Back in January when I was thinking about 2021 and the goals, plans, wishes and dreams I have for the year I wrote that I wanted to declutter my home by 10%. My motivation was that with my daughter's family moving out I came to realize that there was still too much stuff in my house.
That was January. In March, my son and his daughter moved in with us. Yeah. Once more I rushed around cramming my belongings into wherever I could fit them to make room for Zach and Skye. As usual, my goal was for them to feel at home in the space they're occupying.
That's the prologue to this post. Now on to the actual story. Dan and I have been discussing for years what the next phase of our lives should look like. We knew we wanted to downsize (our home is 2600+ sq ft and I'm tired of cleaning it), but with the housing market so hot we felt it was a poor choice to downsize in sq footage only to upsize in the mortgage payment. Then we visited a Fulton Homes community in our area. The included options were so amazing we started to seriously consider buying a new build. We had our Realtor come out to look at our house and after learning we could pretty much sell it "as is" and make a lot of money for a down payment, decided to move forward. (Side note: my husband Dan is a real estate appraiser. He'd been telling me the same thing our Realtor Nick told me. But you know how it is, I had to hear is from another source to believe it! haha)
Nick warned us that the community we were looking at had put a hold on releasing lots but I wanted to go and talk to them anyway. We went on a Sunday afternoon in late March. When we walked into the Sales Office the Sales Associate asked what floor plan we were interested in and then told us there are lots available. We were stunned. Apparently he had come in that morning to find that five lots had been released for sale. Long story short, we signed a contract for a new home on March 28.
It will take up to 14 months to build the home because of the supply shortages. Fine with me. I have a house to live in that is rising in value each day that I'm here. Although I have to admit, I am so excited to move into a smaller home that it's a little hard to grasp how long it will take.
You may have figured out by now why my original plan to declutter by 10% has risen to 30%. Dan told me that the new house is 33% smaller than our current home.
Oh yeah, and I have no idea what our new floor plan actually looks or feels like because there are no models of it within 40 miles of where we live. So I'm trying to downsize my belongings based on a floor plan map and a virtual tour of the home.
We picked out our structural options in early April and visited the Design Center last week to choose our flooring, paint, cabinets, etc. Our dirt lot is still a dirt lot. We've been told they might "start" it tomorrow (which means laying the boards to mark the foundation). Hey, a start is a start, right?!
I'm hopeful that the supply chain issues will start to improve, but I also know that realistically I may not be in my new home until Spring 2022. And that works for me.
