Q is for Quest...

Danny and I recently started a Quest to find a house.  Our lease is up at our current residence next April and we knew it was time to upgrade from our 725 sq. ft. 1-bedroom apartment.  We got a tip on some great housing prices in a really nice neighborhood nearby so we decided to just check it out and see what was available.  our realtor took us to see 8 or so houses and we quickly narrowed that list down to 3.  I felt like I was on HGTV's House Hunters!  We didn't have a specific home price in mind necessarily but we new that we didn't want to pay more than $700 a month including any mortgage insurance and HOA fees. So.....

House #1:  $113,000, 1-story single family home, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, sunroom, 1418 sq. ft.
                  
House #2:  104,000, single-story Duplex unit, 3 bedrooms, 3 baths, 1400 sq. ft.

House #3:  $74,900, single-story Duplex unit, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, 1268 sq. ft.

House #1 was great, especially in the fact that it was a separate house and not a Duplex/townhome.  It had a decent sized back yard, a deck, a storage shed and a garage.  This house also had a sunroom that was not included in the square footage! Also the kitchen was a nice size and not a galley kitchen...I really liked that! One con was the master bathroom did not have a separate shower...not a deal breaker for us though.  The main con for house #1 was the price.  It would make our monthly payment close to $800 a month and that would be very tight for us.

House #2 was beautiful inside! I loved the dark hardwood floors and the board and batten walls in the living room.  This house had 3 bathrooms...we didn't really need 3 but still nice.  The 3rd bedroom also had a walkin closet like the master...great for storage space.  Plus this unit also had a garage, though there was no access from in the house, only accessable with a garage door opener, kind of strange.  This house would make our monthly payments a little over $700 a month. 

House #3 was very nice as well.  It was basically the same layout as house #2 except there were only 2 bathrooms and there was no garage.  It also had carpet instead of the beautiful hardwoods, but a major plus was the fact that it was $20,000 less than House #2 and with the money we save on our monthly payments, we can put in our own hardwoods in a year or so!  It would be nice to have a garage for storage, but we are getting 500+ more sq. ft. than what we currently have now and a little bit of attic space for storage as well.  And the best thing of all...our monthly payments will be less than $600 a month!  That's less than what we are paying for our 1-bedroom apartment!

So after deliberating between House #2 and #3 for about an hour (maybe less), we decided to put an offer in on house #3.  Our offer has been accepted and we are expected to close at the end of October. 

Another added bonus is that there is currently a renter in the unit and his lease is up in March, so we are going to honor his lease which will allow us to honor our current rental lease at our apartment which is up in April.  It all works out perfectly and in the end we get a house!  God has truly blessed us!