A House!

As I've mentioned, a few weeks ago we flew to Michigan and spent a whole day with a realtor apartment hunting around Battle Creek and Kalamazoo. It was a slightly frustrating day as Jay and I realized our housing expectations for Michigan were too high. We settled on an apartment that was pretty decent and had most of the things we needed. We did hate that we were settling, but it seemed to be our only option at the time. Instead of focusing on the fact that I wouldn't have a space to do hair in our apartment, or a yard for our pup, I kept my focus on the positive things about the place.

On our first Sunday in the Battle Creek ward we were greeted by many and felt accepted and needed. At the end of church we got to know Garth and Kiery- a young married couple from Idaho. They asked about our housing situation and I told them about The Landings apartments. Kiery assured me the apartments were great, but the trail and surrounding area was pretty sketchy. She said the trail (which I was very excited about and planned to run on a daily basis with our pup) was no good. She recommend never walking it alone, even during the day. That was really really unfortunate news to me. Garth and Kiery told us of a house in their neighborhood that was for rent and it just happened to be across the street from the church building. We left the church building then followed them over to the house and even got to go inside.

From the moment we walked in, I saw myself living there. I mean, the house isn't exactly perfect... It's old with squeaky floors, the basement smells musty, moving in would mean we would have to purchase our own washer, dryer, and lawn mower, besides a large room in the basement there isn't a ton of storage in the bedrooms, and there's no fireplace. Despite all of that, from what I could tell it was clean and well kept. And when I asked Garth and Keary about the neighborhood they assured me it was totally safe- they run and ride bikes through the neighborhood on a regular basis. With a safe neighborhood to run in, the hard wood floors, 3 bedrooms (1 that I could completely turn into a salon!), a large basement, a kitchen with the necessary appliances (dishwasher), a two-car garage, a large fenced-in backyard, and the fact that it was 4 miles away from Jay's work, I was SOLD.

I called the realtor immediately. After leaving a message I realized it was Memorial Day weekend and most likely wouldn't get through to anyone until Tuesday. Needless to say, the next two days were mentally exhausting... I have a tendency to get overly excited about things and then I often get my hopes up when it doesn't work out. The more I thought about the house and it's possibilities, the less excited I was about the apartment. There were cons to the house yes, but I felt that the pros over-ruled those cons!

Jay and I spent our Memorial Day researching houses/town homes in Battle Creek, kicking ourselves for not doing more when we flew out three weeks ago. Honestly we didn't know what we were doing! We didn't realize that there could be places for rent that weren't listed, and all we had to do was ask the right people and look around ourselves instead of only sticking with the information our realtor gave us.

The next day (Tuesday) we drove to Battle Creek and looked at a couple of town homes. We weren't impressed... One town home was just remodeled and had a large backyard. But the yard wasn't fenced in, the area was sketchy, and we would have to buy things like a washer and dryer just as we would with the house. Another town home came with a washer and dryer, was affordable, had plenty of space, and accepted pets. But the place was old and dirty and the landlords were weird. UGH. One thing I've come to realize through all this is when it comes to house/apartment hunting, there's no such thing as the "perfect" place unless you build it yourself. You have to give and take everywhere you go. There was just nothing drawing me to all the places we looked at... The giving and taking wasn't evening out.

We drove back to the home Garth and Keary showed us on Sunday, took a better look inside (the realtor left the door unlocked) and still loved it. Finally I got in contact with the realtor and they were able to give us more information. 
The house was available, affordable, we could have our pup without any extra charge, and would be available for move-in on Friday! 
After filling out an application we drove around the neighborhood to look for other houses listed for rent, just to make sure we were aware of all our options. No luck there. Basically it was down to the The Landings apartments or the house. I was still sold on the house and Jay was impartial to the apartments or the house. 

Later that afternoon the realtor called to inform that the house was ours if we wanted it. So from there, it was decided that we would go with the house!

Isn't she cute?! We're stoked to live in our first "home" together! It's been a little hectic getting things like the gas and electric switched over from the apartment to the house, but we're feeling good about this decision. 
I feel that everything has worked out just the way that it should... Had this house been the very first thing we looked at when house/apartment hunting, we probably wouldn't have been impressed and moved on with our search. Based on what we know and what we've learned through looking at SO many places, we feel this house will make a great home for the next 18-24 months!