So . . . We’re moving!

Hi Friends!  If you haven’t heard the news on the gram, I’m here to share that we are selling our 1878 Victorian.  I knowwwwww!!!  We are feeling all of the emotions right now.  This house is my baby, my first big project and I’m so proud of how far it’s come.  I received a ton of questions, which I had anticipated, so I created a Q&A video on IG, and figured I’d write it up into a blog post for posterity.  To see the Q&A video I created you can click here: Q&A in my Instagram highlights.  So let’s get started!!!

 

Why are you selling?

This question is tough to answer, but to make a long story short, some of you may remember that when we bought this house we were actually casually looking for a flip house. But we had the rare opportunity to purchase this fixer in a great neighborhood (a neighborhood we had only dreamed of living in) and made the decision to move here. It’s now been a little over two years-*most* of the work is complete (there’s always room for improvement in my eyes), and we are just ready for a change.  Plus, the Covid real estate market is extremely hot for sellers, so selling the house at this time made sense for us financially.

Also, while living in the #the1878 was definitely a dream, it wasn’t our dream house. Our next home will have more land/privacy.

Have you found a new house yet?

We currently have a home under contract.  More on that to come!

When will you move?

We close on this house in less than 2 weeks! Because we will need to do some work on the new house before moving in, (and closing date is set for a couple of weeks after the closing of the house sale) we will be living in temporary housing, aka a hotel.

Are you moving out of state?

While we do plan to one day head back down South (maybe when we are of retiring age), for now we are staying in the Ocean State.

If you’re staying in RI, what town are you moving to?

For a few different reasons, I’m choosing not to disclose this at this time, but I’ll be sharing more info about our next chapter soon.

Is it an old home?

Unfortunately, due to the extremely competitive Covid real estate market, the house pickings were pretty slim. The house is not new, but not as old as our current home.

Is it another fixer?

It is!! However, it’s not in as bad of shape as this house was.

How has covid affected the sale/house hunt?

So the Covid Real estate market is insane!  It’s super competitive and most houses don’t last more than 2 days on the market and have typically been going for 10-20k above asking.  Selling our house in a Covid market has not been a bad experience.  Now buying a house in the covid market, that’s another story.  We at one time put multiple offers on multiple properties just in hopes to get the deal.  It was tough for us because we are always going to look for a house that needs work, and even those houses (like the really, really bad ones) are priced far above what they’d be priced in a normal real estate market.

What will we miss about this house?

We will definitely miss the 10 foot ceilings, being a few steps from the bay, and of course all the character this home has.  We’ll also miss the memories and traditions we’ve created in this space like dance parties in the living room, smore’s nights at the fire pit, and cook-offs in our open kitchen.

Are you sad?

I’m not sad . . . but I guess the best way to describe it is that I feel like a song writer who’s written a beautiful song, but didn’t have a chance to finish it before they’re asked to share it with someone else.  I know it sounds dramatic, but does that make sense?

Are you moving because you’re craving a new design challenge?

No, I wish that were the case, but we still had a few more projects we could have tackled here, like refinishing the floors on the 2nd floor, retiling the showers, some hardscaping outside, a finished laundry room in the basement . . . ahhh,  the list goes on!

What is our favorite feature in this house that we hope to recreate in the next house?

There are too many, but the only thing that I think is truly doable, is maybe the arched doorways?

Was the plan always to sell or have recent events influenced this move?

The plan wasn’t always to sell.  We wanted to live here and see if it was a good fit for us.  If the plan were to sell, I wouldn’t have gotten as emotionally attached to this house as I have.  It’s a beautiful area, only a couple of blocks from our first home,  so we enjoyed staying in an area we were all familiar with.  I guess the answer is that the plan wasn’t always to sell, but we knew it was an option for us, we wanted to feel it out here, and we’ve learned a lot about what we want in our forever home, and what we will need to do to attain what we want in a forever home.  We’ve always been flexible and somewhat risk takers (my hubs a bit more than me, lol) so that helps in times like this.

Did any of our renovation projects help with the profit?

For our area, and the price point in which we purchased this house, we knew we would definitely make a profit, no matter what we did. Had we known for sure/or planned this from the beginning as a “flip” we might have done a few things differently. And put money/attention in different areas first.  So the bottom line is they didn’t hurt the profit, that’s for sure.  And I think that a lot of my finishes helped to set our listing apart from others.

I think that is it guys–I need to get to packing!!!!  If I missed anything, or if you have any more questions, please drop them below!  I’m really looking forward to starting this new journey and sharing it with you all along the way!