Why We Wanted a Fixer Upper

Hi everyone! Once again, so glad you are here, I cannot say it enough. I figured our first introduction should speak to how we got where we are today. Sooo I'll start from the semi-beginning. Ryan and I lived in the upstairs of a duplex, during the beginning of our relationship, which is honestly where I really fell in love with all things design. (In fact we renovated that place too!) That little apartment was honestly the cutest size; it was a single bedroom, single bath space with a cozy kitchen, dining spot and large living room. It was great in the moment, but we wanted something to call our own, as in purchase, and also have some additional bedrooms for the children we eventually wanted.

We had a short list of our needs; we think it's important to lay out needs and wants when looking for a home. It's also a good idea to be clear on deal-breakers. You also have those times when you just get a certain feeling in a house when you walk in that you can't put into words on a list. You just know you can see yourself living there.

This is what our list looked like back in 2016...

We needed something at a super low price point, we really couldn't afford much, but knew we could make it special. We wanted more than 2 bedrooms, it was a need. Finally, we wanted a yard that had enough space for running around, plus we like to entertain. We knew it was going to be something we had to fix up big time, but I also have to admit I wanted to be able to choose all our furnishings rather than go with options that other people chose at a higher buying price for the house.

We wanted a spacious kitchen that had a good amount of countertop space. We wanted 2.5 baths, one for the master bedroom, one for the future kids and a powder room. We would have loved to have as many bedrooms as possible, like if there were 6, I would have loved it. Bedrooms don't necessarily have to be places where people sleep, I liked the idea of as much space as possible too for offices and playrooms etc.. An open floor plan was high on the list of wants to be honest, because I really did not like the idea of the kitchen being completely segmented from the living and dining areas. Also, our dream was to have a biggg yard and tons of woods.

The only absolute deal breaker was structural integrity problems. We could get creative and work around everything, probably even the needs, but we had the one walk away, end of story deal-breaker.

We looked around pretty nonchalant until we got a call to check out a house and instantly knew it was the one when we walked in. It hit all of our needs (1) good price point aka cheappp (2) 3 bedrooms and (3) had potential of a pretty good yard. We got some of our wants on the list, but they did not come without some hard work. Structurally, good to go. It felt weird to say we wanted to make an offer.... Oh did I mention it was super ugly, yea that too! :)

YUM

We had a unique scenario in that we found the house before it ever hit the market and we were able to do a private sale. Actually, our situation got veryyyy unique, one I would never recommend, but we somehow made it work. To give you a glimmer into what I am talking about, we actually started renovating the house before we bought it, since it would not pass inspection. The seller was kind enough to let us have full access to the unoccupied house to do what we needed, but that meant us pouring hard earned money and time into a house we didn't own... scary. Oh shoot! How did I forget to mention, I was also pregnant at the time. Talk about stress and unknowns, whew, we really had to trust that it would all work out and thankfully by the grace of literally all the forces in the universe, it actually did. Financially, physically, mentally it was a struggle, but dang I am still proud of it.

Here are the deets on the house if you are interested.

Built in 1957

1,584 sq feet

3 bedrooms

2 bathrooms

-Ryan and maddie