*Photo is not of the house we are purchasing*
Later this evening I will be able to say I’m officially a homeowner. It’s hard to believe.
I’ve talked about our house search in the past but today is the big day: our close date! It’s crazy how fast the process went; we literally went from pre-approval to homeowners in less than four months. That might be closer to the average than I think (not counting short sales which take forever), but it still feels like a very quick turnaround time.
We didn’t buy a fixer-upper, but we did buy a house that could use some work and upgrading. An older couple owned it for decades and there are many things that are outdated in the house. We have a long list of projects that we want to tackle, some high priority and some low.
There are a few things we are going to do right away:
- Change the locks
- Change the outlets in the kitchen and bathrooms to GFCI
- Paint
- Put in new blinds throughout the house
- Get cable wired to the house and set up
- Finish Fence -> Get Dog :)
- Install basement stair railing
This is really only scratching the surface on things that we would like to get done within the first month or so, but as usual I will probably accomplish a little less than planned. I don’t plan on taking any time off from work to work on the house, and I will still be keeping up with the blog while moving out of the apartment and into the house. Thankfully I have been preparing for this for some time so I have tried to get ahead on the site.
We also have a great rental unit in the basement and already have a renter lined up for January 2013. With the rental income, we will be paying a couple hundred less than we were at the apartment. As you can read in a previous post getting the unit ready for rental is a whole other project in and of itself. Nevertheless, we are excited to put some sweat equity into the new house.
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Photo by Casey Serin
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Congratulations!
I remember when I first signed the papers on our house, I was so nervous yet excited.
5 years later I couldn’t be happier with my decision.
I would personally move number 6 up the list a little bit, having a dog is so much fun and they love to try and help you out around the house.
@MonsterPiggyBank Thanks! My wife would get a dog today if I let her ;)
Congratulations David! A very wise choice to get a house with built-in rental income :)
Before I settled on some land I always had in mind basements and roof lofts as ways to offset the purchase price with an extra unit. Many people told me they couldn’t have that promiscuity and would rather live on their own, but the perspective of extra money is a much stronger point for me!
@RFIndependence Thanks so much! I think as long as there is separate access for the renter, there would be enough of a divide to make the extra income worth it.
Congrats! Enjoy your new house and making it into a home,so much fun! We bought and renovated 2.5 year ago and love it. I’d love to have a rental income, good for you guys for saving some molla. Hope for an easy move!
@PlungedinDebt Thanks and good to hear!
Congrats! You’ll love being a homeowner. We bought our first house about five years ago and are thrilled with our decision. That’s awesome you have a rental unit to help defray some of the cost of the mortgage. Have a great weekend, I am sure you will!
@FrugalRules Thanks! I hope you have a great weekend as well.
The joys of homeownership. Was it a long process to find a decent renter for your basement?
@sethA Not at all. We didn’t even advertise it or anything, just mentioned that there was an apartment available in the basement. We had probably 3 or 4 people who were interested pretty quick. We have a great renter lined up!
Congrats on the purchase! Don’t forget to READ everything!! There were errors in some of the paperwork on almost every RE purchase we closed on – some of which were in our favor, but others which were not… We corrected the ones that were not =)
@Plantingourpennies Thanks for the tip, we definitely will. Yesterday we spent a long time going over the financials and whatnot. We feel prepared for closing!
Awesome! Good look with the transition to homeowner and landlord all at once!
@Holly at ClubThrifty Thanks! We have a couple months here before the renter moves in so we have some time, but it is all a bit overwhelming.
Congratulations. I remember buying out first place. It was a really exciting time.
@OneSmartDollar It’s a bit surreal, not gonna lie.
Yes get a dog :)
Congrats! Very exciting.
@SenseofCents Haha we made the mistake of going to the humane society a few weeks ago. We definitely will not go back until we can leave the place WITH a dog. We found one we for sure would have taken home with us. I still think about her and how great of a dog she is. We’ll get one soon enough.
That house looks like it’s in the neighbourhood adjacent to the one where I grew up… very similar to my friend’s neighbour!
Congrats on the purchase – good luck with all your tasks!
@Ugifter Haha that house isn’t ours tho : ) Thanks!
That’s awesome. It is much more fun to do work when it’s your own place (most of the time). Can’t wait to hear about which dog you choose.
@Eyesonthedollar We are definitely motivated and ready to do some work because we haven’t been able to do much in our apartment : ( That’s one of the bigger downsides to renting I think, renovations are at the mercy of the landlord.
Congrats on closing on your home! I could of swore I saw you post on twitter that it was extended another week but I might be wrong (horrible memory here lol). Remember, there are tons of dogs just waiting to be rescued from shelters. Don’t forget about them.
@DebtnTaxes Nope you were right, at first they thought we’d have to wait a week but because our loan officer is awesome we are closing today!
You will be happy to hear we would not even CONSIDER a non-shelter dog. There’s too many waiting to be rescued.
Congratulations! I can’t wait to get a dog either :)
@vanessapage I’ve never had a dog but I’m definitely excited about getting one. It will take a lot more work than a cat but I think I’m ready for it.
Congratulations on the new house! Welcome to the life of the homeowner where there’s always another project to complete, another furnace filter to swap out or another leaky faucet to fix. It’s not always easy, but it is nice to have a place to call your own.
Sounds like you’ll be landlords as well, look forward to hearing more about that, and how it turns out for you!
@moneymatters Yeah it’s going to be a lot of fun. I anticipate projects literally until we sell the house. We have so many ideas (some that require a decent chunk of change) that I see it as never-ending, but that’s how we ant it : )
Renting will be huge and we went through TERRIBLE management at our current apartment so we are motivated to be really good landlords.
Congratulations mate… I look forward to all the DIY projects you will have on your plate and will post about!! Cheers Mr.CBB
@CanadianBudgetB Thanks man, the DIY projects have definitely begun! This house needs some serious updating on small thins like GFCI outlets, light switches, chandelier, interior design haha nothing too major tho.
I wish there were those houses with basement rental units here but basements just don’t exist in Florida… no way this close to sea level :)
@Money Life and More Haha that’s true, different place different market. Basement rentals don’t seem to be SUPER common here tho either. We got lucky with this one since the last owner set it up for rental, I guess they had the same renter the past 8 years.
Wow that
Congratulations!
Good luck with the house. It was a smart choice not buying a fixer upper for your first home. And with the money from the tenant you can either reduce your portion of the mortgage or use it to speed up payments. Whatever you choose to do I wish you the best of luck.
@JustinatTheFrugalPath Thanks! It is move in-ready besides cleaning, but we have a lot of little things we want to do right away plus some more long-term “wants” such as renovated kitchen and bathroom. Overall I think it is manageable, though, and should be a good house for us.
Congratulations on your first piece of property, DC! This may be a completely ghetto tidbit of advice…but we went with custom blinds for some windows in our home due to the uncommon size of windows we have and were really impressed. However, in our kids’ bedrooms, we went with blinds that were the same color and size (2 inch faux wood in white) from Wal-mart and were equally impressed! The price was WAY lower than the box store could ever offer, but the quality is identical as far as we can tell. They’re in our kids’ rooms, so they have to be tough…and so far, no complaints. I know a lot of people would frown on buying anything for your home from Wal-mart, but when we update our blinds in our bedroom, we’ll be heading to Wally World after figuring out the only difference between Big Box Store and WM is the price! Congrats again…so happy for you guys!
-M
@seedebtrun Thanks for the tip! Very timely as I am measuring windows tonight and buying the blinds tomorrow. I am not a huge fan of WalMart but we have even discussed going there to compare prices. We might head there first before Home Depot and see what they have to offer.
Also, we do hope to update the windows within the next 2-5 years whenever we have money, since they are outdated. I’d rather not sink a ton of money into expensive blinds knowing we will have to do it all over again the future.
Thanks and we are also very excited! Lots of work (even the cleaning portion is taking forever but we expected that, they did NOT stage the house haha) but well worth our time.
Congrats on the purchase of your new home and moving in!! It will be so much fun to work on and get everything just the way you want it.
Somewhere in here you mentioned doing the window coverings yourself. How did that go? What kind did you buy (I use to sell window treatments, that’s why it caught my attention) :-)
Renting out the basement is a great idea. I’m sure it helps when renovating and making the house payments.
I wonder how that will affect your homeowners insurance policy since you have a rental in the basement. Does your house insurer have a special policy for that?
Congrats DC!