Some Background

GF finally got to come over and see her new house. She is very happy with it and even happier it no longer smells. She is the reason I bought this place in Mesa at all. I was looking at the Marlen Groves Haver house that djinertia2 posts about here. They beat me too it…I couldn’t get my down payment together in time…but it worked out for the best because in the process of seriously considering getting that house, I realized it was going to put what was likely to be an insurmountable strain on my relationship.

The problem we have is that my rental in Phoenix is only 4.5 miles from my office and her house in Gilbert, which she owns, is only about a half mile from her office. So any move closer to her puts me further from my office and any move closer to me puts her further from hers. We are both very happy with our jobs so there is no plan to try to reconcile the distance. So after the Haver deal was off the table, I decided to look somewhere between us. I would have preferred Tempe but we have lots of dogs and cars which means we need some space. I started off looking for a place with a 3 car garage but all I could find in my price range is 80’s crap that is all garage door up front and typical stucco and clay tile. (Note, I like stucco so don’t be insulted). I couldn’t deal with that and it usually came with a small yard anyway so I started just looking for a place with a big yard with hopes I could build a garage.

That lead to Mesa and to the first place I put an offer in on. It was in the Evergreen Historic district. That was a 1947 bungalow, about 1600 sf 3 bedroom one bath on a 17,000sf lot! It would have been perfect for the dogs. The house was in great shape and didn’t “need” anything to begin with so I would have been free to concentrate on a garage. It wasn’t very modern though and it was going to take a lot of work to get it to the appearance that I would be happy with. Doesn’t matter. It didn’t appraise…it actually appraised for $37,000 less than I offered for it. Basically, Mesa is full of $100k 1600 sf homes so finding comps for $200k was impossible. The seller wasn’t in any kind of bind so there was no reason for them to let it go for such a low price so we just ended that deal. It’s still on the market but someone is going to have to come up with some cash if they want to buy it.

So, I was back on the internets looking for the next one and couldn’t find anything else with a lot that size that was at all desireable. I changed my parameters and decided to look for something larger hoping to find at least a 2 car garage and some space for all the rest of our junk. That didn’t happen either. But somehow I stumbled on the Hillcrest house which didn’t meet hardly any of my criteria other than it is a 50's ranch. But it is large enough for all our stuff and has a decent size lot. Due to the layout, there is room for a large garage and a pool and can still maintain the long length of the lot for the dogs to stretch their legs. Plus, we just fell in love with it when we looked at it. Both the house and the neighborhood sold us as soon as we drove by.

The vital stats on the house are:
Built: 1957
Addition: Unknown.
Conditioned space: 2350 sf.
Arizona room: 300 sf
3 bedroom
2-1/2 baths
Living room
Kitchen
Breakfast area
Family Room
Porch (closed in now)
Laundry Room
Carport (under family room)
Lot size: 12,200 sf.
Xerascape front, Grass in back
Block and frame with some vertical vinyl siding (lovely)
Wood Shake roof (in pretty bad shape)

Getting it was not a smooth path but well worth it…so far. I had a budget of around $200k. When I found this house it was listed for $260k. I thought, who knows, maybe I can offer 225 or 230. I drove the GF by it and she freaked out so I called Janice, my real estate agent and told her we were interested. She called me back and said it was about to be foreclosed on and they were dropping the price to $209k the next day! We were in. I don’t know why they waited so long to drop the price but it worked in our favor. We did a lot of talking with the seller’s agent and due to my first experience, I was afraid the house wouldn’t appraise for that money in Mesa and neither did my agent. I felt like the house was worth the $209 or around there but had to factor in what it would appraise for. I considered low-balling it at $185k but we ran that by the seller’s agent and she basically said if it went that low, it would have to go to a short sale because the seller owed too much on it and by the time all fees and everything else was taken care of, that wouldn’t cover it. Plus, with a short sale, the bank has the option to consider other offers and it strings out the timeline indefinitely… So, I offered $200k even and they took it. Amazingly it appraised! It needed some repairs to meet FHA standards and the seller took care of most of it and I kicked in a little extra. In the end, the seller ended up just about flat even but she didn’t get foreclosed on so it worked out great. Part of me thinks I could have gotten it for less but it would have taken a lot longer and now I don’t have to feel bad about the seller even though her issues weren’t my fault.

So, that is how we ended up in Mesa.