House Hunting: New Hampshire Edition

When we moved to Georgia we moved into our first home 6 weeks after we got there. The house we bought was the only house I saw and Brian looked at maybe 10 houses total. It was fast, easy, and extremely affordable. We had hundreds of options in our price range which made house hunting in Georgia easy.  Well we have not had the same experience in the Hamp. I feel like there are 100 things to consider. Do we want to live near the beach or the mountains? Do we want an older (1900's) home or a newer home? A fixer or turn key? Do we want land? Do we want to live in New Hampshire and pay high property tax or live in Maine and pay income tax? I am indecisive and this has become impossible in my mind. Houses are very different here and even the homes in our price range vary greatly. Just check out pictures from one day of houses hunting to see.  

Since we don't have the options like we did in Georgia and we have more variables to consider, we have started our wants and needs list. My list in probably different than Brian's list so we'll go with mine. 

Needs:

-3 Bedrooms (2 with potential for 3 is fine)

-1300-2000sqft (We prefer small houses)

-Good neighborhood for walking

-0.5 acre + (most houses have 2+ acres)

-Decent schools

-Storage space

-In a rural area

Wants:

-Within 2-3 miles to the beach

-Basement

-Large backyard

-2 Bathrooms (most old homes only have 1 bath)

-Ranch style

-1st floor laundry

-Needs TLC

-Low property taxes

-Close to work

So you can see that we have started to assess what we need and it is helping narrow down our search. We are still not close to pulling the trigger and houses seem to go fast. We have called on a number of houses and within a week they are all under contract. Basically when we are ready to pull the trigger we have to do it without hesitation. Our rental is up middle of May so I think February is going to be our month of house hunting frenzy. Not to mention after plenty of research it looks like house prices dip during the month of March. Let's hope that trend continues for us. 

I feel like we are first time home buyers because this experience is so different than the first time. I wish I could just call the Property Brothers and they could handle this for us :)

What are your wants and needs? Any tips for us rookies? 

Finding Inspiration

As you know we are currently renting a little beach cottage. We don't have any house projects to work on so I have been trying to do "crafts". I am not very crafty, more DIY friendly. I need things to work on so I have taken up crafting. No better time to be crafty than the holidays. I have been putting my crafting into overdrive because my surroundings are incredibly inspiring. I love decorating a home to reflect where you live. In Cali we had a lot of surf inspired decor and in Georgia we started to lean toward the farmhouse rustic style. Now that we are in New England we may start becoming a little more colorful. Here are some inspiring photos from our little weekend drive up the Kancamagus Highway. 

Can you believe those colors???? There is a lot of hype around a New England fall and boy does it deliver. With this new inspiration has come my attempts at crafting. 

My first go at a banner (please ignore the ugly desk, not ours) 

You know I love chalkboard EVERYTHING. Painted a fake pumpkin with chalkboard paint and now we have the cutest little monogrammed pumpkin :)

After our weekend of colors, I made Brian stop at Michaels so I could do my first fall wreath. Love how it turned out. I am keeping all this inspiration bottled up to use when we do buy our New Hampshire home!

Happy Monday!

Selling Our Home: What We Learned

 This blog has been neglected...very very neglected. Our summer was madness and I really only had 24 hours in the day, and those were used up. We have since had a lengthy vacation, packed up our home, moved to New Hampshire, and sold the house! 

our much needed vacay

My last post was right after we went under contract for the first time with our house. We were so excited to be under contract within a week of listing and everything was going very smooth, and then we had an inspection. Now remember we had just purchased this home (and had the inspection done) in October of 2012. We were not really worried about the inspection and were just excited to be moving forward. Well, a couple of days after the inspection came the craziest thing we have ever seen. The buyers agent sent over a list of 73 (WHAT!!!) items that needed fixing. We were shocked, and to be entirely honest, pissed. Reading through the list was crazy. Let me just give you a handful of gems from the list: broken tub stopper in the master bath (not broken actually we used it everyday), missing key for the fireplace (hm, actually it's in a drawer since we have a baby), stain on the driveway, chipping paint under the deck, no light in garage door opener (or just a burnt out light bulb), missing door stopper in master bedroom, and the list went on and on and on. When we got the list we didn't even know where to start. 

After talking to our realtor she suggested offering money and a warranty. We did just that. We offered more closing, a warranty, and a gift card to home depot. The buyers then came back agreeing to the extra money and gift card (of course) but still wanted some stuff fixed. We ended up coming to an agreement and we were on our way. 

The next morning, after negotiations, we got a call from the realtor saying the buyers were backing out...NOOOOOOOOOO! The realtor called to let us know at 10am and said, "don't worry though we have more showings at 2pm". We had already started packing up our entire house, and the place was a disaster. I started crying, like full on sobs. I was so bummed. Not only is the house a disaster but we were also leaving for a vacation in 3 days! I was seriously beyond stressed. After a frantic call to my mom (am I the only one that does that?) I put on my big girl pants and got to work. Lucky for me Amelia took an extra long nap so I was able to get it all done for the showings that were coming. Oh did I forget to mention that we had sold Brian's truck so I didn't even have a car. Super stress. 

We ended up leaving for vacation with our house back on the market. We were fortunate to have family that stayed at our place and kept things in place for all the showings while we were gone. Our realtor worked really hard and got in touch with some of our original offers. Lucky for us, one of them was still interested! They came in with a great offer (not as good as the first) but still great. This time everything truly went very smooth. The inspection came back with normal items and we were happy to complete everything on the list. We closed September 20th, only 10 months from when we bought the house and we even came out a little ahead. Lucky!

What did we learn? I guess the better question is, what will we do different the next time? Overall it was a very good experience and we got very lucky with the market on the buying and selling end. We still might have done a couple things a little different

1. We would continue to show the home even if we were under contract. Our realtor did not see the purpose of continuing to show but looking back I wish we had. 

2. We would rent a pod and pack in most of our stuff ahead of time. A house shows better with no clutter and our basement was full of boxes during the showings. If we had a place to put stuff as we packed it that would've been nice. Also it would have been much easier when we were ready to move. 

3. EAT out! While we were showing I was constantly stressed about the house being clean. It was just better when we ate out. Maybe not for the waistline, but stress isn't good for that either. 

4. Do not go on a 2 week vacation in the middle of crazy town. Now this is hard because the vacation was planned way before we even knew we were moving. The timing wasn't great but in this situation it could not be helped. Those 2 weeks would have been very helpful for us. We ended up basically packing our entire house in 2 days and that is not good for a marriage ;) Basically we just wanted to punch each other all day. We should have timed it a little better or hired movers, and we will next time. 

What we did right:

1. Ready to show at the drop of a hat. I told the realtor I needed 2 hours notice, but if she gave me 15 minutes I would still show the house. We packed in a lot of last minute showings.  

2. Kept the house super clean and cool temps. Selling a home in Georgia in the middle of summer, yikes. Lucky for us it wasn't a hot summer but we still kept temps low for comfort. I was also a crazy person with the cleaning. I would hate for some dust or dog hair to deter someone from buying the home. 

3. Do not get offended. People pick the house apart and it kind of feels personal. But tastes are different and its not for everyone. A buyer will come along :)

4. Having a realtor. This was a tremendous help because of our schedules. She worked so hard and took care of everything once we moved. Huge huge help!

We were sad to say goodbye to our first charming southern home. We loved living in Georgia and loved being home owners. How does that quote go, what i love most about my home is who I share it with...Georgia was wonderful because we had each other. We can put our spirit and vibe into any place and we will love it too. 

On to the next.

New Hampshire is incredible and I can't wait to share more about our new digs in the Hamp. We are living on the beach in a rental and plan on starting our home search very soon. We are feeling New Hampshire for the long haul (it's that amazing!). For now our stuff is packed in storage and we are living the life at the beach. I am still pretending like it is not about to snow in a couple months. 

It is going to feel like Christmas when we get all that stuff our of storage. 

"our" beach 

I am still debating on a name change for the blog. Just a heads up this blog will still be on a little hiatus until the home search or projects pick up. If you want to check out our New Hampshire happenings check out our home blog! 

Happy October!

Let The Games Begin!

Well we are officially under contract on the house. After 8 days, 10 showings, and 4 offers we have accepted an offer. We lucked out (big time) with the market and people are really looking right now. We were offered our asking price and the buyers actually want our farmhouse table. We were thrilled that they asked for the table! We have loved the table but it really was custom made for our dining room. We love the idea of it staying with the house, I wish we could track it from here :) 

Now onto a couple weeks of inspections, appraising, negotiating, and PACKING! How is it possible that I am packing AGAIN. Hopefully we will have our New Hampshire location locked down soon. We are planning on renting for 6 months to a year and then looking for a house. We have a cute little beach cottage in mind and if everything goes through we will share the details soon. Wish us luck!

Listing Update

As I announced last week, we listed our house for sale. We started off with a bang. We had 6 showings in the first three days (one couple coming back for seconds) and those showings followed with two offers. We are getting interesting feedback and I am BEYOND stressed. I am not a person that handles stress well so this is rough. Brian keeps telling me, "we are only 4 days in", buck up. 

Some of the feedback we are getting is:
-Cute kitchen
-Love the island
-Cute dog?? (obvious but not really helpful:)
-Master is too small
-Living room is too small (we had this issue when we looked but ended up loving the cozy feel of it)
-Clean
-Well maintained

I will tell you I was much happier on the buying end of the deal and I can not wait until this is over. Lets hope that we can make one of these offers work and we'll be on our way to buying in the Hamp! 

Painted Door Hinges?

All, and I mean all, of our door hinges have paint on them. Clearly the previous owners wanted quick(er) paint jobs and just left the doors on. The house was a rental for a couple years before we moved in so I assume they painted a lot and this is the result...

Not pretty at all. In fact, it has driven us crazy for the last 8 months. We talked and talked about replacing them, spray painting them, or scraping the paint off. All these jobs sound pretty tedious but we did not want to look at it anymore. Mostly we don't want future buyers looking at it either, total turn off. 

We first tried a magic eraser....nope. Then we used a screwdriver to scrap the paint off....nope. Next we took to google and pinterest. Turns out all you need is: an old crock-pot, water, and some dish soap. We got to work and removed all the hinges. 

Seriously, just take the time to remove when painting.

We found an old crock-pot at Goodwill for $4.94. Sweet deal! Filled it up with water, a little dish soap, and the hinges from 3 doors in the pot and turned it on to high for 3 hours. 

Paint came right off with a little rub a dub dub and occasionally some sponge love. (I clearly should be a poet) 

Tadaaaaa! Like magic. 

$4.94 and we have shiny new(ish) looking hinges. I'll take it. 

Big Changes Coming...

We have been working hard over here and making some progress. Most of our time has been spent doing a lot of touch ups and little changes. I figured since the changes have been minor and all over the house I would just dump them all into one post. 

Media cabinet next to the fireplace and some new art on the walls.

Uh...we sold our couch this week. It was gigantic and not working out for us. We have definitely been sitting on the floor. It has been fun for Amelia and Goose to have all that space. 

Our office/piano room. Leaves a lot to be desired. But I love the color. 

Moved some homemade art to the entryway. Look at that cute little pig in the corner. I had a pet pig growing up and this is a little shout out to our good old Effie. The funny thing is that we flew with that little pig in a carry on a couple years ago. When it went through the scanner, TSA had a panic attack and thought we stuffed a dog in our carry on. 

Guest room. Also a little boring, but that bed is SUPER comfortable

Guest bath. We didn't do much in here. Changed the hardware and cleaned basically. 

Master bedroom. I think this actually looks the same as when we moved in. Anyway trying to sell this furniture as well because as nice as it is, not my style. Interested??

Master bath got the same makeover the 1/2 bath did. Love it! We also made some hardware and light fixture changes in here.

And the craziest picture of all....the one that justifies the title of big changes. Our lawn got a new little ornament today.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

WE ARE FOR SALE!!!!

I know I know, we JUST moved here. We got an incredible opportunity and we are taking it. We are moving to New Hampshire and we are thrilled. 

The question I keep getting is, "what are you going to call your blog now?". Well, that is still up in the air but I am probably going to keep it how it is. Our style is still very much Golden Peach and while our location is no longer gonna be peachy (moving to the Granite State) our style is very rustic and southern with a hint of beach. Golden Peach still applies, even in the Northeast. 

We love new opportunities, meeting new people, and new experiences! We want to see it all and can't wait to find out what New Hampshire has to offer. Now about selling this house and finding a new one... 

Kitchen Progress

Since we are getting close to finishing rooms I thought I would share a kitchen progress picture. We love our country kitchen but it really needed some help when we moved in. The kitchen didn't have much counter space, not a lot of storage, an awful back splash, and wonderful bisque appliances. 

Here is a look when we first moved in...

We took of the laminate back splash and 3 layers of wallpaper underneath off, painted the walls, added a chalkboard wall, removed a cabinet, added a light fixture, and put in some open shelving. 

We have now put some of our finishing touches on this kitchen. We would love to do more (mainly those appliances), but this is where we are now... 

We finished the crown molding, installed the mason jar light, and added the kitchen island.

Added this sweet little kitchen cart from Ikea. 

We replaced our wrought iron looking utensil holder with this hand painted beaut from Goodwill ($2). 

Here is a better look at the crown and pendant light.

Once you have open shelves you may never go back. So convenient! We would love to put in some actual open stainless shelves but that is on our full kitchen redo list. 

Painted our open shelving to match the cabinets, and styled them a little better. 

Our kitchen is nowhere near done, but we think it is coming around. As we are getting our projects done I am starting to feel like this place is our home. It has been so fun customizing this home to our needs and taste.