seems I love mortgage paperwork

Sorely disappointed in the lack of affordable quality rentals in the area, the hubs and I gave ourselves one week to find a house. Our new location isn't huge geographically, and the available houses in our price range totaled 26. Narrowing the 26 houses down to about 10, knowing we could eliminate some purely on style (or lack of), yard (or lack of), and convenience/proximity to work (or lack of), we called our realtor and got to looking.

 Funny story about our realtor - he isn't the realtor we were assigned by the relocation company. No, that realtor was useless. So last weekend, the hubs, me, and Britton are in the pool, and we're talking about renting versus buying. A lady who is doing laps looks over at us and says, "Do you have a realtor?" We told her yes, but not really because our realtor has called us once about a month ago and we haven't heard from her since. She tells us her husband is a realtor in the area and gives us all his info. We tell her thanks, but figure we're just being polite because at this point we're still thinking we're renting.

 That night we decide to give ourselves the week to look. And who should happen to leave his card and a note at the front desk for us? That's right - random swimming woman's husband. We call him up and get set up on some viewings. And let me tell you what - Karl the Realtor was awesome. Hands-off, not pushy, never mentioned losing commission when I requested showings on houses $100,000 below our budget. But, even with Karl's awesomeness, I was losing hope. Because the beautiful updated houses I saw had no yards. NO YARDS. A deal-breaker for anyone with a kid and a dog, and I was not interested in any houses that perched over cliffs. I knew that the yard was a no-comprise for me.

 But then, as fate would have it, I happened to go look at a house the hubs had discovered online and sent to Karl...

I'm intrigued, because I love the curb appeal and mature landscaping.  And I had seen pictures online of the inside, which showed a beautiful, updated, well-kept home.  But you can see the hill out front - I figure the back yard is a cliff.  So many realtors are just downright deceptive in their pictures!

As I'm trying to remember the phone number to the last townhouse rental place I spoke with, Karl suggests I go look at the backyard first.  No need to waste time inside if the backyard doesn't measure up.  And I see this...

The only house I toured where I didn't have to go down a staircase from the back deck to reach the yard.  An almost completely flat half acre yard - something I wasn't aware even existed where we were looking.  The next day we set up a second showing so the hubs could see it.  

And our offer was accepted on Friday!  We close (hopefully, because I can't handle the hotel one more day) on July 27th.  More pictures of the inside to come!