When should we do it? Is it too early?
I still had a year left of dental school here in Charleston and had (still have) no idea where I would land a job (although we were obviously planning on it being SOMEWHERE in Upstate, SC). At first, it was just fun to cruise my realtor.com app and dream of the possibilities.
After enough cruising, talking, and dreaming, we knew we had a decision to make. The debate boiled down to whether we should look and buy now, or wait until next Spring once I was ready to graduate and move right in.
We decided to contact a realtor just to do a CASUAL search. Nothing serious, just a fun look to see if there is anything out there worth considering immediately. Narrowing our search to Easley was a pretty easy decision. We love Easley, and with both of our families living here, it is definitely where we spend most of our time. I also felt confident that, should we decide to buy early (before I had a job lined up), that living in Easley would not limit my possibilities. Easley offers a good central location in the Upstate where I could easily consider jobs in Clemson, Anderson, Greenville, etc that are all within driving distance.
So, we made a list of some of the favorites we had seen online, and on a hot Sunday last July we did a marathon search! We saw somewhere around 9 houses that day, but the one I couldn't stop thinking about was "B Street", as we kept referring to it.
This house actually caught my eye one of the very first times I ever started looking at houses online... long before we even really started to seriously consider this idea. I remember showing it to Adam and talking about all the possibilities it had way before we were in a position to even consider the idea of buying a house. He likes to tell me I had this house completely renovated in my head months before we even looked at it. Needless to say, it did not disappoint in real life!
We knew we had a decision to make, and Adam and I talked on the phone for almost my entire three-hour drive back to Charleston that night discussing the pros and cons. Is it worth buying now? Are we READY to buy now? Can we afford to buy now? Should we be patient and wait? Will we regret not getting it if we wait and buy in the Spring? So many things to consider.
I wasn't going to be able to come back up to Easley for several more weeks after that visit, so we decided to use those weeks to really think about our decision, and if it was still on the market by the time I came back up to Easley, we would take another look and make our decision.
About a week later, Adam decided to take another look at it with our realtor. It was the very first house we looked at, out of 9, on our original search day, so we didn't know when we were looking at it that it would end up being our favorite. So Adam wanted to look at it with a closer eye, knowing this might be the one.
He called me after looking at it and was completely sold. He had been the more hesitant one all along, so with his approval I was starting to realize this may actually become a reality. Our realtor, Steven, told us that if we think we wanted this house, do not wait until I was able to come back up and take another look. He said, "If you woke up tomorrow and found out this house was off the market, would you be upset?" The answer was a big fat YES!! Meaning we had a BIG decision to make, and FAST!
After a long conversation with my mom (the smartest decision-maker I know) we decided the risk of not buying this house and regretting it was much greater than the risk of buying now and wishing we would have waited until the Spring. So with that, we were ready to make an offer!!
After a long conversation with my mom (the smartest decision-maker I know) we decided the risk of not buying this house and regretting it was much greater than the risk of buying now and wishing we would have waited until the Spring. So with that, we were ready to make an offer!!
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