Healing and Moving Forward

First up the Nose News.  Last Wednesday I had my surgery to set my nose and it was really successful.  I did not have an adverse reaction to the anesthesia (I have not had experience with anesthesia in the past and my mother has an extremely bad reaction therefore, I was afraid I may also react poorly) and the whole process was rather quick.  It also helped that they got me in a full hour and a half early, meaning I left the surgery center when I was originally scheduled to to arrive!  I did get to wear a ridiculously awesome nose cast for 5 days and then the doctor removed it earlier this week.  Now I wait the 5-6 weeks for it to heal completely.  I can feel a bump from where it is broken but I think overall my nose looks good, and is essentially the same as it was before.

Here I am, awesome cast and all at a wedding last weekend!

And now onto the House Hunt...we found out on Tuesday the 20th that the bank decided to go with the other group's offer on the house.  And while it was a little disappointing to hear, it was nice to finally get some sort of answer.  Now we know that we really need to be looking at others houses seriously and by going through this process we were yet again able to evaluate what we really want from a house.  By doing this we realized that we were willing to raise our price ceiling a bit to get a bit more for our money.  So today we are heading out with our FR to look at some new places and we are both so excited.  I am feeling really positive about to day and I think there is the potential to truly find "THE" house today.

Wish us luck! 

Negotiating with the bank is about as much fun as breaking your nose!

And sadly both have happened in the last few days since I posted. On the house front, the bank decided to counter our offer on Wednesday. We told them that they already asked for our biggest and best and that our offer would remain the same. As of Friday the bank had said they may accept some other offers and we let them know that our offer stands through Tuesday and then we will reevaluate. We love this house but we are not willing to go 10 to 15k over market price to get it. Please keep your fingers crossed that they bank decides our offer really is the best out there and that we can come to mutual acceptance soon!

In other news, aside from the house, I broke my nose last weekend. I was out wake surfing with some friends when I biffed it sending the board into the wake, the the wake rolled over me causing the board to punch me in the face. Luckily I did not need stitches for the open wound on the outside, but after visiting an ENT on Thursday we found out that I will need surgery to set it. The doctor told me I'd be much happier to be under slight sedation than to have them do it in office. Apparently one can't really have their nose numbed and since they have to manually shift the bones over surgery will be far less painful!

Currently we are spending time with family, waiting on the bank, and waiting for my surgery on Wednesday!   

Umm still waiting

After the bank received our offer on Tuesday they decided to open things up to a multi bid situation. Meaning we now had to give our biggest and best offer by 9am Friday. So we met with our FR on Wednesday to put in our final offer. We left that evening trying to be realistic about the fact that we likely would not hear back from the bank until Friday at the earliest, but then we recalled that Monday is Larbor Day meaning that Tuesday is the more probable day.

Low and behold we heard nothing either way yesterday, so here we are waiting until Tuesday.  Keep your fingers crossed that we hear something early Tuesday.

To make this waiting game worse, our downstairs neighbors were extremely loud last night, slamming doors and stomping around which happens frequently. Then this morning they were playing their music exceptionally loud and were stomping around so much it was shaking our apartment. So we called the front office to file a noise complain and they didn't answer, so we called our first response security to leave the same complaint. Clearly they talked to our neighbors because they maturely responded by pounding on the ceiling/our floor,stomping around, opening the windows, turning up the music full blast, vaccuuming, and slamming the door over and over again. We called the front office again and no one answered. So irritating! Eventually they gave up and left for the day, but the whole experience was so pointless, be respectful people!

We need a house!

Sitting, waiting, wishing!

So the big news in our neck of the woods is that we put in an offer on a house last night!  We put an offer in on the only house we've really liked and after thinking about it all weekend we decided to make our move. Unfortunately our move was sped up because someone else had also put in an offer.  Our hopes aren't high since we had no response from the seller today but in this game of house buying one never really knows.  So here we are waiting...

We def feel that if this house is meant to be we'll get it, but if I doesn't work out we know that something else has to be out there.  We are still excited by the fact that we are even one step closer to having a home!

A house hunting we will go...

On Tuesday night we went out on yet another searching adventure and this time we at least found somethings that sparked our interest.  In fact there is one home in particular that could use some work but would provide the right amount of home improvement projects for the hubby.  We like it but we are still interested in exploring some more homes.

This time has provided us with some really great opportunities for some really open and honest discussions and I've really enjoyed this extra time we've been spending together planning OUR future.  I guess it's reminiscent of wedding planning, spending time figure out what's next!

We are heading out again tomorrow night to check out a few more places and then we are taking it easy over the weekend.  For one thing we don't want to exhaust all the listings, our FR (fabulous Realtor) or ourselves and we have a best friends Birthday festivities to attend as well as an out of town friend coming for a visit.  So  a busy weekend will provide some time to rest, think and evaluate everything we've seen!

We came, we saw, we...said NO...

A lot! Today for the first time me and my beloved looked at houses with our Realtor!

It was a truly wonderful learning experience.  Our Fab Realtor (FR) came by this morning to share some important information with us, in addition to going through a mock offer with us so that we can truly understand the ins and outs.  This was also a great time to ask questions and get an even better feel for the amount of money that we need to have on hand to make this house buying thing actually happen.

Afterwards, we set out to look at a few houses around town.  FR didn't want to overwhelm us on our first time out, so we stuck to one city and looked at about 5 houses.  First major important lesson learned, even if a homeowner says they will be out of the home at a certain time, it doesn't mean they will be.  The first three houses we looked at all had their owners there and well, at first, it made for an awkward situation.  However, one house we decided to come back to later and  that really helped.  It's not that it's awful to have them there, but I felt like the creeper checking out their house and stating loudly everything that I DID NOT like about it.

But luckily the day went on swimmingly.  The weather was gorgeous and we learned some practical lessons like if the kitchen looks a bit small in the pictures, it's gonna be real small in person and if there are no clear pictures of a mater bedroom that's because one doesn't exist in the true concept of the word!  We also learned something about our selves, like Jon is more willing to find the good in any house and well I'll nix it quicker than you can get the lock box open.  But learning and seeing this makes me realize even more how perfectly fit for each we are.  Not that I am saying that he's always Mr. Optimist and Mrs. Pessimist but it's more like I Mrs. Practical and Jon's Mr. Potential which creates a perfect balance when it comes to finding a house that will truly fit our needs.

Also after spending the day with our FR, we are beyond thrilled with our choice in her.  She tells it like it is, is sarcastic to boot and is one sharp shootin', smart lady.  We feel so fortunate to have found a Realtor who feels like a partner in this and not just someone who's looking to gain a profit based on our desire to own a home.  We love, love, love our FR!

So out of the houses we saw today only 1 remains on the possibilities list...everything else got chucked out the door for some other lovely family to make their home.  Although we are ready, willing and eager to find a house now...we are not going to stop looking until we find the perfect house that will become our first HOME together.

PRE-APPROVAL!

Holy Cow, we just received word today that we have gotten the approval on being pre-approved.

We've been busy searching all over zillow.com and with the support of our Realtor have a list of homes we will be looking at this weekend!

More on what lead up to this soon, but until then YAY for pre-approval!