Back to Square One

Having realized that our desired floor plan was simply not going to be available at our price point, we reopened all of the brochures previously filed away as unsuitable. The 'new' criteria was to find a place; less then 5 years old, two baths and laundry room on the same level as the bedrooms, and keep the reasonable commute requirement. In addition we really wanted to find a place that would allow my Mother-In-Law to keep her same doctors.

We looked at Twins and Townhouses again, but I still didn't want to share my wall with another family. I could just imagine a young family with screaming children and crying babies, or a part time drummer being on the other side of that wall. A nice 2200 sqft Townhouse became available, but I declined.

Finally we found a new development being built with a beautiful Pennsylvania view of quilted farmlands and wooded groves, in the right location but not the right price. The smallest model offered just over 1600 sqft, had an option for an upstairs laundry room and two baths. It had no attic storage and was part of (a rather expensive) HOA. We could move in as early as October.

The small size was a problem. Yes, we wanted to downsize our home, but going from 2800 to 1600 was too much of a step. Even though we had thrown a lot of stuff out and given furniture away, we needed a lot of storage space. With the bedrooms upstairs we would have to plan an extra $3000 for a stair lift. There was no dedicated space for my home office.

About ready to toss this one aside, my wife scanned the internet to find other developments by this builder and found that a "morning room" was being offered as an incentive in a different locale. That would add about 200 sqft to the plan, could be used as my office and add additional storage space in the basement. So I called the agent with an offer, and after a few phone calls we closed the deal. Exactly one month after selling the old house we had a contract to build a new one.

Our stuff is still in storage, but now we have a target.