I've been looking into buying a home for about a year now. Very tentatively at first, just trying to figure out if it would be in any way possible. I loved the idea of not paying rent anymore and making a good investment and being able to paint the walls without Freaking Trent making it so impossible. I searched Remax and local sites whenever I had time, wishing and dreaming. I did that for about 6 months until I found a tiny two-bedroom 900 square foot house for $95,000. It was old and adorable and I saw so much potential with the property. Gab took some convincing but we got pre-approved for a loan and put it an offer. Well someone else was quicker and we didn't get it. I was bummed and even that small process was draining so I hung up the towel for the time being.
When Gab and I started looking for our own place to rent we wanted to find something very, very cheap so we could purchase a home in a year or so. We were looking at one bedrooms and studios that went for around $475 a month. We were ready and willing to rough it for a while basically.
Then one day a Craigslist miracle happened. I was browsing through the rentals on my lunch break at work when I came across the most ideal place for our situation. I hurried and called the lady right then and it's a good thing I did because she had so many calls the listing was only up for probably three hours. We set up a time to go look at it that night.
The place was an above the garage apartment in my favorite St. George neighborhood (up above Diagonal). The lot was tucked into the very corner of the street against the mountain and the garage was detached and enormous. The apartment was small but the deck was probably 900 square feet. I had already started looking for outdoor furniture and planning barbecues.
When we pulled up I was flipping out at how gorgeous the place was and then we saw a Vivint truck in the driveway. Um, Gab works for Vivint. Connection. We were in. The lady showed us the place and gave us an application and after some very intense nudging and eye contact with Gab he finally got my message and brought up the fact that he also worked for Vivint. She perked right up. She left us there to fill out the application and about three minutes later her husband came out. Boom. We chatted for 20 minutes. When it came up that I worked at Hurst he said his wife was always buying clothes in there and how much they loved the store. We left with plans to go home and pack our bags.
Well you can probably guess we didn't get it. The lady called and said that it was a hard decision but they decided to go with someone else. I was crushed. The only thing I can think of was that they wanted a single occupant renter.
I took it as a sign and told Gab we were supposed to buy a house. He's very good at going with me on my ideas, whether they're small or crazy. I started hitting up remax.com again every day. Our original plan was to get something small that we could pay off super quick and then turn around and rent it while we buy something bigger and more long term. We looked at a few condos and townhomes but the HOA fees were stupid high and the rooms were dark. I was so done living in dark dens. The good thing about looking at those condos was the fact that we met Ray, our real estate agent. He was very knowledgeable and patient with us over the next couple months and would always check in with us every couple weeks to send us a listing or see if we saw anything. The answer was always no. I hadn't found anything.
We had decided to look for a single-family home in the price range of $100,000-$150,000 and I really wanted to stay in downtown St. George. There were options but if I were going to spend that much money it had to make me swoon a little instead of just checking off the boxes.
One day I decided to see what happened if I upped the price slightly. I was trying to stay strict with myself but nothing was happening. So I changed the maximum to $200,000 and what do you know, my house was staring me in the face.
Side note: I always get very strong feelings when things are meant to be mine. My car that I've been driving for 3 years that I love? I saw it and instantly felt a connection (if you can call it that). My dad tried to talk me out of buying it because it had a rebuilt title. I kept coming back to it and when it was still available a month later and I had found nothing else I just went with my gut and bought it. That's how I felt about this house.
It was brick. I love brick! The kitchen was white. I love white kitchens! It was in a cul-de-sac! Guess what? Yep, I love cul-de-sacs.
The next day we put in an offer. We offered $199,000 and asked them to cover closing costs. When our offer was accepted a couple days later we were on top of the world. Our closing date was set for June 26th, a couple weeks before the wedding. It was all working out wonderfully.
I went to the bank by myself because Gab's work schedule wasn't going to allow him to be there. After an hour of being there we discovered that Gab's credit score was five point too low. Those five points cost us the loan and maybe the house. The only thing we could do was try to get the score up and then come back in a month and try again. I didn't know if the seller would be willing to wait a whole month just to see if we could get the loan.
I called Ray and told him the predicament. His expertise came into play and the next day I was on the phone with Debbie, who worked for SGI mortgage. Ray said that if she couldn't get us a loan then no one could. I actually knew Debbie slightly (benefits of small towns) and she knew my dad pretty well. So she gave us a step-by-step plan for increasing Gab's credit score and then she was going to do something called a rapid re-score where we could get the score back in a couple days instead of a month.
Well it worked. Gab's score went up twenty points. And once we started on the paperwork we discovered that going through SGI our closing costs would be $3,000; at the bank they would have been $10,000 plus we got a better interest rate. Basically my number one advice is to shop around. I felt a lot of pressure to hurry during this process because A) we had experienced not getting a house because someone got there first B) the wedding was coming up C) we were supposed to be out of our place July 2nd so we didn't have much wiggle room. But can you imagine my shock and relief when I realized that we had just saved $7,000 by going through a different company? Sure, the seller was paying closing costs but only up to $6,000 so that made a huge difference.
As long as this post already is I could easily double it by going into detail about our loan process. It was an endless, stressful mess. It got to the point where I was almost ready to walk away. I was going to walk away from my dream home! With the brick and white kitchen and fireplaces! But we were going big for our first time buying a home so bumps in the road were expected. Plus ya know, I was planning a wedding at the same time (I don't recommend that).
Anyways, our closing date got pushed back twice and currently it was going to be July 3rd, two days before the wedding. The Monday of that week I got a phone call from Debbie saying that technically she was supposed to have called us the Friday before and told us sorry, but it wasn't going to happen. But she didn't! She wanted to try one more thing. What a champion. This literally wouldn't have happened without her and I can never thank her enough.
On July 3rd at noon we met at the title company and signed papers on our house. What a strange feeling that was. I don't know that I'll ever understand the whole process behind buying a house but I definitely thought we would be handed keys at this point. We weren't. Everything had to be sent to the deed company and because it was the afternoon the day before a holiday they didn't know if they would get to it that day. If they didn't we wouldn't be able to get keys for 1-2 weeks. We had all of our belongings in our cars and we were planning on having a 4th of July bbq with all the family that was in town for the wedding. All we could do was leave and pray.
Hallelujah, prayers are answered. At 6:00 P.M that evening I met Ray at the house and was handed the keys! Oh how I loved those keys! We basically threw everything in the house that night and I went to bed completely exhausted but so satisfied, humble and grateful.
I talk about this a lot but I strongly believe that things happen how they are supposed to. I put my blood, sweat and tears into getting this house and it almost didn't happen three different times. So now that we're in it and I sleep here every night I know that this is where I'm supposed to be. And that's a good feeling.
The first photo of us and our first home!
