Why this house?

How did we decide that this was the house for us? It's a long story, but it has a happy ending!

Our realtor, Brooke, was awesome. Before we even met she had us fill out a questionnaire that really got us to think about what was important to us. Did our house have to have a certain number of bedrooms? Would we consider a two-story? A split-level? How about a townhouse or condo?

Dana and I really thought hard about what we wanted - mostly based on what we hadn't liked about our places in Woodbury and Inver Grove Heights. Number one on our list was no shared walls - we wanted a standalone single-family house. 3 or more bedrooms, at least 1.5 baths. Dana and I had talked a lot about finding a house with an unfinished basement, so we could finish it ourselves and add some equity. We would be willing to make some cosmetic updates but we didn't want to re-do anything major, like a kitchen or a bathroom.

We both wanted to be closer to work. I work in Edina and the drive from Woodbury (20 miles each way) was killing me. We weren't sure where Dana would eventually find a job, so we figured that it wouldn't be too hard to find something more centrally-located than Woodbury.

Next post: We start looking at houses!

Welcome!

So six months after we closed, time to document some of what we've done!

Dana and I closed on our first house in Bloomington Minnesota March 30, 2011. It was in great shape - it had been remodeled just before we bought it - so the work we have done is mostly just to make it our own.

The basics:

Built in 1969

3 bedrooms

1.75 bathrooms

Kitchen, dining room, living room, bedrooms and bathrooms all on the main floor.

Basement is unfinished (now - it was finished in the past but flooded and now it's bare)

It's a rambler, or maybe a ranch? I'm not sure what I'd call it.

Stay tuned for more about how we're making this house our home.