on the hunt! // houses, houses, houses.

portland is chock full of adorable houses.  unfortunately there seems to be no shortage of buyers either.  so all the owners of the cute homes?  have allll the power.  lame, right?  we've toured a handful of houses & all of them have had parts i've completely fallen in love with.  hard woods, built ins, leaded glass, laundry chutes, subway tile, clawtooth bath tubs!  the list goes on.  still, none of them have been right for one reason or another {wrong neighborhood, wrong size, no yard, awkward layout, etc}.  so we wait.

we're being super picky because this is the house we plan on being in for 15-20+ years.  neighborhood & schools are a huge factor & since we are hoping for a pretty specific area, waiting for potential houses to come on the market is about as exciting as watching paint dry.  slooooooow.

in a perfect world, we find a house in the right neighborhood that hasn't been updated yet... and that may be the only way we get one in our budget.  but the dreamy part is that we would get to do all the fixin' up & remodeling to our tastes & that gets me pretty dang excited.  if this happens?  pinterest wouldn't know what hit it.

it's crazy to think the right house could come up tomorrow or it could be six months!  no matter how long it takes, we're holding out for the one that makes us fall in love the second we walk in the front door.  i'm thinking it's gonna require a lot of work... a lot of painting, probably some floor refinishing, fixture updating, kitchen remodeling, pipes & wire updating, maybe even basement finishing.  can't wait.

so for all of you out there who have bought a home recently {we bought our current house over seven years ago & made lots of rookie mistakes} tell me, how long did it take for you to find "the one"?  what was most important to you in a house & did you get it?  did you buy it & then see something come on the market later you liked more??  i worry about that.  but i also worry about unrealistic expectations... ya know, hoping something will come up that just doesn't exist.

so that's where we're at!  and i'll just keep on hashing it all out on the blog every now & then until the day that house comes along, if it exists... ha!  only time will tell.