Our Hong Kong apartment has an old phone in the kitchen where the security desk used to call up when visitors came to the building. This system has since been abandoned, but the phone remained there, so naturally, the kids thought it was the coolest thing in the apartment (not their toys or the view over the whole city, the old land line phone complete with a curly cord!).
At least once a week, Isla would ask about it and I would explain that when Mom and Dad were kids, this is how phones worked: You never knew who was calling until you answered the phone, you had to stay close to the wall where the cord was, and hang up when you were done talking or nobody else would be able to call. Isla’s response was the same every time. She giggled like I made the whole thing up (Nate and I have been known to make up some elaborate stories from time to time...) and then yelled, “But MOM! That is ridic-li-us, where did you see the person’s face?!” Aaah, technology. We recently used FaceTime to do the most ridic-li-us thing yet - buy a house!
Nate and I have never in our adult lives lived somewhere where we couldn’t walk to a town with shops and restaurants and kept that trend going while living abroad. So, when we learned we were headed back to the Main Line of Philadelphia, we felt we really couldn’t happily make a transition to an area where you had to drive everywhere. This made our housing search pretty straightforward. There is about a two mile radius around where we were comfortable buying a house, which happens to be the same two mile radius lots of people also want their houses, so this pocket of real estate is very interesting. You definitely have to be mentally prepared to fall in love with a house or two and then get out-bid.
Given this dynamic, we lived and breathed on realtor.com and other housing sites, emailed with our awesome realtor (and previous neighbor) almost daily and watched houses pop up and go within 48 hours for months. We also toured lots of houses via FaceTime to help get a sense of what our priorities were (a nice way of saying, what we could sacrifice and still be happy). After seeing 10+ houses via FaceTime and hundreds online, here are my real estate takeaways:
1. The color of mustard should only ever occur in, well, mustard.
2. Hiding all your random belongings into a closet for realtors to open is a actually pretty funny game. My personal favorite is when our realtor opened a closet on FaceTime, then immediately dropped the phone and yelled when something fell on him. That “something” was a life-size standing cardboard Justin Bieber. There was also a life-size Harry from One Direction in that closet. If we had put in an offer on this house, I’m pretty sure I would have asked for those to be included in the sale.
3. Buying a house in a flood plain may scare most people away, but remember, we’re both Ironmen. We even sometimes train for them. NBD.
4. Unfinished basements are pretty blah, but not if you create a mini wine cellar area with wooden racks and symmetrical rows of bottles in them - then it just makes me feel the people must have impeccable tastes and of course I should buy their house.
5. Hanging multiple chandeliers over a dining table or kitchen island is completely unnecessary. It’s also totally beautiful and I fall for it every time. Damn you Pottery Barn, for making me feel I must buy three of the $250 chandeliers for my new house. Now I’m going to have to go back to work just to pay for all my unnecessary chandeliers and to repaint mustard colored walls!
We felt as we aged, our houses should get older too. We are suckers for historic charm. The first house we purchased in Arlington (and lived in for eight months) was built in the 1940’s, our second house in PA was similarly-aged, and now we’ve taken a step back into some serious history with a house built in 1890. Most of the houses in the location we targeted are quite historic, which caused us to have even more unique questions when we weren’t the ones physically in the house to tour them. Between the inherent challenges of seeing houses via phone as well as the odd little areas and intracacies of old houses, we kept stopping our realtor as he walked through the house to ask stuff like:
Nate and I have never in our adult lives lived somewhere where we couldn’t walk to a town with shops and restaurants and kept that trend going while living abroad. So, when we learned we were headed back to the Main Line of Philadelphia, we felt we really couldn’t happily make a transition to an area where you had to drive everywhere. This made our housing search pretty straightforward. There is about a two mile radius around where we were comfortable buying a house, which happens to be the same two mile radius lots of people also want their houses, so this pocket of real estate is very interesting. You definitely have to be mentally prepared to fall in love with a house or two and then get out-bid.
Given this dynamic, we lived and breathed on realtor.com and other housing sites, emailed with our awesome realtor (and previous neighbor) almost daily and watched houses pop up and go within 48 hours for months. We also toured lots of houses via FaceTime to help get a sense of what our priorities were (a nice way of saying, what we could sacrifice and still be happy). After seeing 10+ houses via FaceTime and hundreds online, here are my real estate takeaways:
1. The color of mustard should only ever occur in, well, mustard.
2. Hiding all your random belongings into a closet for realtors to open is a actually pretty funny game. My personal favorite is when our realtor opened a closet on FaceTime, then immediately dropped the phone and yelled when something fell on him. That “something” was a life-size standing cardboard Justin Bieber. There was also a life-size Harry from One Direction in that closet. If we had put in an offer on this house, I’m pretty sure I would have asked for those to be included in the sale.
3. Buying a house in a flood plain may scare most people away, but remember, we’re both Ironmen. We even sometimes train for them. NBD.
4. Unfinished basements are pretty blah, but not if you create a mini wine cellar area with wooden racks and symmetrical rows of bottles in them - then it just makes me feel the people must have impeccable tastes and of course I should buy their house.
5. Hanging multiple chandeliers over a dining table or kitchen island is completely unnecessary. It’s also totally beautiful and I fall for it every time. Damn you Pottery Barn, for making me feel I must buy three of the $250 chandeliers for my new house. Now I’m going to have to go back to work just to pay for all my unnecessary chandeliers and to repaint mustard colored walls!
We felt as we aged, our houses should get older too. We are suckers for historic charm. The first house we purchased in Arlington (and lived in for eight months) was built in the 1940’s, our second house in PA was similarly-aged, and now we’ve taken a step back into some serious history with a house built in 1890. Most of the houses in the location we targeted are quite historic, which caused us to have even more unique questions when we weren’t the ones physically in the house to tour them. Between the inherent challenges of seeing houses via phone as well as the odd little areas and intracacies of old houses, we kept stopping our realtor as he walked through the house to ask stuff like:
- “But what would you say the basement smells like?”
- “Can you please lift your phone up so I can see how tall the ceilings are? No, wait, I just see white and have no concept of space...actually could you reach one hand as high as you can and show me with the other hand? Right, Oh, that looks good! How tall are you again? Okay, that seems sufficient.”
- “Could you please touch the grass and tell us if it’s soft? Maybe on a 1-10 scale? Actually, I don’t even know what a 7 means. Would you want to sit on it?
- “This bathroom looks small...is it that odd cabinet throwing things off or does this room look like it was designed for a hobbit?”
- “Crap, we had a poor connection and we actually totally missed the master bedroom. I know we are short on time...was it good?”
- “If you were a toddler, would YOU want to play on that carpet? ...Okay, I hear you that it’s soft, but like, HOW soft?”
- “Now, what’s behind you? No, the other way, turn left, my left. Oh, that is your left...wait...OMG, sorry, that was just a mirror behind you. I’m so disoriented. What floor are we on again?”
- “Let’s say today is Thanksgiving. How many pies would you say could fit in that oven at one time? Jeez, only two? Screw it, we get our Thanksgiving pies for free at the local horse track anyway.”
While it is not yet a done deal, we have a contract on a historically charming Victorian house (the one built in 1890) just a 5 minute walk to town. We’re excited to actually be there in person for the inspection, which is likely when we’ll see it in person for the first time. Given the “charm” factor, the house comes complete with a land line phone in the kitchen. My kids are going to be beside themselves.
Some of my blog readers have asked that I continue writing posts even when we are back in the States. To both of my blog fans, thank you! I’m glad it has been enjoyed as I’ve really enjoyed writing it as a way to document our time abroad as well as keep people posted on what we are up to! I’m not sure how fascinating our Philly lives will be, but I’m happy to continue writing from time to time! After all, we bought a 130 year old house in a flood plain...there are bound to be some stories...
Some of my blog readers have asked that I continue writing posts even when we are back in the States. To both of my blog fans, thank you! I’m glad it has been enjoyed as I’ve really enjoyed writing it as a way to document our time abroad as well as keep people posted on what we are up to! I’m not sure how fascinating our Philly lives will be, but I’m happy to continue writing from time to time! After all, we bought a 130 year old house in a flood plain...there are bound to be some stories...
