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Time to get packing

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Looks like we will be staying with in-laws until our new home is ready. In the meanwhile, we need to get all packed up and into storage.  We will be using PODs systems. Of course, I have several large projects at the same exact time, so it seems to me like I am getting nothing at all done. I actually have a middle school opening a show on the same day my moving containers show up (I am costuming 30 kids in Charlotte's Webb.)

Selling a house to a sibling

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Gonna be leaving this beauty for a new home soon.  Did I mention that my sibling is purchasing my existing house? For me, that's really weird for several reasons. 1. You don't get to sell and walk away... you will be visiting this house for the foreseeable future, so we put a lot more money into the home prep with that in mind... .that we actually cared to make sure nothing broke or there were no existing problems in the home that my sibling would have to deal with. (Even though we weren't positive they would actually buy.) 2. I will continually be visiting this house, that I owned for 15 years for the foreseeable future, and I will have to knock and not just march into a bedroom because it is not mine. 3. The awkwardness of selling something valuable to a relative. We're already super awkward people, so this did not help. We pretty much just got realtors and let them handle it... rarely even mentioning the house to each other (really awkward, right). And of c...

Why are we moving again?

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The process of cleaning up, packing excess stuff, and staging the house has revealed that the house we live in is kinda awesome. Regardless, we are committed to the new house and it is coming along nicely. I still need to decide how to go about moving... twice and where to stay for the month (likely) between selling the home and buying the new one. I guess the answer is that after 15 years in one home, we're just ready for something different. 

Making progress on the new house

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Fingers crossed for an offer completed on the current house. Progress on the new house. I just remembered that my current house was framed on the 4th of July and we moved in on the 31st, and surprisingly, there has been no real structural issues in this house.  I don't expect the new house to go up quite that fast, we still have 3 months to go, but I still have a feeling the builder is going to offer us an earlier closing... of course, we will need to have the current house sold first.

Oh poop, Hurricaine Irma and a new house build

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I wasn't really worried about the state of the house. It was in the beginning stages and I knew that anything that blew down could be put back up. What I was worried about was the projectiles that a house in progress could cause on the rest of the neighborhood. The good news is that only a couple pieces of wood blew away and did not ruin anyone else's house that I know of. The bad news is that the construction workers probably needed a fresh toilet. eww.  At home, we in the NE suburbs of ATL lost trees in the neighborhood.  My yard is a mess. A shutter is kinda in a precarious position and we lost power for an hour. Most of our friends and family lost power for 24 hours. Some lost power for two whole days... one person is still out. 

Old and New

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As my old house gets closer to ready to sell, I am becoming nostalgic as it is a particularly beautiful home.  So why am I moving?  It doesn't work well for us as a family. My "old" two story foyer at Christmastime It doesn't work for a 4 car family. We have to constantly shuffle around cars every morning and evening. You could say that it only temporary as my children will fly the coop before long, but whenever my grown family will come home to visit or whenever we have visitors, we will have the same annoying problem. Photo of "old" great room Another reason it doesn't work is it doesn't flow to fit the way we live. We walk in, kick off our shoes, put down our bags and go about our business... the foyer door and kitchen door become littered with, shoes, and bags, and mail and stuff like that, and with 4 adults in the house, it gets a bit overwhelming to stay on top of.  With a proper mud room and foyer closet, the new house will hopefu...

Getting a house ready for sale is a nightmare

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Getting a house ready for sale is a nightmare, and makes me really crazy.  So far I have replaced flooring.  Had painters do the deck, some minor facade repair, and interior painting.  Now I am looking at fixing the front porch, and it's a bit more money than I expected.  Ugh.  I don't want to sell a house with issues, but I also don't want to pay much more to sell the house... what to do, what to do? So far, I am just practicing being mean and difficult with the people who sell the services. In the meanwhile, we are building another house, thankfully far enough away to not be obsessive about always being there.  They are kinda nickel-and-diming us too. I mean after you've paid a sizeable non-refundable deposit. Why does a couple of minor changes mean you have to pay an additional non-refundable deposit?  Are my changes so egregious that no one in their right mind would want them if the sale fell through? It's not that it is a lot of m...