We Bought a House!

When we moved to Miami in August, or situation had not yet been determined. We could continue renting an apartment as we had in Greenville or we could live at the in-laws house, save money and eventually buy a house of our own. And that's just what we did.

Initially, I didn't want to live with my in-laws. I loved them and I thought that living together would change that. (But this topic is a post for another time).  I wanted to be out as soon as possible... But Mauricio made me agree to stick it out for 6 months. Those 6 months came and went and we stayed. On August 1, in just a few short days, it'll be a year that we've been living here!

Back in December, we started looking for a house to buy. We knew that since our current living situation was good and we were saving a good deal of money every month, that we could take our time looking and not have to settle on the first thing that came along. We could wait for the hidden gem... And we did!

Finally after months of searching, we came across a home that was in our #1 desired location.  Pinecrest.  A location that has the best schools, the best restaurants, the best malls, the best parks.  It's centralized and nice.  It was available.  It was at the top of our designated budget.  Our budget was only as high as we wanted to go... not as high as we could go.  Plus we wanted to have the option of having a 15 year mortgage.

All along, I felt like God's hand was over this entire process.  It was all a little too easy, a little too planned, a little too perfect to be coincidence.  I knew, from the moment we walked in the door that THIS was the house that had been set aside for us!

When we came across it, we immediately jumped on it and was inside within hours of finding it online. Right after seeing it, we told our realtor we wanted to put an offer for list price.  She was hesitant, because given the location, the list price was very low and it was an UNapproved short sale.  For those of you who don't know, a short sale can either be approved or unapproved.  If it's approved, then the list price is basically the bottom price a bank will accept.  If it's unapproved, as ours was, the list price is a GUESS as to what the bank may or may not accept.  A lot of times, an unapproved shortsale will go for months before either becoming approved by the bank, or rejected.  So, our agent wanted us to offer much higher than the list price, but the list price, although unapproved was still at the top of our threshold, which we didn't intend on passing.  We basically told her that that was all we could offer, and if it was rejected, then it wasn't the house for us and that it would be ok.

But that's not what happened.  Within 3 days of placing our offer, it was accepted by the sellers!  And within a week later, the bank had approved it!  We had been expecting to wait months and months before even hearing a yes or no, and all of it came together in a week!  We were ready to roll!

So a few days after that, we had our inspection done.  To our disappointment the house needed a new roof.  But after having some roofers come out and quote it, we figured out that we could still afford to do it!  And thankfully, that was the only real issue with the house... and even though the roof has been compromised, there is no internal damage, mold or termites!  The house was built in 1956, so that's pretty solid!

We continued to work with all the necessary parties in order to close, and had a few bumps in the road with getting insurance coverage (I'll talk about that in another post too) and getting the seller's cooperation, but eventually we did it.  We closed!

We are homeowners!

We have a home in Miami to call our own!
A home to raise our boys in.

And the funniest part is that if we stay there for the life of the loan (15 years), we'll pay it off the same year that Marco graduates from high school!  Isn't that incredible!?

So now what you've all been waiting for.  Pictures!!!
Keep in mind, the house is FILTHY!
And we have a LOT of work to do!

Here's a video of my manly husband doing the honors of removing our for sale sign.  And you can see the front of the house.

Entrance:  This is the view from when you open the door.  To the left you have a small living space and beyond it a converted garage into a large living space.  To the right is the hall to the bedrooms and straight back is the dining and kitchen.

Dining Room.  Sorry, no lights yet.

Kitchen:  We really like the cabinets, but will be adding some handles.  We would eventually like to change out the countertops and get a nice backsplash, but that'll have to wait.  We would also like new appliances. 

This is the converted garage.  It's huge.  We'll be using it as our family room. 

This is the boys' bathroom. We hate the pedestal sinks, but love that there are two of them.  Eventually this bathroom will need a makeover, but not for many years to come.  It's not on the top of my list.

This dump will eventually be my precious children's room.  They will be sharing.  This room needs new carpet because this one smells like a homeless man.  And obviously we'll clean and beautify it.  Stay tuned.

This will be the office.  We decided to have the boys share because this room is really small and the closet is practically non existent.  But it'll make a great office!

And this dump is going to be our master bedroom.  It's small but we like it.  I can't wait to get all Pinterested up in here!

Master bath... there's nothing "master" about it.  But we'll fix it and it'll be fabulous.  This picture sucks, by the way... it shows nothing! haha.

This is the BEST part.  A screened in (dirty) pool AND a MASSIVE yard behind it.  I mean, look at my land!  Can you see the boys playing out there?!  I can.  I can SEE IT!  Wooooo!!!

 So there you have it.  Your tour.  Don't worry, I will keep you updated through our decorating, cleaning, fixing and everything else.  I'm so excited to get started!  I already picked up every paint magazine at Home Depot!
Who wants to help?!