Buying A House: C or D?

In between. You can learn to live with almost anything. Modern expectations are historically aberrant, especially modern USian expectations. But you still may feel it's an unnecessary compromise.

The house I grew up in had one bathtub (no shower) for 5-7 people. That seemed crowded-but-manageable to us in 1976. It would have been normal in 1900, when the house was built, and luxurious in 1850.

That said, we don't live in 1850 so make the decision that feels right for your family.

Oh hey, I bought a house in November! It was a full year earlier and 25% more expensive than I'd originally planned, but I don't regret going for it one bit.

Of course, I haven't yet paid for the new roof that it needs soon, or the top-to-bottom rewiring that it really should have (it's still rocking 100-year-old knob-and-tube in some places), or the radon mitigation system that it needs, or etc etc etc....

we have a bidet, which is one more bidet than we'd like

A big part of it was the realization that if house prices around here (Minneapolis area) keep going up at the rate that they have been, the houses we'd have been interested could soon be forever out of our price range. Backing off from the ultra-responsible "not one cent less than 20% down" line was hard for me

xpost!

pmi brethren

I want a house, a particular house, in a particular area, really bad. So I guess I'm on the road to saving $20,000 somehow and hoping that no one else wants to buy it a year from now? It's already been on the market like 450 days.

As soon as I sign the papers I'll issue an ILXOR wimmens bat signal for anyone who wants to join the collective.

we're looking to buy a new house. sadly despite it being a supposed seller's market we are sellers and buyers so that doesn't help us much. we saw this one house that was practically perfect except the kitchen was too small. :/ still looking!

you guys want to see a sweet-ass duplex for a cool 1.6 mil? anyone want to go in on it?

https://www.redfin.com/CA/Los-Angeles/4349-Prospect-Ave-90027/home/7135597

I saw Los Angeles even before clicking the link, so braced for lols

we've a giant mirror in our small kitchen that offers one the illusion of a big kitchen. but hard to keep it up when the roomba finds a resonance between a cabinet and your ankle.

comes with a pool

https://ssl.cdn-redfin.com/photo/40/mbpaddedwide/184/genMid.17-212184_10_2.jpg

upgraded entertainment room

https://ssl.cdn-redfin.com/photo/40/mbpaddedwide/184/genMid.17-212184_11_2.jpg

good bones

1.6 million dollar bones

enjoy the view with a cup of coffee every morning on the porch

https://ssl.cdn-redfin.com/photo/40/mbpaddedwide/184/genMid.17-212184_5_2.jpg

amazing

Here's what 1.2 mil buys in Cleveland:

https://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/10229-Lake-Shore-Blvd_Cleveland_OH_44108_M47992-27192#photo0

1.2m in most places inc my overpriced neighborhood will buy you a v nice house.

Even dude on the TV isn't so sure about this.

That Clevo house, holy shit

i was riding around with my dad near his place in Rochester NY a couple years back and had my redfin mobile app up while going around and i swear to christ it was depressing to see this kind of thing considering L.A. prices:

https://www.redfin.com/NY/Rochester/61-Pelham-Rd-14610/home/79330620

Hey, that LA property is two on a lot, let your renter pay your mortgage!

Damn, that Rochester house is still 7x what I bought mine for, but it seems like a steal for what it is.

Here's the https://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/15-E-Palisades-Dr_Little-Rock_AR_72207_M78000-33055#photo3.2M house in my town. Love it when they've got a mansion for sale and show pictures like this:

https://i.imgur.com/oKXmyvl.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/k0p6nC2.jpg

"What's the matter, don't like your steak?"

lol

i think there are entire areas of the country where even the best staging is like, "well we could put an IKEA Lack table in the corner with an empty bottle of water on it..."

nice furniture is expensive everywhere

home staging is such a weird thing

my parents lived in a 70s split-level home on an acreage, and the realtor's "staging expert" was some douche who used to work for Ethan Allen who thought they should borrow or buy a bunch of staging furniture and redo rooms in dramatic fashion in order to sell

it was a relatively modest house in the countryside! I have no idea why you'd stage it like it was a mcmansion

do you guys think having only one shower for two adults and two kids approaching adolescence is a minor problem we'll forget about or something we should strive to fix

My kids are only 3 and 7 so my feelings might change over the next few years, but we settled for a single bathroom house because it was better in all other aspects than what we'd seen in the 2+ bathroom houses in our budget, and I have no regrets at all. It's occasionally a minor annoyance, more than made up for by everything else we love about the house that we wouldn't have had otherwise. The people we bought it from had raised two kids there too. We might look into adding a second one at some point but I'm in no rush.

Biggest downside will probably be resale difficulty if we don't add a bathroom, but I don't anticipate having to worry about that for 20-30 years.

I mean, on one hand sounds challenging, but otoh at least tens of millions of americans could not fathom living in my situation, i.e. raising two kids in an apartment (which happens to have two showers). I think you'd just have to plan a little more carefully, and if ultimately the rest of the house works really well for you, showering is a pretty small part of your day. I do hope it has a second toilet at least though.

Yep, right now it has 1 shower 2 toilets. I think we are leaning towards adding one more shower/toilet before we move in if we buy this place. Current owners say they're not considering places with fewer than 2 baths in their current house-shopping, so I guess THEY find it annoying....

can't figure out whether i'm stressed we might actually buy this house or stressed the purchase may fall apart somehow

One of the only times I have ever cried at work was due to buying a house for the first time. Constant stress about paperwork missing, rates changing, being short of money that was never requested before, trying to time moves, finding out something was wrong during inspection. Ugh.

can't figure out whether i'm stressed we might actually buy this house or stressed the purchase may fall apart somehow

yea, it's probably both. i was scared the deal wouldn't go through for some reason, but also scared i was making a huge mistake.

I cried at the closing when I found out about an undisclosed assessment and I thought my lawyer was being dismissive of me.

Now you are happy though, VP!

okay, here's the jam and under a quarter million! Buy now!
https://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/508-N-Hamilton-St_High-Point_NC_27262_M62980-39945

http://hyperallergic.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/LargestDrawers-720x486.jpg
http://ap.rdcpix.com/921387147/41cd7f0ccd68f533136f2a60756ead5bl-m1xd-w1020_h770_q80.jpg

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/bd/87/c1/bd87c1210fe519af3e0600c1b5d0ab02--funny-clothes-lost-socks.jpg

I would love to have a life where I could have that dresser place. And it's got two buildable lots included? Dude, you could build a normal house on one of the lots, and use the wacky novelty house as basically anything: rumpus room, recording studio, art space, library.

I bet the person who built it had nice furniture in there.

quite nice furniture shaped like various habitations

I tried looking for this on Realtor and Zillow, but no luck. Apparently it's in Lincoln, IL for $145k. (?!)

http://thehousehuntingblog.com/post/170166691375/1450002-br2100-sq-ft-lincoln-il-ah-yes-ive

http://78.media.tumblr.com/173250bca21f86a93c49a73a65b36fb7/tumblr_p36sc2esAT1tdcgqjo1_1280.jpg

http://78.media.tumblr.com/46de10a75a43bc451234446495bea845/tumblr_p36sc2esAT1tdcgqjo8_1280.jpg

http://78.media.tumblr.com/9aa92c60671ec18a313cc5f85b0426af/tumblr_p36sc2esAT1tdcgqjo6_1280.jpg

http://78.media.tumblr.com/0ee8b6a9566d419405b37b5b5f6bc3e5/tumblr_p36sc2esAT1tdcgqjo9_1280.jpg

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/314-Pulaski-St-Lincoln-IL-62656/125012316_zpid/

Oh dern, it sold. :(

Kind of a different perspective in this one:

https://i.imgur.com/nWQMhFo.jpg

I'd happily live in the middle of a small midwestern "downtown."

Why does a 2-bedroom house have 3 bathrooms?

"First settled in the 1830s, Lincoln is home to three colleges and two prisons. The three colleges are Lincoln College, Lincoln Christian University, and Heartland Community College. It is also the home of the world's largest covered wagon."

Langston Hughes is from there.

I bet those transformers right behind the house are loud as hell if they blow.

Apparently Henry Darger was institutionalized there in the early 20th century for excessive masturbation

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Darger