Put an offer in on a house

We moved here to Metro Atlanta last summer to escape the failing economy of Upstate NY. I found a job as a technician at a large Chevy dealer here and after lots of discussion with SWMBO, we took the plunge. We decided to rent for the first year to be sure that we were in the right area as far as schools and that were concerned. Well, my daughter has been thriving in her school (her teacher tells us that if she hadn't been told that we just moved here, she would never guess that she hasn't been in this school all along.) We also wanted to be able to scout out the neighborhoods which, as it turns out, was extremely smart since I absolutely HATE the subdivision we are renting in.

Since we really like the area we are in, we have been looking around at houses. I contacted our realtor a couple of weeks ago (our lease isn't up until the end of July) since we seen some evidence that our landlord may be about to have the house foreclosed on. Last Saturday we looked at a bunch of properties and found one that is perfect for us. Its a short sale, so even if our rental doesn't get foreclosed on, it will probably time just about right for us.

The place is 5 bedroom, 3.5 bath, just over 3000 squre feet on a shade over 3/4 of a acre. There is an office upstairs for SWMBO's scrapbooking studio and the basement will be a perfect man-wing. About 2/3 of it is finished with part being a bedroom which would be a study and the other finished part is a rec room that would be a great place for a pool table & bar. The back 1/3 of the basement is unfinished workshop space with the mechanicals that walks out into the backyard under the deck ~ perfect spot for a brewery! :rockin:

We put in an offer yesterday and are now just waiting on the bank's approval. My agent told me when I was signing the offer that the owner was getting ready to take it off the market, so we got there just in time. SWMBO is a bit nervous about the whole short sale thing, but the way I see it, if it is meant to be, it will happen.

Sounds awesome. Good luck on getting the house. I am envious since I live in a townhome and would love to have a house like that to have the space to brew AG.

-Stanley

Best of luck on the purchase. The place sounds great!
Hope it all turns out perfect!

Great find! Good luck.

Thanks guys. We are pretty excited since it has pretty much everything we are looking for. It needs a bit of TLC... carpet, paint, appliances, but nothing outrageous. We are trying not to get our hopes up too much due to the unpredictable nature of short sales, but I have a good feeling about it.

Upstate NY to Atlanta GA... I see refrigeration for fermentation in your future!

M_C

Good luck man! My wife and I are looking to purchase our first home and have put in a few offers on short-sales in our area.

It has been a process. Have put in a few offers, all rejected (even the house that was on the market for two years that had NO activity - we did a full listing price offer and we were a weekend too late and someone else got it). My wife was getting overly attached to every house - so I am relieved that the blown offers have made her look at home buying rationally instead of emotionally. It is really difficult to buy something that expensive when the other person is saying that the back yard is perfect for our son / dog even thought it isn't big enough to play catch in.

We are going out today to look at a few more. Hopefully throw in a offer today. Our realtor always tells us how shocked we are that we are so cool about the process. I told her there is no reason to get worked up about something that I didn't know about a few days earlier.

M_C: There is a spot in the workshop portion of the basement that would be a great spot for a large fermentation chamber!

BeerWars: Good luck to you guys as well! It can certainly be a stressful situation. So far we have been pretty lucky. We put our house in NY on the market on a Thursday night, showed it Saturday and signed the contract on Sunday! Hoping that our lucky streak continues.

How are the property taxes down there? (i'll proably feel sick after you tell me....)

My sister lives in N Tonawanda and the taxes on this house are roughly a third of hers.

stanley1271 said:

Sounds awesome. Good luck on getting the house. I am envious since I live in a townhome and would love to have a house like that to have the space to brew AG.

-Stanley

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Ditto. Even having a kid didn't convince my SWMBO to look for a single-family home. May have to knock her up a second time.


Congrats!!

Got a counteroffer from the seller and we submitted another counter last night, so we will see if they send this one along to their bank for approval of the short sale. I have a feeling that our revised offer will be acceptable for them. And now for more waiting...

Misplaced_Canuck said:

Upstate NY to Atlanta GA... I see refrigeration for fermentation in your future!

M_C

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A lot of basements here stay cool enough for ales with little effort.

Shoot. I forgot I swore I would not talk about how nice it is here! I meant to say it is unreasonably hot, people are awful, and the food is horrible.

Well, after long weeks of (sometimes not so) patiently waiting, the seller's bank finally accepted our offer and approved the short sale! We have our home and termite inspections scheduled for this afternoon and then need to finalize our financing. We are hoping to close by June 24.
Our rental house is now in foreclosure but our lease goes through July 31. If we can get closed before the end of June, we can leave early and not have to pay July's rent.
Of course, it is far from a done deal, but things are moving right along according to schedule.

Sounds great, congrats!

Congrats. Sounds like things are falling in line for you.

So, I got an email from my mortgage guy that we are clear to close! Seemed like I was going to need to fax every sheet of paper from my files to them, but they finally had seen enough apparently. Our closing is scheduled for next Friday at noon. I am beyond stoked that we are getting this house. Can't wait to get a brew day in!

Congrats. You probably got a much better bargain than I did by renting for a year. I was in a rush to catch the tax credit last year, and had to fly down from New York and find a house in a weekend.

That rush worked out for us last year back in NY selling our house ~ we had a signed offer within 48 hours of listing it! I am really glad we did wait since this house will be perfect for our needs and our hobbies.

How are you liking Georgia so far? We absolutely love it. I am even getting used to the heat...

I'm from the Southeast, was in Queens for 4 years and I really missed having central air.

We mss being able to have virtually any food known to man delivered, but we can take our golf cart all over town where we are. It's also great to be out of a 1 bedroom apartment with loud neighbors. We're really happy to be down here now.

That's cool! We have lived our entire lives in the snowbelt of Upstate NY and this is quite a change for us... just wish we had done it years ago.

We are finally in the house! Closed on the 24th and are all moved in. Plenty to do before we are settled -- LOTS of painting, minor repairs, updates, etc. I'm just glad to be back in our own place and to not have to rely on a landlord for things and to have my own space again. Still not back to brewing, but I hope to be able to squeeze some basic batches in here and there.