House Stuff in Parenting

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I’ve always loved St.Augustine. The history , the culture, the food, the atmosphere. If I ever had extra time and money that was where I wanted to spend it. Every time I came home, Id look at houses for rent/sale, even though we already owned our own home. But in the back of my mind St.Augustine was always there.

We bought this house 5 years ago. Its a big beautiful house. 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 2 living spaces, 2 dining spaces, 2 car garage, and a huge backyard. The biggest one in the neighborhood. It has everything I ever wanted. I love the garden tub and the closet. But the mortgage is killing us. Now for the house itself the mortgage is great. But over the past 5 years things have changed. Hubby and I both took pay cuts to move to jobs that didn’t make us miserable. We have more animals, we have a toddler. So there lies debt and bills and it just sucks to be working so hard to be house poor and have no money left over or worry about if we’ll have enough to eat. When we bought this house, I pictured having my kids here, raising my grand kids here and retiring here. It was my dream house. It was everything I wanted and more. But as you get older you realize whats important. Things are so different than they were 5 years ago. Things are constantly changing and evolving.

There’s so much wasted space in this house. It was nice for the few parties we had, it was fun while it lasted but its time for a new chapter in our life. Its time to downsize to something smaller and cheaper. I’ve looked a lot at trying to become somewhat of a minimalist because its what appeals to me. Holding onto so much stuff stresses me out and wears me down. Not having money stresses me out. I want more for our family than what I’m giving them now.

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and expecting different results. I was sitting here day in and day out waiting for something to change but I wasnt doing anything about it. Nothing was changing. So after much discussion we decided that selling the house would be the best and smartest thing to do. Its not an easy decision by any means as there is so much emotion tied to this house. But we need to do whats best for us. Selling the house, making profit, paying off debts, putting down payment on a new home where our mortgage is cut in half.

This blog will be all about this next Chapter in our life. I’m scared, nervous, excited, anxious for what the future holds but trying to speak it into existence.

I will sell this house .
We will get that house we want
We will pay off our debts
I will find the perfect child care for my daughter
We will be happy and we will save

Phase 2: Selling
A few weeks ago we met with our Realtor Jamie from Endless Summer Realty in St.Augustine. We had a few houses to look at. The first house we looked at was off King Street right over the bridge from US1 (Philips). I loved that these houses were so close to the historical district. We made a right and it looked like a ghost town. It was attractive at first as it had that small town vibe but then the further into the neighborhood we got we could tell that this would be what they considered the ghetto. Probably why the houses in this area were so cheap. We got to the house and waited. We loved everything about the house but the lady next door came over to us and said You do not want to raise your kids here. This neighborhood is drug invested and I’m trying to get OUT of here. So cross that one off the list. The next house was only a few streets down. Didn’t like the vibe but cute house. The next house we didn’t even go inside…it was straight trash all around with a creepy black man standing in the middle of the road. Our realtor and I exchanged looks and said yea no next house. The next house we looked at was a bit further down on a dead end road with one other house and big beautiful oak trees all around. It was a cute little cottage with a blue door, high windows, huge ceilings and a rustic kitchen. The charm of the house was nice. It looked cute for maybe a vacation house but I just couldn’t picture it long term. At that point this was the house that we really liked. BUT the next house I loved more. It was a bit further down US1 and it was a mobile home. NOT a trailer but a nice mobile home off a nice road where you can tell people took care of their homes and lawn.

I really had to get over my mobile home mentality but when I walked inside I was like this is nicer than most HOUSES I’ve seen. It was huge, open, bright, clean. I love the bathrooms and the size of the rooms AND it was over 10K cheaper, with a nice yard.

This was the house we decided we wanted so then we had to get our house ready to put on the market. so that’s what we did all week. We packed and organized, cleaned and scrubbed. Brian fixed things around the house that’s taken him 5 years to do. We replaced the carpet in 2 rooms. One room was for the cats and completely wrecked. Brian mowed the back yard and front, we planted and weedate. It took all week but we got it done. Even painted some areas.

Our realtor came over and we did some paper work with the buying and selling process. Our house hit the Market today and we already have 5 people that want to see it. Apparently people say its gonna move fast. I sure hope so. Because the house we wanted didn’t accept our offer. Only because we don’t have an offer on our house yet and the seller really wants to get the place sold. My personal feelings about that aren’t nice and Ill keep to myself for now. but if our house gets sold and that house is still on the market well ITS OURS.

We have an open house Saturday and showings all this week. Its kinda difficult considering we have dogs and full time jobs but my job is pretty flexible since I’m remote.

We listed our house for 199K. I really don’t want less than 195ish for it. Its a :

4 bedroom
2 bath
2 huge living spaces, open floor plan (1713 sq ft)
2 dining areas
Fire place
Nice hard wood/nice carpet
Huge master bath with dual blue marble sinks
Blue marble garden tub
huge walk in closet with built in shelves/drawers
Huge fenced in back yard. Biggest in the neighborhood
Great neighborhood located within walking distance to shopping
easy access to stores/shopping/highway
5 miles to the beach.
PRIME LOCATION!!

Well now I wanna cry. Im gonna miss this house. This is my dream house. But its breaking the break and breaking my dreams. Ill miss this house. It will always have a piece of me.