Moving on up, to the east side.

In October of 2005, John's company decided to relocate our little family to the east coast. We had to sell our house in Kentucky and find a new home in New Jersey. Because of our animals, renting wasn't even an option.

At the beginning of November, we put our home on the market. Before the realtor even put up the For Sale sign, we had an offer on our house. I was thrilled, elated, and relieved. My biggest fear was that our house in Kentucky wouldn't sell (we had a nice house, but it wasn't in the best neighborhood). We accepted the offer, and started making plans to visit New Jersey.

At the end of November, we traveled to New Jersey for a week to look at houses. John and I agreed that we needed to place an offer on a house before leaving NJ. We when arrived, we were shocked. Houses in New Jersey are expensive. EXPENSIVE. For $175,000 you basically get a fixer upper. I was so discouraged. Every house we looked at fell into one of two categories - nice & incredibly small or crappy & moderately sized.

We probably toured at least 50 houses during our trip, but we didn't find one house we really loved. However, by the end of the trip, we decided to place a bid on a cute little house, with a finished basement. Unfortunately, the house had received multiple offers - for more than the original asking price. We could barely afford the original price, so we lost that house. We inquired about a few other houses (none of which I really liked), but every house already had a bid for the full asking price. We left New Jersey, with no prospects of finding a new home.

A few weeks later, our realtor called with a listing for a small ranch style house. The room dimensions seemed to be large enough to accommodate our furniture. We asked her to go take some pictures of the house and email them to us. When we received the pictures, John was very excited. He thought the house was great. I thought the house was okay. Afraid we would lose the house before making it back to New Jersey, we put a bid on the house. I know what you're thinking - Are they insane? Basically, we didn't have a choice. We were doing the closing on our house in Kentucky at the end of December. If we didn't have a house, we would be homeless.

The next weekend, we drove back to New Jersey to look at the house and complete the paperwork. The house needed lots of work. The rooms were dingy and dirty, the floors were covered in navy blue carpet (gross), the kitchen was from another era, and there were holes in nearly every wall. John was still excited about the house. I was sick to my stomach. Were we actually going to buy this dump?

We bought the dump and are currently living in the dump. Our house's only redeeming quality, is that it is located in a great neighborhood, with a terrific school district. We have made some improvements to the house, but we still have a long way to go. We patched all the holes, painted every room, and replaced the carpet throughout the house. However, we need to remodel the kitchen, replace the roof, and install a new furnace.

Honestly, I hate this house. I can't wait to move.