Hit the Deck

Why the delay and random Independence post to break up the housing saga? Mostly because I didn't want to jinx it... I believe my house-hunting to be over.

In preparation for trip 3, Rea sent me a few more listings. I picked out one that was quite near the parents’ house. As I wanted to live a little more in the East Nashville area, so I RealTrac-ed anything in the area with 2 bathrooms. This is mainly so I can have one bathroom that appears clean for visitors without having to actually clean it. Found one with potential. Trip 3 was set – 2 houses.

So, Mom had been asking to join me in the house viewings. She said she didn’t want to go to give me her opinion, she just liked looking at houses. Trip 1 occurred at the same time as a family dinner that no one told me about until 24 hours before. As such, Mom had alternate plans. She didn’t make it to trip 2 either, so trip 3 was her first time out.

I told Mom I’d pick her up after work. As I get to the parents’, Dad informs me he’s decided to ride along for the house that is near to them. A family outing has been formed. So we roll up to house 7 to see Rea talking to the homeowner. Homeowner pulls out of the driveway as we get out of the car. This will become slightly less unimportant shortly.

I introduce Rea to the parents and vice versa. Let the house viewing begin.

House 7: Located on a riding mower sized lot. Pro. We open the door and are immediately met with a new objective: find the cat that’s been smoking a pack a day. Con. Why did we care earlier that Rea had been talking to the homeowner? Because it was during that conversation that homeowner informed Rea that the wood in the first room we walked into was formerly used at a Captain D’s run by his wife’s ex-husband. Let that sink in. Not only is fish-grease-soaked wood a selling point, but the guy went through his wife’s ex to get the fish-grease-soaked wood. That’s pretty much all I remember about house 7. Potential diseases acquired: Tetanus, West Nile, Double Emphysema. Naked people seen: 1.

After I have made my way through house 7, Mom comments, “Wow. You went through that really quickly.” Rea, “Yeah, usually I have to schedule an hour to show a house. For Loren, it’s more like 15 minutes.” Turns out, I can tell if I like something almost as quickly as I can tell if I don’t like it. Mind you, I have seen plenty of places I didn’t like in this process. God made home inspectors to find the flaws. So, Rea and I make small talk as Mom and Dad roam around house 7, making up for my sub-par walk-through.

House 8: After Dad says peace out, we’re back in Inglewood, where the slogan is “It’s where we want to live.” Catchy. We park on the street. Primarily because there is no driveway. Good start. We walk the 45 yards of new deck to get to the door. And by new deck, I mean enormous monstrosity that the seller appears to have built himself. Good news, if a strong wind blows through, it will take care of tearing down the 6 foot fortress. Either that or I’m hiring some Israelites with trumpets for 7 days.

As we enter, Rea tells us the house has been staged. For those of you who haven’t watched as much HGTV as I have, that means, someone has strategically arranged the furniture in order to create an atmosphere that encourages home-buying. This would become very apparent when we walked into the master bedroom to discover a cute breakfast in bed tray. These are the kind of personal touches that really make me feel like I could live in one of these places. Overall, nice place. Pretty much all carpet, lots of green, and an enormous mirror that could replace the moon in a pinch. Outside of the “improvements” the guy made on the house, I like it. I kind of wish Noah would have consulted me prior to building his ark outside, but I guess the rest made up for it.

To make an incredibly long story short, after potentially acquiring Tetanus, West Nile, and two strings of Emphysema and seeing one naked person scurrying around, we commence to make you jump. Jump. Nevermind. That was Kris Kross. We, in actuality, commenced the offer/counter-offer process on House 8. Whew.

Thanks for following my soap opera. If you're not some sketchy blog-hopper, stop by the house sometime... There's a clean bathroom if you need it.