2021 is becoming an interesting and eventful year, we are taking on the challenge of owning a house!

We unexpectedly started looking at homes, and found one we liked back in April we put in an offer, but didn’t get it. Clearly it wasn’t meant to be. But then after that we started to ‘slowly look’ at houses, seeing what was out there & just looking at places. We had looked everywhere, we didn’t care what area we lived in but we knew what type of house we wanted. We looked at semi detached houses in Toronto, houses in the suburbs, you name it. All we wanted was an older home with character, preferably already remodelled on the inside. Something old, but turn key to move into. The market up here is also pretty crazy, which really didn’t help. Homes we were looking at were listed quite low but going for insane amounts over ask, we didn’t even want to compete in those games & be stuck over paying.

One night we saw a house, not far from where we are now. It was old but in need of a full interior renovation. That night we decided it wasn’t going to happen, we would keep looking but had to face the facts that it could take at least 6 months to find a place we not only loved but that was also in our price range. That night we sent a house in that same neighbourhood to our agent, which we ended up viewing a few days later. We were not crazy about the pictures, or the listing in general but liked the area, the house had been on the market for about 3 weeks, which is insane right now, all we kept asking was ‘what is clearly wrong with the place’. We walked into that house on Friday & knew we walked into our future home. We ended up putting an offer in that night, and getting the house for under the asking price, which these days is completely unheard of.

I am going to be 10000% biased, but the house is honestly amazing. The fact that we also got it for under the asking price with how crazy the market is, was also the cherry on top. We will also be staying in the city we are in now, which was what we were hoping for. The house has lots of character, and it’s over 100 years old (spooky I know). It has been fully renovated on the inside, plus it has a half-finished basement (the ceilings are too low to finish it) but it’s better than other older places. There are a few little things we have to do but nothing majour. The house has a little white picket fence around the front yard, a small pool in the back and the dining room has 18 ft ceilings. There unfortunately are only 2 bedrooms, however we already know what renovations we could do to add a third so we’re not worried at all! They had also enclosed the front deck, & added a small little office, so I will officially have a work from home space. Once we’re settled I’ll probably do a little home tour, we will see. ‘P’ is honestly the most excited about having a full sized barbecue, & a space to properly eat outside. It’s safe to say we love eating outside & that man will be barbecuing rain or shine. We are just under 2 months away from our close & honestly I am super nervous for this next adventure but also extremely excited.

To be honest, I think the most stressful part is furniture shopping. Everything has such long wait times thanks to covid, so we might be sleeping on a mattress on the floor for a while, but we’ve already started buying things just to be sure we don’t have to wait too long for what we want.

I wanted to wait on this post until the condo sold, but it’s currently sold conditionally & there have still been a million showings, so I am not worried about that anymore. It’s just crazy to think that this chapter is coming to an end.

It’s a big step next step for us but it’s a step in the next direction & i’m excited to see how this next chapter unfolds.