traceimage_IHB
New member
I'd like to share my recent adventures in real estate, in case anyone is bored enough to want to read it. My husband and I just bought a house after searching for about a year. When we first started looking, we didn't know anything about real estate except that everyone and their grandmother told us it was a great time to buy. We weren't buying for that reason, though. We decided it was time to buy because our living situation was intolerable and we needed to move, and I hate renting as we've had some bad experiences in the past. Even if we did end up renting, we were planning to buy soon anyway and we didn't want to move twice in a few years. So we decided to take the plunge and do it. Time to look for our dream house!
As we looked for a house, we quickly learned that it wasn't truly the buyer's market everyone promised. Or at least, it didn't seem that way to us. There were few properties on the market and it seemed like the good ones had multiple offers and were snatched up quickly. I'm sure that doesn't surprise anyone on here, but we weren't expecting it since everyone told us it was a great time to buy. We were getting really frustrated. It started to feel like a frenzy...crazy buyers snatching up any decent house for prices that were still crazy high.
After we'd been looking for almost a year, we found two potential properties. Hallelujah, finally we have some options! House #1 was an SFR. It was big, but needed some updating. House #2 was a detached condo, about 250 sq ft smaller and $30k more than #1, but it was in move-in ready condition. After a lot of discussion, we decided to go with #1. It was bigger, it was a real house, we could paint it any color we want without asking the neighbors, etc. So we made an offer and it was accepted. Yay!
Only now I'm experiencing big-time buyer's remorse. It's the middle of the night and I've been tossing and turning, thinking we should have bought the detached condo. Because we are now in the middle of a HUGE remodeling project and it's going to take forever. We're still in our lousy living situation because our house will probably not be ready for months. Plus we're paying double - rent plus mortage. And the renovation is going to be so expensive when all is said and done. We are in WAY over our heads since we are first-time buyers, and here we are with a gutted house. I also haven't been liking the house too much lately. Not just because the remodeling isn't done yet, but I think the condo was in a better neighborhood. Plus, I think the house is kind of ugly. Maybe the remodeling will fix that. I hope so. And I keep thinking that if we had bought the condo, we would have moved in already instead of being stuck in the middle of a huge remodel on a house I might not even like.
I think everything just got so crazy...we were getting desperate, couldn't find anything perfect or even close, so we bought this house. I keep thinking of all the other houses that we saw that I wish we had bought...the house we made a super lowball offer on, the house with the great view that went into backups in 2 days (even though we saw it at the broker's preview and decided to make an offer an hour later...too late!), and the detached condo I mentioned. But oh well, no crying over spilled milk, right? I'm sure some people are thinking we shouldn't have bought anything at all, and maybe that's true. If the shadow inventory ever does hit the market (and it seems like it has to, where else is it gonna go), and prices drop I will be pretty annoyed...especially living in a house I kind of don't really like. Putting the house back on the market is not really an option because then we'd still be stuck living where we are now with no prospects. I think if we did try to sell it now, we probably would find a crazy buyer to take it off our hands, as a similar house in the neighborhood sold pretty fast. But we would definitely lose money on it because we wouldn't get back all the money we are putting in with the remodel. Maybe we could price it a little higher than what we paid, but not much. Plus we're not in the flipping business...we just want a nice house to live in!
Anyway, that is the situation that's keeping me up when I should be sleeping. Thanks for reading.
As we looked for a house, we quickly learned that it wasn't truly the buyer's market everyone promised. Or at least, it didn't seem that way to us. There were few properties on the market and it seemed like the good ones had multiple offers and were snatched up quickly. I'm sure that doesn't surprise anyone on here, but we weren't expecting it since everyone told us it was a great time to buy. We were getting really frustrated. It started to feel like a frenzy...crazy buyers snatching up any decent house for prices that were still crazy high.
After we'd been looking for almost a year, we found two potential properties. Hallelujah, finally we have some options! House #1 was an SFR. It was big, but needed some updating. House #2 was a detached condo, about 250 sq ft smaller and $30k more than #1, but it was in move-in ready condition. After a lot of discussion, we decided to go with #1. It was bigger, it was a real house, we could paint it any color we want without asking the neighbors, etc. So we made an offer and it was accepted. Yay!
Only now I'm experiencing big-time buyer's remorse. It's the middle of the night and I've been tossing and turning, thinking we should have bought the detached condo. Because we are now in the middle of a HUGE remodeling project and it's going to take forever. We're still in our lousy living situation because our house will probably not be ready for months. Plus we're paying double - rent plus mortage. And the renovation is going to be so expensive when all is said and done. We are in WAY over our heads since we are first-time buyers, and here we are with a gutted house. I also haven't been liking the house too much lately. Not just because the remodeling isn't done yet, but I think the condo was in a better neighborhood. Plus, I think the house is kind of ugly. Maybe the remodeling will fix that. I hope so. And I keep thinking that if we had bought the condo, we would have moved in already instead of being stuck in the middle of a huge remodel on a house I might not even like.
I think everything just got so crazy...we were getting desperate, couldn't find anything perfect or even close, so we bought this house. I keep thinking of all the other houses that we saw that I wish we had bought...the house we made a super lowball offer on, the house with the great view that went into backups in 2 days (even though we saw it at the broker's preview and decided to make an offer an hour later...too late!), and the detached condo I mentioned. But oh well, no crying over spilled milk, right? I'm sure some people are thinking we shouldn't have bought anything at all, and maybe that's true. If the shadow inventory ever does hit the market (and it seems like it has to, where else is it gonna go), and prices drop I will be pretty annoyed...especially living in a house I kind of don't really like. Putting the house back on the market is not really an option because then we'd still be stuck living where we are now with no prospects. I think if we did try to sell it now, we probably would find a crazy buyer to take it off our hands, as a similar house in the neighborhood sold pretty fast. But we would definitely lose money on it because we wouldn't get back all the money we are putting in with the remodel. Maybe we could price it a little higher than what we paid, but not much. Plus we're not in the flipping business...we just want a nice house to live in!
Anyway, that is the situation that's keeping me up when I should be sleeping. Thanks for reading.