How We Met Our Home

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April 27th will be our 9 month home-owning anniversary!

While hubby was at Ft. Knox training, we found out our first duty station was going to be at Ft. Benning. Tired of apartment & close quarters living (not with each other, but with neighbors) we wanted our OWN space and knew we wanted to live off post.

The cute bungalow style home. The landscaping has grown so much since this photo, and there are now 2 crepe myrtles on either side of the stairs right off the sidewalk.

I had been looking at homes online, and had a whole list of ones I loved. Then we had to narrow that list down to the ones we could actually afford. I guess I had got caught up in that game up ... let's just see what $5000 more would get. Before you know it you're looking at 5 bedroom 3 bath homes that over look a lake. Um, okay, not happening. Bye bye huge list, hello little list.

We arrived in Georgia, hubby reported to his unit, and we had less than a week to find a house before hubby left for a month long training in California. Well, we could have taken longer, but I didn't want to make that decision alone. So we had a week to find a house TOGETHER.

The back brick patio. Gravel driveway comes all the way into the back yard.

We linked up with a real estate agent and began the house hunt, some of which included homes I had found on my list. Let me just say, houses do NOT look the same online as they do in person! Some homes that I was so excited to see ... I took one step in and wanted to walk right out.

We hated just about every house we saw. We were actually a little depressed after the first two days and were thinking maybe we couldn't afford to buy a house. Well, not one that we loved at least.

The barn!! Looking at it from the far side of the yard.

At first all we looked at were newer homes in newer developments. While they were ... nice ... they weren't us. The biggest thing I just couldn't take about these neighborhoods, was the fact that there weren't TREES! I'm a tree girl, gotta see trees.

Finally ... we found a home. It was adorable. It was a breath of fresh air. A one story ranch, newly painted, quiet neighborhood (with history & trees), move in ready. It would need some updating, but nothing urgent. It had a lot of potential, and was about $15,000 under our budget. We were sold. Especially after a couple days of seeing nothing.

The back of the house and yard, standing at the very back of the yard.

Then the agent was like ... well, there's one other house I want to show you. We drove up and I gasped. It was one I had looked at and loved online, but we had dropped from our list because it was out of our budget. Well, they had dropped the price. It's a historic home built in 1928 and is in a historic neighborhood, a couple of blocks up from a very active park, oozing with charm, move in ready, great landscaping, had a barn on the property. It was one that looked just as charming - actually MORE charming in person than it did online! It was just so ... us.

We were now in love with two VERY different homes and had some serious thinking to do. The ranch home was much less money and more home. The historic home was a smaller home on the top of our budget, but the type of home you don't see every day. We drove to the first house and sat in the car in front of the house for about an hour making a pro and con list to each house. The entire time we sat there ... not a SINGLE CAR drove bar, nor did we see a single person! This was a STARK contrast from the other historic home where it was blocks away from a park, baseball fields, the high school track, tennis courts, where there was ALWAYS people and children.

A snow day, here in GA.

Truly, we were sold. And within a couple of day, a few back & forths, we came to an agreement. Hubby left for California, I went back home to NC and returned to GA with my mom to close on the house and move in less than a week before hubby came .. HOME. To OUR home.

Hubby was HOME for a little over 2 months before we deployed, and we enjoyed every night in, coffee on the front porch and movie on the couch. Now I can't wait for him to come home.

So ... that's our story. Of how we met our HOME.

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