Home Sweet Home

We bought a house!

That's right, it's a cute 2 bedroom 1 bathroom place with an attached garage a little over a mile away (~20 blocks) from downtown Albany. It's definitely a fixer-upper with some funkiness, but that's the kind of place we wanted. We're doing some minor repairs this week, packing next week and moving on May 5th. Then we'll turn our attention to fixing up our duplex unit to rent. It goes without saying (but I'll say it anyways) that we'll be busy the next 6 weeks.

Here's a panorama of the kitchen:

We're super excited about having more counter-top space and a dishwasher. Ah, the simple pleasures in life. :) By the way, this place was actually Jessi's fault. We were at a restaurant waiting for our food and decided to flip through my latest listing alerts for entertainment. This listing came up because of a recent  price drop. I read the price and description and then moved on.

Jessi practically yelled at me to stop. I looked at her quizzically. In my opinion it was a dump that needed a lot of repair and she said a few months back that she didn't want to move into another fixer-upper. Well... apparently it can be a fixer-upper if it looks cute.

Here's a panorama of the living room:

BTW, that plastic on the floor is straight, that'll give you an idea of the kind of curve the panorama has.

Fast forward a short month later and we're now the owners. It definitely needs some TLC, but most of it can wait a few years. That'll give us time to finish paying off our student loans and plan out the bigger projects.

Here's the view out our front window:

The price we paid was excellent and it means our monthly expenses will actually be less than if we rented in Corvallis. That's a big win. Plus, through some financial wizardry the cash required to close was pretty close to what we expected to spend to start renting. I have another post already in the works talking more about the financial logic.

The bathroom:

I'm a little concerned about the counter space... Oh wait... There is none. I guess there's nothing to be concerned about. One of the perks of downsizing in home size is that everything is smaller.

OK? Ready for the funkiness? Feast your eyes on this stair case:

First, yes there is a door that opens to the side of the stairs. I guess we'll use the space below the ladder err... stairs for storage.

Second, I'm pretty sure those stairs are not up to code. We would like to do something with the second floor in the future and the biggest hurdle is going to be figuring out what to do with the stairs. We have some ideas, but we'll take a few years to feel it out.

Speaking of upstairs, we're not sure what to call this. I like "unfinished bonus room":

That's right. It comes with its very own model train set. The real train is a block away.

Oh! before I forget! If you know anyone into model trains who might have a use for old tracks, send them my way. I just recently came into a treasure trove of model train tracks.

Unfortunately, I'm not a trained conductor (get it?!) so I couldn't figure out how to get it to turn on.

We'll leave it alone for now, but some day in the future, once our student loans are paid off (really!) we'll rip all this out to make space for another bedroom and bathroom.

I did think this picture was cool. It probably won't survive the wrath of Jess though...

Super fun! We've been talking about moving out since October... Then I hurt my finger... But now it's happening for reals! If you want to help us move, you're more than welcome to come help. Also, if you have any experience building a new countertop or replacing a window (for our duplex), I'd love to pick your brain. I know I can do a functional job, but if I could make it look good, that would be a bonus.

Fun fact: Bonnie and Clyde died in 1934 during an FBI ambush of their hideout (the address number of our home is 1934).