Our Long-term Plan

Since yesterday's post was all about defining the relationship we are going to have with our house, I thought that today's post should sort of branch off of that. Why don't we talk about our goals with this house. Does that sound good? Shall we delve a bit deeper into this relationship thing?

Just say 'yes.'

Trust me, you want to. :)

When we were searching for this house, we had a couple of things in the back of our minds.

We knew we wanted a house that involved some sort of fixing up. I wanted to be able to make the house ours and Jonathan, being a carpenter, always dreamed of remodeling his own place someday. Needless to say, we both decided to openly communicate about the state of whichever house we were looking at. If we both didn't agree about the amount of work, the house was crossed off the list.

Location was also another thing that we were constantly aware of. We ultimately wanted to have acreage, but knew that it might be hard to find in our price range. Houses in our area that have acreage, need a decent amount of work, and are priced under $100,000 sell very fast. So, an expansive backyard was deemed acceptable. (That was one of the reasons we decided to purchase this house. The backyard made us giddy!)

And finally, the third thing we kept in mind was the whole resale/investment ideal. We knew that to get into the whole house-in-the-country-with-acreage-and-plenty-of-square-footage deal we would need something that had the potential for a great investment. Our thought was to live in the home for approximately 15 years, in hopes that the housing market would rebound a bit, and then sell her for a decent profit. Profit + $ in savings + a bit of time = enough to purchase/build our dream home.

After keeping all of those things in mind, we set out to buy the 'ideal' house. I have to say, I think we found her. :) Why don't we continue to break down our thought process a bit further? I'm going to attempt to explain our long-term plan. Here we go!!

Let's start out with the basics. We purchased our house for $51,600. More on that here. We were also told that the house across the street (which is completely updated) sold, in 2011, for a little over $90,000. So, to do the math for you, that is a $38,400 difference. Why don't we just say $40,000. Based on that we have a lot of wiggle room. Also, to sweeten the deal, we have the huge backyard, whereas the house across the street doesn't.

Of course, there is a lot of work that needs to be done to our house and we know that we may not see some of the money, we put into her, back. Yet, we still feel that we made the right choice. Forty-thousand beans is a lot to work with. Plus, when you have a carpenter for a husband...that sort of helps things a bit.

There are definitely things that need to be done to this house, that we won't see our money back on. You know, the stuff that buyers expect to be there, but probably wouldn't throw cold, hard cash at. These include:  upgrading the electric, putting in new windows, installing a new hot water tank, and tearing down the plaster and lathe. These things all need to be done, in order to sell the house at a decent price, but a buyer wouldn't pay extra for them necessarily.

But the important thing is that there are a host of other projects that we should see a major return on. For instance, renovating the bathroom, kitchen, and master bedroom should prove beneficial. Also, adding-on two more bedrooms and another bathroom should be a big selling point. We also hope that redoing the landscaping, fixing-up the garage, and possibly residing the house will add more bang-for-the-proverbial-buyer's-buck. Catch our drift? We are just banking on someone appreciating that we did all of the work for them.

Yet, we feel that it is important for us to remember that God is in control and no matter what we do to this house, it is in His hands. We just are hoping that He has instilled enough wisdom in us to do the right thing. We are excited about all that is before us and we can only pray that all of this will be to His glory in the end. I mean, isn't that what its really all about?

Now, I do want some input for all of you homeowners out there! Please tell me, are we crazy? Any tips or suggestions?