Buying Our First House!

Oh once again, I've been a very bad blogger. But I promise I've had a great excuse! Jason and I bought our first house! It was quite an ordeal to have it all work out, but we couldn't be happier that it did. Our amazing realtor Kari had a lot to do with making it all work!

We first saw the house on February 2 on a Saturday afternoon. We had started looking a couple of weeks earlier, but we hadn't seen anything that we loved. We had narrowed down a list of what were must-haves in our house and what would be nice-to-haves. When we first looked at pictures of our house, all we saw were arches. Arches in the middle of the living area. Yuck. We almost didn't even come see the house, but we hadn't even seen Kari in a couple of weeks since there was NOTHING on the market, so we decided we would go look, just so we could see her and get to see another house.

The front of the house. My car out front, and that's Kari's in the driveway. Wish it was a new car of ours though!

We were pleasantly surprised when we drove up. It was pretty cute! We didn't think we would like light brick like that, but with this new siding and the complementary shutters and door (they look black or charcoal, but they're actually a really really dark green) we liked it. The big "Wow!" moment came when we walked inside.

Picture taken standing just inside the front door.

Unlike MOST of the other houses we had seen already, this one was completely open when we walked in. Vaulted ceilings! Beams! Open to the kitchen and the living areas! Lots of big windows to let in natural light. And hardwood floors and tile throughout. That's right, no carpet in the whole house. At first we still weren't into the arched openings between the living room and den and kitchen, but as we walked around the house for the next hour, they grew on us. And Kari, being amazing and brilliant, loved them the whole time, so she helped us come around to them.

Picture taken while standing by the fireplace. The living/dining room is off to the left. Backyard out to the right.

Then we walked over to the kitchen, and if I hadn't been sold already, I was then. It was the biggest and most beautiful kitchen we had seen yet. We found out later that it had been remodeled in 2008, so it was pretty new! There is TONS of counter space and so much storage. I wanted to lay on the counter tops, just because there was so much room! The counters are actually not granite (though they look like it), they're recycled glass. So so pretty. I still couldn't get over the big windows either.

Off the kitchen. To right is the living room. The hideous vertical blinds have a sliding glass door to the back patio and yard.

Another living space, with a super rustic awesome fireplace! And that wall of doors has a huge closet behind it for storage. We started being able to see ourselves really living here and being happy for a long time. At the far side of this room, you can see the two staircases. The one on the left is 4 stairs down, and the one on the right is 8 or 9 stairs up.

Then we went out in the backyard, which is absolutely HUGE! Seriously, this picture doesn't do it any justice, but I wanted to show the back of the house. It's a 10,000 square foot lot, so the backyard is massive. There's also a HUGE tree back there. Along with two HUGE trees in the front yard. We knew it would mean investing in some serious lawn equipment and committing ourselves to a lot of yard work, but we loved it. We knew Kingsley would love it too, and that we would love playing out there with our kids someday!

We went upstairs to see some of the bedrooms. It's a tri-level house, so if you go up about 8 or 9 stairs, there are three bedrooms upstairs. Bedrooms look like empty bedrooms, so here's just one of them. This would become our room! The guest bedroom across the hall is about the same size, and there's a smaller bedroom to the right of it. And a LINEN CLOSET. I shouldn't be so excited about a linen closet, but there you go. Storage options blow my mind! Back on the main level, if you go down 4 stairs, there's another bedroom, the laundry room & half bath, and the door to the basement and garage.

At first we thought the master bathroom looked small, but now we know that it's just right! We were disappointed though that while the black and white tile looks awesome, the previous owners managed to find the one color that doesn't go with black and white. That green is awful to me, but it's nothing a little paint can't fix!

Yeah, if anyone feels a great need to do some raking... come on over this Fall!

After spending an hour inside, we knew we had to try to buy this house. Jason and I kept looking at each other like "Is this real??" When we started going over our must-haves and nice-to-haves lists, we realized it has absolutely everything we wanted in a house. To make sure we weren't crazy, we had Jarrod & Rachel come over and see it really quick too. 

We slept on the decision to make sure. We woke up knowing it was the right decision, so we met with Kari and put in an offer. At this point, the house had been on the market less than 24 hours. And it turns out we were right to jump on it, because there were 2 or 3 more offers on the house right after us! 

It was a fast, crazy, grueling, stressful, emotional six weeks to get to closing. The inspection went well, but the appraisal came in low, and Kari had to do some serious negotiating to make it work out for us. She ended up almost sacrificing a lot of her commission for us, just to make the deal happen. Luckily, the seller finally came around, but it meant SO much that Kari was willing to do whatever it took to get us our house. We could not recommend her highly enough. Seriously, if you're in the Denver area, you have got to talk to Kari if you want to buy or sell a house. She's absolutely amazing. Super fun to hang out with too, and you do spend a lot of time with your realtor when you're looking for houses. 

So even though it was a crazy process, we ended up closing on our house on March 15, and we moved in over that weekend! We've been living here a month now and we're SO happy. It's a wonderful house, and we feel so very blessed to live here. And we own it! That is the coolest thing! Our neighborhood is so nice and has seemed very friendly so far.

Here are some final stats on the house, because I know what I would want to know about the house!

• Built in 1967
• 10,000 square foot corner lot
• 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms
• 1941 finished square feet
• 900 square foot unfinished basement
• Central AC & Heat
• Two car garage
• Open tri-level floor plan
• Remodeled kitchen & bathrooms

The house already looks a lot different since we moved in a month ago, so I hope to have some updated pictures as we finish rooms. It's definitely going to take a long time to have it be everything we want, but we are thankful that there's nothing major to fix, it's all just taste and preference stuff. We are so thankful to be here and can't wait to make it feel even more like our home!