I own a condo.
Lately, I've been thinking about whether I should upgrade to a house. A little more space, more mine, less having to deal with an association to get anything done, and no $430 monthly association fee. Four hundred and thirty dollars. Honest. And it isn't like we have a pool or a clubhouse or anything. That's $430 to keep the fountain from overflowing and ruining the courtyard again.
I haven't been real serious about the house-hunting, but yesterday some friends (who are also curious but not yet real serious) went to some Open Houses. We had spotted a few in the newspaper we wanted to check out, but by the end, we were just following Open House signs in the street.
Which would explain the NINE bedroom FIVE bathroom house we looked at. Which was about twice the price of some three-bedroom houses. Of course, this is probably because the place had recently been used as an assisted-living home, so none of the bedrooms had doors on them, and they all opened up onto other living areas in two directions. We needed a freakin' map to get out of that place. And we did want to get out. Especially after we went through the room someone had apparently been using for manicure practice, as it had a row of little fake fingers (with nicely painted nails) lined up all in a row on the desk.
And then there was the townhouse we looked at. Now, I'm trying to get away from association fees and all, but this was a lovely townhouse with pretty much exactly what I'm looking for in a home, at a price I could afford, so we figured we'd take a look. And it didn't disappoint.
Until the agent showing the place pointed out "the one quirky thing about this unit."
Oh, what's that?
There's no place for a refrigerator in the kitchen. The lady who used to live there wanted a desk in the kitchen. So she had this gorgeous desk built in, with a tile surface (matching the rest of the kitchen) and lovely glass doors on the cabinetry. It just happened to be where the fridge should be. Instead, she replaced two of the lower cabinets (where normal people would keep pots and pans) with alittle half-fridge and a little half-freezer, and then covered the doors with false fronts so they looked just like the other cabinets.
The agent said the place had been on the market for two months, and we could probably get it for less than the asking price.
Ya think?
5 comments:
Holy buckets! That's double my association fee! And we have a huge lawn and 50 year old grove of trees to take care of. Lots of manicuring, plus there is snow removal.
I've lived in a single family house and now a town home. Man I'll take a well designed townhome any day. Less hassle, not much to deal with personally, and for me, time to do stuff I rather do.
A association pool sounds cool, don't have one of those. Read my blog and you'll see about me getting elected to the board, since I'm one of the few males who can weld a tool without forehead injury.
The thought of moving? Yikes! Hopefully you aren't the packrat I am though.
Actually, life with pullout refridgerator/freezer drawers isn't half bad at all, particularly if you place one of those little bar fridges handy to where you hang out the most for cold beverages of choice.
The big drawback to any of the new places, aside form being the manager you call on when something breaks or leaks, is moving the cat. They hate to move.
I'm just saying, y'know?
That's a huge association fee.
Get the house with the nine bedrooms! Then get 8 more cats... They could have their own rooms! C'mon!
I probably shouldn't mention that you can get a house out here for about $100K. Heh heh.
Would it be possible to take out the desk and the two half-appliances and put in a refrigerator and replace the cabinets? Looks like the realtor or bank, or whoever owns the place, would have done that already. Or they should knock a couple thousand off the price.
Lori
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