Frenzy

We, or I should say the DH, are in the midst of a home-buying frenzy.

When we first moved to Vegas, we found a nice rental house in a nice neighborhood for a good price. I was prepared to keep renting for a while, if not the whole time we are here (we definitely do *not* plan to stay in LV for the long haul).

Due to various issues with the company that is managing the property we are in, the DH decided he wanted to move to a new rental property. We also figured we could save some money and move into a less expensive place.

As we started looking into new rentals, we discovered the housing market around here is imploding. I mean, we knew that when we moved here, but we just started realizing what that really means. Houses that were sold a few years ago for 250K to 300K are being sold as foreclosures now for 160K to 170K. In other words, they are now in our price range.

Regrettably, the neighborhood we are in now is still out of our price range, but plenty of places are not. This has fired up the DH something awful, so we have spent the past few weeks looking at houses. In fact, pretty much all he does is sit at the computer, combing the MLS for houses in our price range (and there are plenty).

So yesterday we looked at 5 houses. Here is the list:

The first house was one our realtor picked out. It was big, over 1,600 square feet, in a gated community with a nice pool. It needed a little work, but was in pretty good shape. I liked that it was big, had a community pool and wouldn't need much work. The yard was small, though and there wasn't much parking.

When we started this venture, I wanted a pool. It gets mighty hot in the summertime here and a private pool is just the ticket. The community we're in now has a community pool. I only used it once or twice last year, but it was *very* enjoyable. There are houses with pools available in town, but in our price range they tend to be older homes that are closer in and in not as "nice" neighborhoods. Buying a foreclosure means I'm not as willing to take a chance on an older home. Vegas is known for having more than it's fair share of crime, and I'm not so willing to take a chance on that, either. Unfortunately, none of the houses we looked at yesterday has a pool.

The second house we looked at was really nice, big (around 1,580 sq. ft.), nice layout with a nice-sized yard and in a seemingly good neighborhood. The bedrooms were kinda small, though, but the kitchen was nice. I liked this one.

The third house I liked a lot. The house was a decent size, the yard was pool sized (cuz we may put in a pool in a couple of years; I won't give up the dream!), the master BR was big, the house was in decent shape and the layout was nice. This house probably has the best layout of all the houses we saw yesterday.

The fourth house had a huge, double-sized lot. You could put a pool in and still have room to have a back yard, no small feat in LV. The house, however, was trashed. We've seen a couple of examples of vengeful foreclosees taking their anger out on the house before leaving (for some reason people seem to like to take the shelving out of the closets), but this was the worst. They took a hammer to practically every wall in the house, leaving big holes in the drywall. They poured something sticky (the DH thought it was some sort of epoxy) on the counters in the kitchen and bathroom. The flooring was removed down to the cement in the living room and kitchen; the carpet in the rest of the house was trashed. ALL of the appliances were missing. In short, it was a mess. The DH was entertaining romantic notions of fixing it up (he was enamored of the gigantic yard), but I had to veto it. I wish I'd taken some pictures, though.

The last house we looked at, and the one we'll probably bid on, had a nice large lot (definitely pool sized), the master BR was HUGE, it has a covered patio, nice kitchen, with all the appliances. My only complaint is that it's an open kitchen/great room kind of thing and I've never really liked that. I know open floor plans are the style these days, but they don't really do anything for me. The back yard is partially landscaped and the neighborhood is nice. No community pool, but maybe we'll sneak back up to our old digs to use the pool here. :)

So that's my list for today. This whole house-buying deal should give me blog fodder for a whole month of posts and more.