s going to be a BUSY month! I can’t wait to share more…especially photos! 
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