Our house, January 2013
After we got married, and I moved into the house, I set about making it "our" home. Tweaking the decor, changing around the furniture, etc. We never thought we'd be in this house a long time and thought that sooner rather than later we would buy another home, so over the next several years, we went to Open Houses quite often. We weren't looking for a huge home, just something around 1500-1700 square feet. Maybe something with an extra bedroom or a basement for storage or a family room.
Once we had our daughter, we did some more looking because we were sure that we'd want something bigger with a child in the house. Our price range was pretty conservative (more on finances later) and we really wanted to get a 15 year mortgage instead of a 30 year mortgage as we consistently have been paying extra on our current mortgage for several years. This limited what was available to us and every time we looked at a house it seemed like it got us a bit more space, but it needed a ton of work. My husband had already done so much work on our place, we really didn't want to commit to all that work (and time and money) again to re-do the entire interior of another home.
I was feeling pretty frustrated, and we were feeling kind of stuck. We were living thinking about what was next for us and not really seeing what we had in front of us. So we started brainstorming...what could we do affordably to our current space to make it work better for our family? After getting a variety of quotes on different remodeling projects, we made the decision to hire a contractor to add on a second bathroom off of our bedroom, plus a small closet (for me!), making our bedroom more of a master suite. After investing that money in our home and with our changing financial perspectives and priorities, we made the decision to stay where we are.
This decision has been amazing! We're focusing on utilizing our space to the best of our ability and focusing on the lovely home that we have instead of what we don't have. We don't look at open houses anymore to speak of and we truly feel at home where we are.
Have you ever felt freedom from making a similar decision? It might have been about a house or a job or anything really. Leave me a comment! I'd love to hear from you!
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