Since we shared our house wish list back in the fall of 2010, we wanted to document what was on the list now (I just found it scrunched up in a vase that was sitting on the bedroom floor, naturally). It’s actually the same list – we just scribbled things out as they changed and added new things as time passed (even when we weren’t house hunting, if we thought of something for our “someday house” we jotted it down whenever we came across the list). Not surprisingly, many things were the same – although it does seem that after 7 years of home-ownership our nice-to-have list grew a lot (I guess since we keep realizing new things we’d appreciate but don’t necessarily need).
Must Haves:
- Four bedrooms (or three bedrooms and an office) of which at least three are on one floor
- At least two full bathrooms and no more than three (three full ones occasionally felt like one too many tubs/showers to clean, so we were open to scaling back down to 2 or 2.5)
- Within our budget (duh)
- A private street with less through traffic (we wanted a place that Clara could ride her scooter and someday learn to ride a bike)
- Around the same square footage as our last house, since that worked well for us (give or take 100 square feet or so – but nothing significantly larger or smaller)
- Something not new (we just love a home with character and eons of potential behind all of those dated decorating decisions of yore)
- Great schools (Clara’s the most important thing in the end, so it didn’t matter how awesome a house was if it wasn’t in a good school district)
- Located in a walkable neighborhood (our long evening walks keep us happy and sane, so couldn’t live on a road where walking is dangerous)
- A flat-ish backyard without a big treacherous drop off (this is another Clara & Burger safety parameter)
- A safe and well loved neighborhood (the reasoning behind the word “safe” is obvious, and the “well loved” thing just means that even if our house needs help we’d love to be on a block with other homes that have already been spruced up, so we don’t risk over-improving our house for a crumbling-around-us neighborhood). You know, that “pick-the-worst-house-in-the-best-neighborhood” thing.
Nice To Haves:
- A private backyard (our first house’s grassy and then wooded yard was the gold standard in our mind)
- A kitchen that we could expand into a living/family room (you know we love knocking down walls, and we’ve noticed that a lot of newer homes have open living rooms and kitchens for a nice airy and casual feeling that appeals to us)
- Extra high ceilings are always on our list, but they’re hard to find within our budget (just like our first two homes we didn’t hit on those this time, except for in the unfinished storage room, where we could potentially loft the ceilings a little and have exposed beams someday).
- A brick exterior (we’ve grown used to how nice and low-maintenance they can be – although it can be harder and more expensive to find a two-story brick house so we were open to other options too)
- Easy access from the kitchen to an outdoor BBQ/eating area without having to walk through a bunch of rooms (we love eating outside when the weather is nice – so once we switch out the windows in the kitchen for a big french door that leads out to the deck we’ll finally have this one checked off after two other houses without such direct access)
- A window over the sink that looks outside (our first and second house both had pretty over-the-sink windows, but they looked into a sunroom in both instances)
- A real pantry (our first house didn’t have one at all, and our second house had a tall cabinet, but not a true blue pantry with a door).
- Sidelights around the front door (we honestly thought this was a pipe dream since no homes in our budget seemed to have them… until we found ours!)
- We thought an actual foyer/entryway would be nice (our first two homes had a front door that led right into the living room/dining room)
- If we found a two level house, we hoped the front door wouldn’t open right into the stairs (some other two story homes we toured had that setup and depending on how close the steps were to the door, it felt a little cramped – so we thought it would be nice if the stairs were offset from the door somehow)
- A garage (we had a double garage at our first house, and a carport in our second house, so all the garage things ended up in the separate entry basement, which wasn’t as convenient – even though we made the best of it by adding a sweet little pergola).
- A deck or patio (in our second house we DIYed both of them and lived to tell the tale – but we thought it would be nice to inherit one for a change, even if it needed some love).
And as for how we did, our new house meets all of the must-haves and checks nine of the twelve nice-to-have boxes (there aren’t any extra high ceilings going on, our backyard could use some shrubs to up the privacy-factor, and we don’t currently having easy outdoor dining table access from the kitchen). But we actually think all three of those things can be explored over time and we’re certain that at least two of them (the last two) can be accomplished. So it should be fun to see where we end up.
What do you guys look for in a house? Do you make two lists (one that’s full of musts and one that’s full of “in a dream scenario” things)? That seems to help us weigh the “needs” and the “wants” better than putting them all in the same category.
Lorraine says
I actually think it’s so exciting that you guys bought a new house. While I was initially shocked, I’m looking forward to following your journey from the beginning!!
YoungHouseLove says
Aw thanks Lorraine!
xo
s
Anele @ Success Along the Weigh says
That’s so great that you guys were able to find almost everything you were looking for regardless of which list it fell on. I’m so excited to see this house transform!
As far as our lists, our must haves are:
Central air, a decent sized kitchen (the bigger the better. I’ve been in a “2 butt kitchen” for 17 years. Translation: 2 butts are too many), a full basement that has high enough ceilings that we can do a tricep extension (Yes, we seriously do a tricep extension at open houses!) and at least 1 1/2 baths.
Nice to haves: HUGE kitchen, nice tall fenced yard (good fences make good neighbors!), 2 car garage, a yard big enough for a garden patch, mucho storage.
Jennifer says
It made me grin to read “true blue pantry” since there’s so much blue going on in your new house.
We’re only just barely beginning to seriously consider our second house, so for the last couple years our list has been “two toilets and a real mailbox.” (We live in a very small town that doesn’t have door-to-door mail delivery. I hate that.) As we’re looking forward, though, I think we’ll have to add 1) more consideration for practicality of use than size of living spaces, 2) no strange textured walls or surfaces, 3) adequate heating and cooling for the size of the house, and 4) some sort of dedicated office space.
If we can pull that off and not lose the features of our current house we love (sunny spaces for gardening, a large garage, and relatively open living spaces), I will be happy as a clam.
Wendy @ New Moms Talk says
Thanks for the timing of this.
We just had one of those list-y chats on Sunday and it gets revisited probably every day as another move to another state is only a few months away.
The perk this time is that we have family in the area who is more than willing to scout homes, send pics to us, and do any investigating that we might need.
If there’s one person I can count on to help, it’s my hub’s mother. After all, she became his legal guardian after he was hit by a car resulting in a severe TBI (http://www.newmomstalk.com/2013/06/12/tbi-new-moms-talk-style/).
YoungHouseLove says
Oh Wendy, I have so much love for you and Scott and the family. You guys are just awesome.
xo
s
Kathryn says
Thank you for posting the link, Wendy and for your candid and clear explanation of three letters that didn’t really conjure anything to me before. I’m probably just one of the many you’re going to educate with that piece. Thank you.
rachel says
When we bought our house (the only house we’ve ever bought) our list was 3 bedrooms and must be inhabitable right away. We didn’t mind it needing some love, but we didn’t want to have to fork out $50,000 for a kitchen/bath reno right away.
The main thing for us was location. Our apartment was in a great area where we could walk to a lot of different things. We saw some great houses, but in the end we went with the house that was in a walkable community. We absolutely love it.
Lesley says
Totally had a need and want list. One item we each had on our want list have been upgraded to need, with all else being equal, now that our budget would be higher; for me, a fireplace and for my husband, a front porch.
…next time…
Elizabeth says
I have always done a need vs wish list. I lucked out and the house we bought about 2 years ago met both my lists :) And 2 years later I still love it and walk thru saying I can’t believe this is our house….I don’t see us moving anytime in our future which is rare because I use to literally start looking for the next house shortly after we moved in to our current house– I love change and liked to move every 3-4 years. But not anymore…I have found my forever home :) And now I have enough space to just change the inside every few years instead of moving!!
Lina says
I’m still so psyched about this new house! One question though: do your neighbors know who you are (do they know about the blog, book, etc.)? I’m curious to know how much attention your moving into the neighborhood has received.
YoungHouseLove says
Hardly any of our neighbors have any idea who we are, but we have met three families who do. They have kids Clara’s age so it’s awesome for her to be meeting some little partners in crime…
xo
s
Ashley@AttemptsAtDomestication says
Oh house hunting! Though it may not have been intentional, you totally just reminded me that unless you custom build (and even then) there is no such thing as an absolutely perfect in ever way house. I often find myself playing the “I wish” game with our house and wondering why we bought it, this reminds me that out of everything we saw, it was the one and now I’m reminding myself of all the things I love about it. :)
Sherry F says
Ashley,
I do the same thing and I have to remind myself all the time of all the effort my husband and I put into finding a house that suited us in the small area we were looking in (we confined our search to three school districts) that we could afford. I think we have found our forever house and I hope you have too.
Kelly {the Centsible Life} says
I love making lists like this! House hunting is perhaps one of my favorite things, even if the process can be laborious and occasionally disappointing.
Our current house fit all our major checkboxes, but requires a lot more maintenance than we initially thought it would. In the end though it’s still way less than we would have spent if we bought something that was more updated, and you can’t get the sidewalks and mature trees (or location) that we have in a newer house.
christina @ homemade ocean says
It is always facinating to see what people look for in a home. All I know about our next house is that it will have LAND :)
caroline says
I love your list and the fact that you’ve checked nearly every single item!!
We just spent 2 months looking for a rental in the Yorkshire area and even though we only had 2 non-negociable criteria (NO carpets and a real shower as opposed to a bath without a shower attachment) after nearly giving up we finally found an old stone terrace that’s perfect for us: http://bunniesandstripes.blogspot.fr/2013/06/country-house.html
It’s a little on the small side but I know we can make it work, specially since we ended up being able to choose between this one and a slightly larger house outside of town that seemed like it was meant for an older couple. This one just felt right.
Goodbye Paris, hello lovely Yorkshire countryside! I can’t wait to finally be able to WALK to places instead of always taking the train or car because there’s nothing to do in my dreary suburb!
Melissa @ HOUSEography says
This is a great tip. We did the same thing when we did our major renovation about 5 years ago. We made a list of “must have”, “nice to have”, and “don’t want” items. We ended up with pretty much exactly what we envisioned. We ended up deciding against a few things to get other things we wanted more. We gave this tip to some neighbors recently and they said it really helped them focus.
Larissa says
What a great idea to add a “don’t want” list. Never would have thought of that, but it is equally as important. Thanks!
Kate Mc says
My list has a few of the same, my current sink faces a wall, with a ceiling light attached at eye level so I want a sink window to outside as well. I would also like a kitchen that opened to family room so as to watch kids while getting stuff accomplished. A pantry is necessary, and what I wouldn’t do for more storage than we currently have. Trying to explain why the snow shovel is in the linen closet is sometimes difficult.
Emily says
We didn’t necessarily write down our musts and wants, but we knew what they were going in.
Our musts were:
At least a two-car garage
At least three bedrooms
At least two full bathrooms
A dining room (no eat-in kitchens here!)
Quiet neighborhood
Cheap & Ugly-I like to redecorate, and it doesn’t make sense to redo something new just because it’s not my taste
Wants:
An attached garage would be nice, but a detached wouldn’t have been a deal breaker (got it!)
A separate powder room for guests (got it!)
Not a corner lot (we lost on that one!)
Madeline @ Create.Bake.Celebrate says
We just recently moved into a house- our housewarming is this weekend- eek!
Here is what we looked for in a house: http://createbakecelebrate.blogspot.com/2013/03/celebrate-hunting-house.html
And how we found it:http://createbakecelebrate.blogspot.com/2013/03/celebrate-meant-to-be-home.html
Sounds like ya’ll are right on track! Can’t wait to see the journey!
YoungHouseLove says
I’m having so much fun hearing about your lists guys! Thanks for sharing. This is like House Hunters. Without the “I’d like this house except I hate the paint color so I can’t buy it” moments.
xo
s
Hanna says
Doh! The new house pictures were broken for me! :)
Koliti says
Interesting that having your front door open into a staircase didn’t instinctively appeal to you – because in Feng Shui that is deemed a bad scenario – all of your good energy would rush down the stairs and out the front door. The idea is to invite the good energy into your home and have it linger and meander throughout your home.
Since it’s stinking hot in Tucson, my “nice to have” list includes a cabana boy, swimming pool, and umbrella drink :)
YoungHouseLove says
Haha! So interesting about the Fend Shui thing. Also, I want an umbrella drink. Is 10:27 too early for one?
xo
s
Samantha says
I was totally unaware of this until I went to sell my last house. One of the doors was in front of a staircase, and when a potential buyer brought his parents through they told him he couldn’t live there because of that. Apparently they were very into Feng Shui and I got a whole education out of the conversation :)
Hayley says
You know, I watched a “Love It or List It” episode the other day (it was a rerun, the 2nd time I had seen it) and the couple had an 18 point list or something and it all revolved around Feng Shui. They mentioned the stair thing multiple times. Your comment reminded me of that.
Gabby Bladdick says
Hi Sherry & John! Good for you guys finding almost everything on both sets of your list! Quick question for you: you mentioned wanting sidelights at the front door. Can I ask why? We inherited a very large sidelight and I feel like we have no privacy! Every time we walk by it I feel like people are looking in (maybe I just watch too many movies). Would love your feedback!
YoungHouseLove says
I think we are just suckers for architecture, so whenever we drive through some of the cooler historic areas of Richmond many of those homes have sidelights and even cool transom windows over the front door and that always charmed the heck out of us. Maybe you could frost yours if you feel too exposed?
xo
s
Gabby Bladdick says
Frosting is a great idea! I’ll have to look up one of your tutorials. :) Thanks and congrats again!
YoungHouseLove says
Good luck Gabby!
xo
s
Hayley says
Gabby, We had one at our old house and I conjured up a little tension rod curtain to hang in it. I wasn’t afraid people were watching me, but I didn’t like the idea that if I was trying to ignore a door knocker, they could look in an see if we were there. Our front door looked straight into our living room, so they could tell if we were hiding or not. :)
Sarah says
We have one on the side of our front door and felt like it was too open as well – you could see us sitting on the couch watching TV if you looked in. Also, it faces west, so in the afternoon, blinding sunlight would just blast in through that window. We found some great window film at Home Depot (patterned with earthy-colored stones) and used that to cover it. It still lets in a ton of light and gives us privacy!
Sarah says
My husband and I are just starting down the path of looking for our second home. We love our first, but you need mountain climbing gear to mow the yard… These last few posts about your house finding journey have been so informative! I love looking at all of your pictures of the new house since I can see soooo much potential! Though I do have a few questions… When you were looking around for a new house did you just casually look on your own or did you have a realtor involved? We aren’t really sure how to “casually” look at homes as weird as it sounds. What steps did you take to get ready for the hunt? Thanks so much and happy DIYing! :)
YoungHouseLove says
For our first and second house we were much more involved with a realtor and that person showed us a bunch of homes over a series of weeks and it was a much less casual hunt. Since we weren’t exactly planning to buy a house right when we did this time (we thought we’d buy something 6 months to a year after we did, but when The One popped up we just couldn’t walk away) this time we were much more casual, so we just were going to open houses and if we saw a “For Sale” sign in a neighborhood we liked we’d just follow the sign. Of course when we drove up and saw our house and were interested, we got a buyer’s agent involved asap. Didn’t want to let it go!
xo
s
Jalene says
Zillow is great for casually looking
Jess @ Little House. Big Heart. says
It’s awesome that even though you guys are old hats at this, you still make sure to do it right!
We had three lists: must have, nice to have, and can’t have. Funny story: top of our must have list was a finishable basement. Turns out homes in Texas don’t have basements. Period. Womp womp.
YoungHouseLove says
Aw man!
xo
s
Krissy says
I had a 1 page list that I gave to my realtor at our first meeting.
It had about 10 *musts*, 9-10 nice-to-haves, and 8 omg-gravy-on-top!!!
Yeah, a long list.. Not quite as specific as yours. This was my first home purchase so I didn’t think about things like easy access to back deck from kitchen…
Of my list of approx 30 items total, we got ALL except 2 of the gravy items. I was seriously flabbergasted.
Granted, I had to live through a grueling short sale purchase to get it!
But we have lived here for 18 months and I love my house more everyday!!!
YoungHouseLove says
That’s awesome Krissy! I love hearing about this from you guys. Favorite new topic.
xo
s
Crystal @ 29 Rue House says
Such a sensible list of needs/wants! You seem to have hit the jackpot with this house.
Ashleigh says
I so totally believe in the “pick-the-worst-house-in-the-best-neighborhood” thing. You can fix your house, but you sure can’t fix your neighbor’s house. I do get a little house envy here and there, but I always know that we can do things to our house to bring it up to the standards of those around us. And, we paid around $40k-$50k less than our neighbors, so we’ll have a much better chance of making a couple of dollars on resale.
YoungHouseLove says
So smart!
xo
s
Megan Cuy Castellanos says
My family and I are in the process of house hunting right now. We have an unofficial list of each category (need/want) in our heads, but never actually wrote them down. It probably would have been a smart thing to do, but we’re at the end of the process now (probably making an offer this week) so I guess there’s no reason to write it out now! Oh well, next move for sure! Just curious, how many houses did you look at/consider before finding “the one”? I feel like we’ve looked at a hundred already! Maybe we’re just being picky but I haven’t walked into any homes and felt like I could live there.
YoungHouseLove says
Always hold out! We like to look at a ton, just so we don’t feel like we’re settling and we know what’s out there. Our first house snuck up on us (we drove by a ton of for-sale houses but only walked through maybe a dozen?) and our second house was a huge hunt (months of checking things out, drive-bys, walk throughs, expanding to new neighborhoods, etc). This one snuck up on us since we were only casually looking but we loved it so much we didn’t want to let it go. My theory is you’ll know when you step inside, so trust your instincts.
xo
s
Kelly says
Our “must haves” were affordable (duh), outside city limits (check), at least 1 acre of land (we got 5.75), at least 2 bedrooms (we got 2 with space to add a 3rd), and opportunity for an open layout (we blew out all the downstairs walls).
Our “nice to haves” were a deck or patio (we got a huge deck the width of the house), garage (we got a 1-car attached plus huge 2-level barn), 1.5-2 baths (we got 1, but potentially could add 1 upstairs with the 3rd bedroom), and a safe location for our dogs (we live on a busy road, but the house is set back far enough from the road for peace of mind).
Can’t wait to see what you do with the new house, it motivates me to get work done on ours!
julie says
I live in the ridiculously expensive San Francisco Bay Area, so all that matters here is price. I’ve bought two houses (decades ago) and haven’t made a wish-list yet. I dream of living somewhere where I could actually look at several houses and choosing which one I’d rather live in instead of having to scoop up the only thing on the market in my budget!! Limitations aside, I just thank my lucky stars I have a house. Enjoy making your new house your home!!
YoungHouseLove says
Oh but SF is so amazing Julie! I’m jealous of your weather!
xo
s
Caroline says
Like you guys, any house that I consider buying must be older. I love straight historic homes with their original features still intact (i.e. old windows (gasp!), no vinyl siding, black and white tile in the bathrooms, original sinks, etc.) I’m generally flexible after that. Though as me and the hubby are starting to plan for the future, I’ve decided that I do want something that will house a kid or two and perhaps a detached two story garage that could be converted into an apartment for extra income.
Sarah says
Caroline, this was at the top of our want list when we were looking for a place- old home that hadn’t been ruined over the years. We were lucky to find an 1883 Victorian in a fantastic neighborhood that had only seen a few updates that luckily were consistent with the home’s character. No open layout, no “master suite”, no vinyl ANYWHERE. We absolutely love it and all its quirks, especially since it was the only one we looked at that had the laundry chute that was on my “A girl can dream, can’t she?” list.
As we’ve been fond of saying to people since we got it, we’re excited to take care of it for the next 40 years. I can’t wait to do some digging at our local historical society to investigate the previous owners- I have census records from 1880-1940!
kim says
I have a question…did you just have that list in case you stumbled over a house? I thought you weren’t ‘really’ looking? I’m never ‘really’ looking either but I find myself perusing the listings every now and again.
I ask because you first described this experience as all just very happenstance, but now it seems as if you were genuinely house-hunting last year with a list of must-haves and all.
I guess this just comes from feeling a little duped about what I was reading about for the last 6 months…a house for you to live in or a house to sell…
YoungHouseLove says
It’s the same list as the one we used in 2010 (same piece of paper). We just kept it and added to it in all different colored pens over time whenever we thought of something we wanted in our “someday house” – even if we weren’t actively house hunting. I thought I had that in the intro about how the wants got longer over time. Maybe that wasn’t clear? I’ll update it for ya!
As for feeling duped, that was never our intention, and it was really a hard thing for over-sharers like us to keep from you guys. But within hours of sharing that we had a new house people had looked up the address (since it’s public record). We’ve never felt more sure about our decision not to post about the new house until we had the alarm system in and were ready to move in (I can only imagine how scary it would be to own a vacant house for 6 months while people looked up the address). Hope that makes sense!
xo
s
Lisa in Seattle says
I don’t get why people are constantly insinuating that you’ve been tricking or duping us. It’s like they’re poring over every word and examining every move you make looking for some deep conspiracy. I am exhausted just reading about it, so heaven knows how exhausted you must be constantly having to defend your life. And obviously some people are never going to be satisfied.
Darcie says
We moved into our home shortly after we got married. Almost 7 years ago! Lately we started looking for another home but couldn’t find anything that compared to our current home. We live in the country with an acre of land, 2500sq ft home, barn, lovely yard…but the house doesn’t have a garage. So, we decided to build a two car attached garage. We start building in a couple of weeks! More storage! (Plus, our house was a foreclosure. Our mortgage would allow me to stay home when we have kids) We found our “perfect” home the first time! :)
Amanda says
Man, I love a good house hunt!
Our needs were: in the city, good schools (yes, we pulled this off!), pre-1945, three bedrooms, 1.5 bathrooms, within our budget (under $300K)
Our wants: original hardwood floors, a front porch, a back yard
I knew the moment we walked into our current Fan home that it was the one. We got all our needs and wants and five years later still love it.
Nancy W says
I’ve never bought myself. My fiance owned when we met so I just moved in eventually. My list is based on what I love and what bugs me about this house. Some things we plan to change someday, others will have to wait for our next house in a few years.
central air, no baseboard heaters, hardwood floors throughout, open kitchen with a space for people to hang out with the chef, larger main living room, larger bedrooms, 2 full baths, 4 bedrooms (or 3 plus office), a basement/garage/shed workspace, at least 1,800 sq. ft., and a nice big fenced in yard with mature trees
Ali B. says
I love the idea of a someday house list. We definitely have ideas about what we’d like in a future home, but we’ve never written it down. Thanks for the great idea!
Lura says
List for our next house:
More land.
Larger laundry room. Ours is tiny http://www.domesticability.com/2012/07/laundry-room-redo.html
One less bathroom. We currently have 3.5 WAY TOO MANY. One is always neglected. Oh well. You live you learn. :)
Lights on the side of each door. I love this look!
Lura
x
Rose says
Love your new house and the slatted screen door!! I really want one to protect our mahogany door from the blazing sun. Are you going to keep yours? I miss all of those details from when we lived in VA. I know what you mean about the side lights.
Tall ceilings and an open floor plan aren’t all they are made out to be. Add in hard floorings and stone countertops and the noise factor and the wafting kitchen smell factor isn’t so charming anymore. I can just imagine when we get older. What? What did you say? :)
So top of my list next. A slightly open floor plan with good outside bbq access. No jetted tub to clean! That one seems harder to come by. A garage big enough to move around in after you pull the car in.
YoungHouseLove says
The slatted door is already off! We’re just not screen door people on a front door, I think! We love a glossy freshly painted six panel door though! So that’s on the list!
xo
s
Alex says
This is kind of random, but I remembered when you guys were talking about your last house that you all got a tax credit/deduction for one day promising to turn your carport into a garage? Could you elaborate how that process worked, and how that factored into your decision to not convert it? Or feel free to tell me I was dreaming the whole thing up (which is entirely possible).
YoungHouseLove says
Oh yes, the buyers were offering a credit at closing to go towards closing costs and new appliances/updates or enclosing the carport into a garage (they got an estimate for how much that would be and that’s how they decided on the amount of the credit). We were happy to take them up on the credit and intended to use it for enclosing that carport but when we opted not to we weren’t breaching anything, they just were offering money towards some of the things they thought might help sell the house, so they didn’t care where it went (I guess it went towards new appliances and the kitchen update, haha!).
xo
s
Katja @ Shift Ctrl Art says
Our list was:
Location, location, location
We did look for a “good” school district, but the trouble is that a “good” school district in our neighborhood at least, just means that the test scores are high which means the teachers “teach to the test”, which is not my personal preference for inspiring critical thinking and being a self starter. But for resale purposes we still chose what the general public in these parts consider a “good” school. And our school is by no means bad. It’s just not really great either.
Second on our list was high ceilings in the living and dining room without being double height. And we wanted the living room to overlook the back yard, not the street. That is extremely uncommon here in tract-house-land where we live. They practically all have living rooms facing the street.
Last big WANT was a nice sized back yard. Again – where I live the back yards are the size of postage stamps. You can sometimes reach the back yard fence from your sliding door…
We got all three of our must haves through sheer luck and opportunity when we bought our house!
I agree with you about the stairs. I was not happy with the staircase in our house. We ended up tearing it down and rebuilding a new one for a better layout. That was my condition to buying our house.
YoungHouseLove says
Woah, that sounds awesome!
xo
s
Rachel says
It is crazy how much your new house is almost identical to the house I lived in for several years as a child. So fun to see it and I look forward to all the changes to come.
Anne says
Walkability is starting to be a huge factor. Moving from metrowest Boston to the burbs of Knoxville, we lost being able to walk the dog down by the river, and even walk to our favorite restaurant. Now to walk the dog more than the 3/4 of a mile around our neighborhood, we have to drive 5 minutes to the local greenway. At least she has the #1 priority we were looking for in our house hunt: A FENCED IN YARD! Our puppy spends HOURS out there.
nancy50 says
What we were looking for 16 years ago – good school district, large family room, within biking distance to husband’s job and large enough that if my newly widowed dad wanted to move in, there would be room for everyone to have their space (in the end he chose to remain in his own home) …now that we’re mid 50’s and one son is out of college and the other one will be a hs junior in the fall, the top of my list would be a bedroom on the first floor, and to not get a house with rooms that we don’t need/use like a formal living room – it’s a shrine! Also i would love to be within walking distance to a grocery store.
RPirotta says
I think lists are so important!!!! It’s amazing how many people jump into the excitement of purchasing a home without a list and then have regrets afterwards. The ONLY thing we didn’t get on our list was “entry from garage to house.” Instead we have to walk out of the garage back door, under a patio, onto the steps into our side patio door. NOT BAD. I am thankful my husband initiated the list because it’s easy to fall for a house that truly isn’t fitting for you. Thanks for the encouragement to others!
Tamisha says
When we were looking to buy the Domus, we didn’t set down and make a list, but we had one in our heads. We wanted it to be in the city, I am not a fan of suburbs. We didn’t have kids and so schools weren’t an issue. We also wanted something with age. My rule was nothing past 1960, preferrably much earlier (the Domus is 90 yrs old), a fixer upper was on our list, but nothing too drastic. At least two bathrooms, three bedrooms, and in the right neighborhood. We wanted as many intact features as possible.
We got a lot of the list. The house is in an impecable neighborhood near to the life of the city. No upgrades had been done since the early 1960s. It was a massive fixer upper (far more than we had originally wanted) and it had the right number of bathrooms. The downside was that it was a hefty chunk more than we originally wanted to spend, but the location was so fantastic that we couldn’t pass it up. And, I couldn’t be happier that I did. Four years of blood, sweat, tears, tantrums, dust, and near disaster has wrought us a house to be proud of!
I look forward to the transformations you’re going to make in your new home as well!
Laura Y says
My husband and I have been working on our list for what feels like forever! I have been in grad school for the past 6 years so we haven’t bought since my degree requires some moving around (internship, fellowship etc). Now that I have a “real job” we are starting to get excited about the idea of settling down. Now we just need to decide if we want to stay by family or move to our dream location of Oregon!
Our must haves are similar to yours: good schools for the kiddo, nice/big lot with good outdoor space, good square footage but not too big, and either a garage or basement. If we decide to buy here (Oklahoma) then we would have to have A/C and space for a storm shelter but in Oregon those wouldn’t be deal breakers.
Love your website!!! Reading it makes me hungry for my own home!!(only so much you can do with a rental) :)
Teresa @ wherelovemeetslife says
We are currently drafting lists like these! We have outgrown our 3 bedroom house and it’s time to list and start looking. Thanks to the market finally looking a little better, people are selling. It’s so much fun to see what possibilities different homes have. :)
Beth R says
Since our area has primarily 2-story houses for the size, price, range, and neighborhoods we were interested in, we really wanted to ensure at least a half bath was on the main level. We thankfully found that! Many houses here originally had one bath, which was upstairs with the bedrooms, and if a second bath was added it was in the basement.
We also wanted a fenced backyard so we could feel safe letting kids play out there alone, hardwood floors, and a kitchen that didn’t need renovations (we had been down that path twice before and just didn’t think it was feasible to DIY another kitchen with a toddler and infant and 2 outside the home jobs, so any kitchen renovations would have to wait at least 5 years). We also wanted a garage or room to be able to build one down the line and a covered porch (I hate standing in the rain to unlock the door). We mostly got all of that; just had to add a bit of fencing to finish off the yard.
We didn’t get two things on our “would be nice” list: someplace to eat in/an arm’s length from the kitchen (that main-level bathroom is between the kitchen and dining room, and there’s no island, peninsula, or room for a table in the kitchen) and decent closet space :(
Anna-Lisa says
Must-haves for our first house:
At least three bedrooms.
At least 1.5 bathrooms. (Some of the cute little old houses we looked at only had one!)
Garage.
Kitchen more than one person can cook in at a time.
An extra room (formal living or dining room or basement, it didn’t matter, just one extra to use as an office/playroom/schoolroom).
Safe neighborhood.
Nice to have:
Lot with mature trees.
Dining room separate from kitchen.
2 full bathrooms.
Walkable neighborhood.
We ended up getting everything except the separate dining room and the walkable neighborhood (we drive five minutes away to a park with walking trails), so not bad for a starter home!
karen says
cool post! your house has sooo much potential.
well, i’m no longer house hunting…but some of my favourite features that my new ‘old’ house (that i pretty much single handily designed…i’m very proud of that) will have:
-large mud/utility room with a small shower in washroom.
-laundry room on second floor.
-large spacious foyer/front hall…with a beautiful round hall table and lantern directly above.
-one garage attached to house and a double garage detached.
-8 ft window in front of kitchen sink.
-entrance to basement from garage.
-switchback staircase.
-private treed lot.
Laura says
I like your methodology… we followed a similar mindset when looking for our house. This is our first house, so we didn’t have the previous home-owning experience as you did, so our list of “musts” and “wants” wasn’t rock solid. But I still think we got most of what we were looking for. And, like you, the things that need fixing are things we plan to do on our own down the road, and we are looking forward to having those experiences.
Like you, we did get things that we can’t DIY: location, school district, nice neighbors, quiet street, etc. We have a toddler too so I know the importance of those! Thanks so much for sharing.
Laura at Rather Square
Kristin says
It’s so great when you can meet all of your house demands on your list. I’m not sure I had much of a list when I bought 5 years ago since it was my first house after renting apartments. I knew that I at least wanted 3 BR and 2 BA so minimally 1 BR could be used as an office. Also, extra storage space was a must. While I wanted to be on a side street even though I don’t have kids, this was somewhat of a trade off – I live on a busier road that backs up to a wooded escarpment (1/2 acre). Hindsight being 20/20 I probbaly would’ve been a little more vigilant about buying a house at the base of a hill but I wound up in a well-established neighborhood in a great school district with loads of historic charm (the main road in the village is lined w/Victorian homes). Oh, and running, biking, & hiking trails to your heart’s content!
Laurie says
I live in AZ….the land of stucco and red tile roof houses. When we bought our house 14 years ago the biggest thing on my list was NO stucco or red tile. I wanted a brick house, which meant it was going to be an old house. We have a 50 year old brick ranch and it was the worst house in the best neighborhood when we bought it. Other than that we wanted: at least 2 bathrooms (we got 2.5) and at least 4 bedrooms. After that, we didn’t care because we knew we could “love” all the grossness out of it. We lived in it for 7 years until we saved the money and made our list of renovation plans and then we did a total gut reno but still managed to retain the parts of the house that were charming and wonderful. I must confess though now that the house is done I am itching for a project so we are toying with selling.
Laura says
After 14 years in a 1198sq. foot three bedroom,two bath condo my list has changed a bit. Although surprisingly I compromised very little with the condo. My current list master suite with a bahtroom that’s not apartment sized & preferably has a true shower not shower/tub combo, a pantry preferably walk in, a true entry/foyer or at least feels like it has one due to columns etc.,lots of windows or large windows I like all the light you get from lots of windows or large ones, the master suite on the opposite side of the house from the other bedrooms, an actual laundry room even a laundry pass through is fine but no laundry closet, one story, preferably no stairs (bad knees & stairs don’t play well together &within walking distance of at least a grocery store & public transit as I don’t drive. I’m not positive but I think that’s it
LauraC says
The only actual thing we didn’t get on our would-really-like-to-have list was a porch. But I could list ten things that we do have, so it’s ok. Not a make or break thing. I hear you about the door right in front of the stairs, you’re lucky you have a foyer. Our house doesn’t and it’s annoying. However, it’s the only real negative we have; we really love our house.