Ok guys, so I mentioned in a previous
post that we’re building our first house which means we have yet another move
ahead of us. Yap, we’re first time home owner and we’re excited.
I thought it might be fun to share
the experience as we go along.
We signed a contract on a lot which pretty much looked like a pile of sand and dirt at the time. Watching the building turn into our first home is quite interesting but one of my favorite part so far was going to the design center and being able to pick out options to personalized our home, from colors to cabinets, counter top, flooring, lighting even down to the knobs. Will talk more about this appointment in coming post.
I have to be honest, the day we
signed a contract on the lot, I had no idea we were becoming lot owners that day.
As in, I didn’t wake up thinking, today is the big day. Let me explain. After
settling on the community we wanted, we had an appointment to pick a lot. I
thought that was all we were doing that day, you know, pick a lot, go home and come back for next steps. Well, long
story short, we signed papers that day that made the lot ours and
even designed the first phase (structural part) of our house and got our new address. I walked in
thinking this is something we can easily handle during a lunch break but boy
was I wrong. Needless to say we spent the second half of our work day at the
builder’s office.
So in the next few months I'll be
sharing the process. This is an exciting experience for us as it is all new.
Since the location is not too far from where we are now, we’ve been dropping by
every now and then stalking the progress and hoping to get a chance to document(picture) each phase.
Today I'll like to talk a little bit
about how we went about picking the community and why we decided to build as
opposed to buying a finished or pre-owned house.
Picking a community was
relatively easy for us. We knew what was important to us and that was what
guided our process of elimination and decision making. First and foremost
is good school system. Eliana will start school in just a few years so we
wanted a good school district so we wouldn't have to worry
about sending her to a private school at least for now. Since she'll be
starting out in an Elementary school, that was our primary focus. We
didn't worry so much about the middle or high school ratings since that is still years
away and who knows where we'll by then. But to start out with, she has
great options for elementary schools and a decent middle and high school as a
whole in the neighborhood.
The second important factor was
commute to work for both of us. Right now we live 3 minutes away from
my work and 45 minutes from hubby's. We wanted a middle ground keeping my
commute to less than 30 minutes because by the time you add daycare drop
off and pick up, my commute can easily extend to an hour or more which was
what I was doing in NJ.
The third factor almost goes hand In
hand with the first with that being a good and safe neighborhood. It's
not guarantee but you can almost say if you end up in a good school
district you’re somewhat in a good neighborhood.
With those three requirements, we narrowed our search down to two places just a few minutes
from each other on opposite end of the road. We visited both communities,
talked to people that currently live there, talked to the sale rep in the
office and toured the model homes. The designated school for each community was
what made the final decision for us. One has a
slightly higher ranking than the other so you can guess which one we
picked.
We decided to build because there is
a lot of new construction going on in the area we are now. After looking at a
few homes and seeing what's out there, we decided why not build and have
the opportunity to make it our own. The other factor is that we are still
currently under a lease and I am tired of breaking leases and having the
landlord take all our security deposit. So since time is on our side, it just makes sense.