House Hunting = Blah

For those of you that don't know...Ross & I have officially started house hunting. If you ask me how long I've been house hunting...I can easily reply, "3 years!" HA! For years, I've dreamed about being a homeowner and making a home into my own! Instead, God thought it would be funny to make me have to rent for the past 3 years. ha-ha. Ross on the other hand is smart and realized we had no money to buy a house, and therefore had no option but to rent. THAT IS until we moved in next door to all the Pedicone's :) He quickly realized how CRAZY my family is, and that he wants out. tee-hee. I tried to tell him my family is NUTS! So now that we've been able to save money by living practically rent-free, we thought it wouldn't hurt to start looking.

We met with the same agent Stephen & Betsy used to buy their townhouse, and got the ball rolling (we also graduated with her, and thought it would be nice to use someone we knew).

Here are a few things we quickly realized:

1. We're poor & were pre-approved for VERY little
2. We cannot afford to live in Allegheny County
3. We grew up spoiled in dang ol' Pine-Richland....and for this I blame our parents!

So far, we've eliminated the 11 possibilities that matched our "criteria." On a side note, Ross & I ARE looking for a fixer-upper, so we are trying to keep an open mind. An ugly house will not scare us away :) Now we are quickly realizing how long of a process this may be. Even our lowest standards seem to be asking too much. Of course, we weren't expecting to buy a house tomorrow, but now that we've started, I am growing impatient! So let's take a look at a few of the 'options' we were handed!.....

This "beauty" has a ton of things missing that we want. First, it only has 2 bedrooms. Second, it has no garage or even space to build a detached garage. Third, the yard is small! I can keep going, but trust me on this one. It wouldn't even be worth anything for the money we would have to put into it to make it liveable. It's OUT!

Another option. This one literally sat right on 228, a busy highway. I can just picture Dakota running RIGHT into the street, even WITH an electric fence. And there was no backyard. I think finding a yard I like will be my greatest challenge! I can't help it when I grew up with TONS of privacy :)

Lastly, I have a HUGE pet peeve with realtor's who can't even update the listing pic when the seasons change....aka Snow vs. No-Snow. I'm not asking for much. And obviously if this has been on the market since last winter, there's something wrong with it. We did a drive-by just in case, and it's also right on a main highway, and the road is at the same level as the roof of the house! It was an awful drop-off.

So there you have it! A clear explanation of why house hunting can be more frustrating than fun. And how we've easily eliminated our few options thus far. I know we aren't looking for a beauty, but c'mon, we need something we can work with!