Thursday, July 18, 2013

Should I stay or should I go???

Track 05 by Should I Stay Or Should I Go on Grooveshark

(That song has been playing in my head for a week now)


JJ & I have started kicking around the idea of moving. When we bought this house we had only been married for 6 months and weren't planning on having kids so soon; much less 2 kids within a 21 month span. 

Look at our lovely house! The front of the house just makes me smile. It is 1900 sq/ft with 3 rooms, 2 baths, a spacious living room with a fireplace and a small room off the kitchen that was used as an office but is now the playroom.  This was perfect when we moved in. 

A few months back we decided to put H in swim classes. We discovered, for the most part, that H doesn't like water. My personal belief is that is because he isn't really exposed to it. We don't live in a neighborhood with a pool and aren't members of the YMCA, so he isn't in large amounts of water often. Both JJ & I had pools growing up. Some of my best memories with my family were hanging out in the pool after dark playing and watching the bats fly around. The pool provided endless amounts of entertainment and a way to cool off for my sister and I. So, I got it in my head that we NEED a pool. So, after months of badgering JJ, he started to agree and then stated that it would be more cost effective to move to a house with a pool than to build a pool. By cost effective, he means that we will never get a monetary return on the pool. 

So, last week we started looking at houses for sale in our area. Ok, just to clarify: we are not moving specifically for the pool. I want a bigger master bath, another bedroom so that we can have guest stay with us and a half bath so our guest don't have to use the small bath that the kids use. We were not impressed. We know that we want to stay in the same area and that we passed the peak buying season as people get ready for school. None of the houses we saw had wood floors or a floor plan that we liked. 

So, JJ floated out the idea of building an addition. This was something that hadn't even crossed my mind. To get the type of house we want, we will have to spend another $150k-$200k.  For JJ, this seems kinda ridiculous just to add 400 - 500 sq/ft and a pool.  We have measured and can add a master suite off the office/playroom area and a pool for less than it would cost to buy a house. Also, interest rates are rising and we already have an incredibly low interest rate on our current house so not only would we be doubling the amount that we bought our current house for, but we would be adding more interest every month. 

Luckily nothing has to be decided now. We are going to take some time and get some estimates on how much it would cost to add on, build a pool, and redo the kitchen (might as well do that while we are at it). I want to get a Realtor in talk about what we want to do and see if it would make sense to do that in our current neighborhood. One of my fears is that we will over-improve for the neighborhood. 

So, that is what is going on in my head right now. I love the bones of our house but we need more space so we will see. 

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

KK

No comments:

Post a Comment

I love your comments, and try to reply to as soon as possible! Thank you very much.