So let's not beat around the bush here and just say it how it is. I haven't blogged in what feels like forever. Many of you may remember me alluding to the fact that August was a very stressful month for me but I never quite said why. I was too nervous and didn't want to jinx anything (yep, I'm a little superstitious).
Well, as you know, we listed our house for sale in late July and we got an offer on it two weeks later (I'm still telling H it was my "decorating skills and staging" that swept it off the market so quickly...you know, so he can come to appreciate that the funds I spent on decorating were a "worthwhile investment" as I've always touted them to be).
So one Sunday, two weeks after we listed our home, H and I were about to go out looking at houses to see some of the ones we liked in person. That morning, we get a call from our realtor telling us there was a good offer on the table. Crazy coincidence, right?
Even crazier...we find a house we LOVE that day. I seriously stepped into the house, said "this is it" and I'm pretty sure I cried when I saw the master closet. It was glorious. More on that later.
So this home we loved is a new construction and a model home so we knew it would go fast and we put an offer in on it Monday morning. They accepted our offer. Awesome, dream house!
The rest of the month was spent on inspections and appraisals and what ensued was some of the most stressful, anxiety-filled days of my life. I worried about the inspection and obsessively cleaned the house constantly (even though "cleanliness" is not even on the inspection). I constantly worried the offer would fall through and we wouldn't get our dream home. I hardly ate, hardly slept. I lost at least 3 lbs of muscle mass that I worked so hard to put on. I was a mess. A wreck. On top of all of this, I was spending weekends packing our home (our movers gave me a 9/10 score for my awesome packing!!!) I was packing all the while panicking that our sale wouldn't go through and I'd have to unpack it all. Like I said, absolute mess.
The thing is, we wanted the new house so badly, that it made it even more difficult to cope with the possibility that it might not work out. It was also tough knowing that our fate rested in the hands of another person's decision.
So, our inspection passes with flying colors. All was well in the world. I was eating again, sleeping okay. Then BOOM! A week before we close we get an email from the buyer's realtor that our home was appraised at $11,000 less than what the buyer paid. Buyer wants to re-negotiate, but it turns out, we hired an AMAZING realtor (please email me if you are in Houston and need a great one!) and he figured out that in the appraiser's report, he had mistakenly subtracted the square footage of our garage from our bottom level twice. Mr. Appraiser hadn't checked his work so our 1400 sq. ft house was being appraised as a 1000 sq. ft house (which was obviously so very wrong). Once again, I was a mess.
In the end, the appraisal was fixed and everything went beautifully. We closed on our first home at 9am last Wednesday morning and on our second home at 12noon that same day. We had the movers mover everything at around 1 pm and I had unpacked, decorated and basically completed 75% of my home in 1 day.
You see, my friends from Canada flew in on September 1st to come visit, so I didn't want our home to look like a box factory. The entire time we were still in our old home, I constantly felt trapped, like the boxes were going to close in on me (yes, totally crazy). I couldn't have that feeling in our new home...so I worked diligently and since I had packed so well, I was able to unpack with ease and organize really well.
I still have to organize my walk-in closet and unpack and decorate my office, but those rooms don't bother me as much because the rest of our home is perfect.
So now, to the photos. I'm going to show our old house with boxes everywhere and our new home, empty. Over time, I will show photos of our new home decorated and each room on its own. I will also show progress as I tackle some decorating projects. As I mentioned before, we were fortunate to buy a model home that had significant upgrades (think super dark hardwoods, travertine tile, granite counter tops, french doors, etc) so we don't really have anything to "fix" or "upgrade." It will be more about organizing and adding decorative touches. I'd also like to add a photo wall eventually.
I am so excited to show you just a glimpse of our new home and can't wait for you to see it all decorated! I even plan to do a home tour video and videos on how I organized each room with tips and ideas.
So here we go...old house first (see how I could have totally legitimately felt that the boxes were closing in on me?)
Well, as you know, we listed our house for sale in late July and we got an offer on it two weeks later (I'm still telling H it was my "decorating skills and staging" that swept it off the market so quickly...you know, so he can come to appreciate that the funds I spent on decorating were a "worthwhile investment" as I've always touted them to be).
So one Sunday, two weeks after we listed our home, H and I were about to go out looking at houses to see some of the ones we liked in person. That morning, we get a call from our realtor telling us there was a good offer on the table. Crazy coincidence, right?
Even crazier...we find a house we LOVE that day. I seriously stepped into the house, said "this is it" and I'm pretty sure I cried when I saw the master closet. It was glorious. More on that later.
So this home we loved is a new construction and a model home so we knew it would go fast and we put an offer in on it Monday morning. They accepted our offer. Awesome, dream house!
The rest of the month was spent on inspections and appraisals and what ensued was some of the most stressful, anxiety-filled days of my life. I worried about the inspection and obsessively cleaned the house constantly (even though "cleanliness" is not even on the inspection). I constantly worried the offer would fall through and we wouldn't get our dream home. I hardly ate, hardly slept. I lost at least 3 lbs of muscle mass that I worked so hard to put on. I was a mess. A wreck. On top of all of this, I was spending weekends packing our home (our movers gave me a 9/10 score for my awesome packing!!!) I was packing all the while panicking that our sale wouldn't go through and I'd have to unpack it all. Like I said, absolute mess.
The thing is, we wanted the new house so badly, that it made it even more difficult to cope with the possibility that it might not work out. It was also tough knowing that our fate rested in the hands of another person's decision.
So, our inspection passes with flying colors. All was well in the world. I was eating again, sleeping okay. Then BOOM! A week before we close we get an email from the buyer's realtor that our home was appraised at $11,000 less than what the buyer paid. Buyer wants to re-negotiate, but it turns out, we hired an AMAZING realtor (please email me if you are in Houston and need a great one!) and he figured out that in the appraiser's report, he had mistakenly subtracted the square footage of our garage from our bottom level twice. Mr. Appraiser hadn't checked his work so our 1400 sq. ft house was being appraised as a 1000 sq. ft house (which was obviously so very wrong). Once again, I was a mess.
In the end, the appraisal was fixed and everything went beautifully. We closed on our first home at 9am last Wednesday morning and on our second home at 12noon that same day. We had the movers mover everything at around 1 pm and I had unpacked, decorated and basically completed 75% of my home in 1 day.
You see, my friends from Canada flew in on September 1st to come visit, so I didn't want our home to look like a box factory. The entire time we were still in our old home, I constantly felt trapped, like the boxes were going to close in on me (yes, totally crazy). I couldn't have that feeling in our new home...so I worked diligently and since I had packed so well, I was able to unpack with ease and organize really well.
I still have to organize my walk-in closet and unpack and decorate my office, but those rooms don't bother me as much because the rest of our home is perfect.
So now, to the photos. I'm going to show our old house with boxes everywhere and our new home, empty. Over time, I will show photos of our new home decorated and each room on its own. I will also show progress as I tackle some decorating projects. As I mentioned before, we were fortunate to buy a model home that had significant upgrades (think super dark hardwoods, travertine tile, granite counter tops, french doors, etc) so we don't really have anything to "fix" or "upgrade." It will be more about organizing and adding decorative touches. I'd also like to add a photo wall eventually.
I am so excited to show you just a glimpse of our new home and can't wait for you to see it all decorated! I even plan to do a home tour video and videos on how I organized each room with tips and ideas.
So here we go...old house first (see how I could have totally legitimately felt that the boxes were closing in on me?)
We moved from a 2-story, 2 bedroom, 2 full bath home to a 3-story, 3-bedroom, 3 and a half bath home. We are absolutely in love with it! The best part is that our new home is not far from our old home so we know the area well.
This is the second floor of our home. The entire second floor is the kitchen, dining room and living room and also has a laundry room and half bath. The kitchen is a like a dream come true. I even told H I would cook more in this kitchen. We love the high ceilings and how the large windows make the space feel so open and airy.
This is our master bath on the 3rd floor of our home. I love the separate shower because we don't really take baths. I also love that the toilet room is hidden behind a door. Our last home had this feature as well and it's lovely. Both master closets are off of the master bathroom. Yes my friends, my H has his own closet and I have mine.
Here is one view of my closet. It has some windows in it which is pretty darn cool. It is a mess in there right now...but it will be amazing one day. I just have to get the time to get it organized perfectly.
(Yep, it's a mess right now)
Below is our 3rd bedroom which will for now, be my office. It is down the hall from our master bedroom and it will eventually be a nursery, we hope.
Lastly, this is the set of french doors that you see from the inside of our second bedroom, the guest room, which is on the first floor of the house. I love them! We also have french doors that lead out to a small backyard and on our second floor we have them going out to a small balcony area.
I can't wait to show you ladies more pictures and more details! As I said, we do have the house decorated and completed at bout 75%, but I wanted to show you all these photos first so you could see it empty.
Thank you for everyone's support during the crazy month of August. I am so thankful and happy that everything worked out with the house. I am so appreciative that we were lucky enough to find this house on our first time out (we had been monitoring the market for over a year with daily listings from our realtor, so we knew what was out there).
If you have any questions about home selling or questions about moving, packing, etc please leave them below! I'd love to do a tips and tricks post about it if you all are interested!
xoxo,
Veronika.
Thank you for everyone's support during the crazy month of August. I am so thankful and happy that everything worked out with the house. I am so appreciative that we were lucky enough to find this house on our first time out (we had been monitoring the market for over a year with daily listings from our realtor, so we knew what was out there).
If you have any questions about home selling or questions about moving, packing, etc please leave them below! I'd love to do a tips and tricks post about it if you all are interested!
xoxo,
Veronika.
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