perry said that the house had been flipped by two guys in a partnership and that only one of the sellers had agreed to the counter-offer. since the counter wasn't in writing, they had no obligation to us as buyers. at that point, two more offers had been received at or above list price. accepting their "counteroffer" (or so we thought) at list price was the best we were willing to do, so we lost it to higher bidders.
we were crushed. we had counted our chickens before they were hatched and gotten ourselves emotionally invested in a house we thought was ours. having it ripped out from underneath us blindsided us and left us feeling cheated and that our good faith had been taken advantage of.
after mourning the loss, we wanted to get back out there and find the house that was meant to be ours. wednesday we saw two more houses. we didn't like the first one. it had a really nasty bathroom, complete with navy blue tile and an orangey-colored "japanese tub" (don't ask- it was bad) and just would've needed a lot of work. we moved on to the next house. this one (unlike most in the area) had been on the market over a month, which was due to the fact that it had electric heat (most houses have forced air heat through vents) and did not have central air. while joe and i both actually really liked a lot about the house, i couldn't move past the heating/cooling issue. ideas were thrown around about getting estimates to put in central air and forced-air heat, as well as other options to remedy the issue. ultimately, though, we agreed we wouldn't buy a house without something major on our "must haves" list that we'd made before we even started the hunt.
our realtors, helen and perry, asked us to be "at the ready" to go look at anything we might be interested in. with how quickly things were flying off the market, we needed to be prepared to move fast. we weren't willing to take any chances that we could get outbid again if we found the house we wanted. at this point, we were feeling pretty discouraged. not only did it seem like there was nothing on the market we liked, we were also feeling like if we actually found something that we would just get outbid again in the [likely] event of a bidding war. this was supposed to be fun, and it was anything but fun. we continued to pray for guidance and for God to lead us to the right home for us.
the next day i got a text from my friend missy with a link to a house that had come on the market within the last fifteen minutes. missy and her husband live in shoreview and she is the biggest advocate of anyone and everyone joining them in "God's country," as she lovingly refers to it. she also trolls the internet for shoreview real estate on a daily basis (along with local prisons' inmate rosters, but that's beside the point) and was happy to step up as our honorary agent. the house she texted me about looked nice and was in a great location, but was slightly over our price range...
I hope you posted the photos of your potential houses, so we could have seen and maybe shared our insight as to which one we think is the best choice. Anyway, the hunt is probably over, and you’re already settled by now. It was a wise decision to prepare a checklist for what you wanted in a house. I hope that speed things up the hunt process. All the best!
ReplyDeleteWillard Evans @ WOW Homes