When do most people look for new homes? Spring, right? Possibly Summer or Fall, but not Winter. Well, we started in Winter - January, in fact. Fortunately, the realtor we used was young and willing (read, hungry) to go through the cold and snow and show us all the houses - many, many houses - that we wanted to see. Many of the houses, because it was off-season, were not heated, driveways not plowed, in some cases entire screen rooms and windows boarded up. Required some imagination to determine a potential in some of the properties!
We discussed our needs with the realtor, set our budget, reviewed the Pike/Wayne Realtors' website and off we went. There are many roads that do not get plowed in winter and we found most of them! And no, we did not have the requisite four wheel drive vehicle that appears to be pervasive up here; we soon found out why everyone seems to have them. Good thing my husband and our realtor had good upper body strength. But it was only a small car we had to keep pushing out of snow drifts, off ice, etc - only called AAA twice. (Did you know they do towing out of drifts?)
The Houses Many homes in the area are in communities that provide trash collection, plowing, possibly a pool, sometimes security. After realizing many communities are iffy in the plowing department and consider themselves more seasonal second homes, we determined that a home outside a community would be better. That limited the search a lot. To keep things straight, each place acquired a nickname.
We wanted a view- lake, mountain, forest, but something to look at besides another house - and on a limited budget! One house we called the garage house, had a view that went on for years, with mountains, river, etc., but small - when we say small, the garage was bigger (hence that nickname). Imagine, tiny house, huge garage. And the living room was taken up by a huge stone fireplace, so there was room for maybe two chairs. The kitchen was a 'step saver' - if you took one step, you were no longer in the kitchen! But we seriously considered it - that view!
Another house we were greeted by the owner watching her granddaughter who had the 'croup.' Could we get out any faster? The house was okay, but who noticed after that? So, the "Croup House" was eliminated.
Then we looked at one we called the 'ice house.' We actually had to form a human chain to get down the hill over the ice to look at the house. This one had everything - a view, open concept, ability to add on if we wanted to, but only one bathroom and some strange right-of-way through someone else's yard from the road. But once there it was 5 acres overlooking a greenway preserve. So we put in an offer. The owner wanted to make his fortune on this house, as he was unwilling to budge on anything - wanted to sell strictly as is, at the listed price, no concessions. Amazing, since the house had been on the market for almost a year, empty. Disappointed, we had to walk away - too many 'ifs.'
Another serious consideration was the first one we looked at, which we called "three rivers" because it had 10 acres of property next to where several creeks met to make one river. (I didn't say the nicknames always made sense to everyone, just us.) It had its own pond, two bedrooms, two baths in a manufactured home, some say a trailer, but a big trailer. Some people had built huge luxury homes nearby, but this property was 'rustic.' It also included a small travel trailer near the river, which my husband immediately had envisioned as a music studio. So what was wrong with this place? Nothing, really, I just did not feel at home. Maybe because the owner was very ill in a nursing home, I don't know, but we looked at it three times to be sure. And this is why our realtor deserves his commission - we were not easy people to please, I guess. Still, he considered it all an adventure and we are still friends.
