Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Did we just...buy a house?!!

Yes, we absolutely did!! Just closed today too - contract signed and sealed, it's official - a big day for us, homeowners again after 10 long years!! Air shipment came in today, and so did our rental furniture - and the important things, TV and Internet will be setup tomorrow - so yes, we're all ready to move in tomorrow!! I know, I know - we just flew to Peoria barely a week ago - where was the time to buy a house?? Well, of course, there's a story to it - but first, here's a picture of our new home!!


I've always liked browsing real estate websites - and when we finally made the decision to move back to Peoria, well realtor.com was my new best friend!! Of course, it helped that we were familiar with the Peoria area, knew what school district we wanted to be in - but even with the search narrowed down, it was still a wide open market!! Peoria - specifically, the Dunalp area - has literally exploded over the past few years, trying to make sense of all the new neighborhoods was quite confusing!! Quite lucky that Ajey had a business trip planned in October to Peoria - it would be perfect for hime to get the 'lay of the land'!!

I already had a couple of favorites by the time Ajey flew here - he had appointments to see over 10 houses in 2 days - we were hoping to find something that would fit what we needed and liked!! And although my initial favorites fell out of the running due to one reason or the other, Ajey still saw at least 2 houses that were really good possibilities!! Our new home - came on the market while Ajey was in Peoria - and when I saw the pictures, I was so, so sure this was the one!! Ajey was a bit reluctant to make an offer right away, though - he did want me to see the house first. Besides, the market in Peoria didn't seem to be really buzzing, so seemed quite safe to wait until December.

So we made our plan. Rent an apartment in Peoria for 3 months after we get there - plenty of time for us to look for a house. Meanwhile, our shipment would arrive, so we could get the house completely setup and ready, and then move in! Apartment was all lined up for us, rental furniture to be delivered a day before we arrived - and of course, our air shipment was planned to keep us going for 3 months - most importantly, Manasi would go to the school we wanted her in!! Perfectly planned, down to the very last detail - no prizes for guessing how that turned out!!

Now back to exactly a month ago - 29th November - the day before our movers came in! Manasi was to go to Shanghai to play soccer - and when we woke up, it was raining quite heavily. So, at 5am, I'm checking my email - hoping to see an email from the coach saying the soccer was cancelled. Well, soccer was still on - but I did have an email from our realtor, Marilyn Kohn, in the mailbox - informing us that an offer had been made on the house we really liked!!! What - no way - how could this happen - total panic for about half hour - and then we called Marilyn to find out if it was already a done deal.

Well, an offer had been made - but not been accepted - so there was still time to put our bid in, if we wanted to. So we made an offer - and were quite surprised when the sellers came back with a counter-offer within a couple of hours!! Just to put things in perspective - we were in China, Marilyn was driving back from Arkansas, and the sellers were in Peoria - lot of emails and phone calls!! A day of nail-biting anxiety later - yes, next morning as we waited for our movers to show up - checking email every 2 minutes - finally, finally!! Email from Marilyn saying our offer had been accepted!! Woohoo!!! Wait, what??? Did we just...buy a house!!!!

Things rolled along pretty quickly after that! With the 'Authentisign' e-signatures, the initial contract, mortgage application were taken care off completely online!! Then the inspections - the overall house inspection, radon, termite, flood damage, mold...so many!! We hadn't really started telling people yet....just a couple of close friends...I'm quite superstitious that way!! And then funnily enough, a friend of mine who had been a Suzhou expat, and now lived in the our neighborhood (very, very small world!!) posted on FB that a friend of hers moving back to Peoria just bought a house close to them!! Well, all of our mutual friends immediately put 2 and 2 together - but I was still not ready to make the 'official' announcement!!!

Until today - it's all official today!! So, yes, we did buy a house - and I couldn't be happier!! So excited!!

1 comment:

  1. Wow.. Gauri, That's a beautiful house! Congrats on the big move. Have fun decorating it.

    xoxo – Style.. A Pastiche! - styleapastiche.com

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