Our House Story

It was late 2007 when our family made the move back down here to Sweet Home Alabama. Bryan had received an opportunity to transfer within Apple's retail division to the store that would be opening up at the Summit in Birmingham and after praying over it we felt lead to make the move back. We had enjoyed our years of living in Tennessee and North Carolina but had always said that if God opened up a door to go back to Alabama that we would go. At the time we moved back down here our North Carolina house had not yet sold. It had been on the market for close to a year and we had lived for 8 months with Bryan living down here in Alabama, sleeping on a friends couch, and the kids and I living in North Carolina trying to sell our home and wrap things up there. We finally decided that enough was enough and that we couldn't live apart anymore so we found the rental home we had been living in for the past 4 years and moved on down in September 2007. We moved with the faith that our  North Carolina house would sell but the next three years would prove to be difficult financially as that didn't happen as we had hoped and planned for it to. 

{Our North Carolina home} 

We started feeling last year like it was time to consider buying again. The rental home we had been living in was pretty small in comparison to the previous homes we had lived in. I appreciated that for the first two years as it forced me to really de-clutter and narrow down our "things". The smaller space didn't bother us those first couple of years but we started feeling the space issue this past year as the kids had all gotten older. We were also just ready to buy a place of our own again.

We casually started looking in 2010 to get a feel for what we wanted to do. We had a general idea of the area we wanted to buy in but we wanted to check out all options available to us. Bryan was considering building and we spent some time looking around at land. It was at the start of this year, 2011, that we decided that it was definitely time to get serious and buy again and so this past spring we began the house search.

We knew what we wanted. You don't move around and live in as many homes as we have lived in and not get a good idea of your needs and preferences. We also knew though that it wasn't going to be easy to find. Had we simply wanted any house in any nice neighborhood it would have been a much easier search. Our desire however was for a place in the country not too far out of the city, within 30 minutes or under for Bryan to work, and on a little acreage though we would consider a lot of acreage if the right house was on it. We knew from our brief looking prior to this past spring that we had a challenge cut out for us. The main challenge being that in rural Alabama most of the homes on acreage are either mobile homes or older homes that need work. If they are newer homes they are typically in neighborhoods/subdivisions. We had no desire to do the whole neighborhood thing again. Our home in North Carolina was in a neighborhood with a HOA and we learned from that experience that HOA's are of the devil and not for us. The idea of neighbors didn't bother us so much but we desired that country feeling with just a few people around, not an entire neighborhood with lots of traffic and houses stacked on top of one another. The main reason we wanted some acreage though was because we have desired for a long time now to raise chickens and to garden and most places that are inside of city limits do not allow chickens.

We found a house this past Spring that we really liked. It was mainly the acreage it was on that we fell in love with. We liked the house too but the acreage we loved! We placed an offer but in the end the house didn't appraise high enough and so we moved on.

We looked at quite a few places from the end of spring through the start of summer. The typical find for us was that we would love the acreage but not the house or love the house but not the acreage. And then their were the homes that we thought had a lot of potential but boy oh boy they needed a lot of work to get there and we knew we didn't want a fixer upper. We had way too much on our plate already to take on a major house project.

Around mid-summer we found another home that was love at first site and we placed an offer on it. It had been on the market for a year with no offers at all and on the same day we placed an offer, someone else did too, and their offer was better than ours and accepted. It was pretty obvious that God closed that door. We believed that without a doubt but we were also tired of the whole process of looking at this point. It had started to drain us and we actually started to wonder if we should remain where we were for a while longer. Maybe we were not supposed to move just yet? Our realtor had gone beyond the call of duty at this point with us and for that we will forever be grateful! Bryan had told him that we were considering giving up the search and he encouraged Bryan to search one last time before doing so. He was a Christian and had been praying for and with us over our house hunt. Bryan reluctantly decided to give it another try and sat down to do an internet search one last time and that's when the house that we bought came to Bryan's attention. It had been on the market for a year but had not come onto our radar because it was a foreclosure and when it was first put on the market it was priced above the money range we had set for ourselves even though it was priced well below its value. The bank had recently dropped the price of the home yet another $40,000 which brought it into the price range we had set and thus on our radar. Bryan knew the minute he saw the picture of the front that he wanted to see the inside but most of the foreclosures we had previously looked at needed quite a bit of work to even move into them so he didn't get his hope up. It was mid-summer when he got the code from our realtor and drove out one evening after work to see it. He came home and told me that I needed to go see this one! That weekend he and I drove out to take a look. I was in complete shock! Shocked at the price of the home, the amazing condition that it was in, how beautiful it was, that it sat on an acre of land that was pretty private, and how the floor plan of the home seemed custom built just for our needs. We took the kids out the next day and of course they fell in love with it too. We decided to place an offer. The home was already priced well below value and the bank had dropped the price $40,000 more since it first went on the market but Bryan decided to offer them $10,000 below that. What did we have to loose? To our amazing surprise the bank came back and accepted our offer! They just wanted to get rid of the place!

Our home is 30 minutes outside of the city of Birmingham and Bryan's work and only 15 minutes to major shopping. From the start of this process Bryan felt lead to go with a USDA loan. You have to be in certain areas and outside of city limits to qualify for a USDA loan. This home qualified. USDA is a lot more picky about their loans than a typical FHA or other funded loan. They require a lot more. I really didn't care either way what route we went down for a loan but Bryan felt strongly after researching that USDA was the way to go. He felt it was the best option loan wise. In the end it turned out to be a HUGE blessing for us that Bryan was lead to go down that route.

The home was in amazing condition, as I mentioned above. It is only 4 years old and was custom built. I love that it was custom built as it makes it very unique and the previous owners sunk some good money into some of the features in the home. There were a few things that needed repairing though. Our master shower is all marble and the top of the shower had been cracked some. Marble is incredibly expensive but we had figured we would just fix it after moving in. In Natalie and Ally's room it looked like someone had maybe stepped through the attic as their was a portion of the ceiling that was cracked in that room. The carpet had been ripped out of the master bedroom as had the ceiling fan. A ceiling fan was missing from one of the downstairs bedrooms and the third bathroom upstairs had never been completed. It simply had the tub and flooring but no sink or toilet. The loft upstairs didn't have a door on it. These were all things we thought WE would repair after moving in. USDA came back after their inspection and said it all needed to be fixed prior to closing. That was at the end of summer. We didn't want to make repairs on a home we didn't officially own yet though so our only option was to approach the selling bank and ask them to make them. Usually foreclosures are take the home as it is so I honestly didn't think the selling bank would go for it but guess what, they DID! They agreed to fix it all prior to closing. We were shocked!

So the repairs began at the end of summer. Everything was fixed and in the end we ended up with a home that we were able to move right into with no repairs needed! That has been a HUGE blessing for us. Especially the 3rd bathroom upstairs being completed. The selling bank installed a toilet and sink in it. If had we gone with a typical FHA or other loan they would not have required all of the repairs to be done prior to closing! I'm so thankful that God lead Bryan down the USDA road. I am so thankful that God reserved this home just for us! It is literally everything we desired in a home and then some more where as all of the other homes we looked at we would have been compromising in some areas. God protected us from that by closing those doors for us even though at the time we didn't understand it nor could we see the outcome. And after all of our struggles to sell our North Carolina home, and several years of financial struggles because of it, it felt like God was reminding us that we might not always understand why things happen the way they do but He has a plan and He loves us and provides for us, all in his timing.

3rd bathroom upstairs before being completed.

After completion.

Loft upstairs without a door

Door on loft

Master bedroom without carpet

Master with carpet

Master bedroom with no ceiling fan

Master bedroom with ceiling fan.

Our home is two stories and has 2800 square feet, 5 bedrooms (one being a large loft), 3 full bathrooms, formal dining and eat in kitchen area, and a large den which we will be turning into our school room. 

If you would like to see more pictures of the inside of our new home, prior to repairs or us moving in, you can do so by clicking, HERE.

In the end we paid far below the appraisal for this home. We are so incredibly thankful to God for that huge blessing! We moved in over the weekend, just in time to start celebrating Christmas. Saturday night was our first night in the new house and we are so thankful to have a place to call our own again!

Unsell Land Related Links: 
Making Our House a Home Blog Posts

"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change."
James 1:17