I couldn’t help but use that title. I’m writing this about a week after the events (March 8th) and I probably won’t post it till everything is said and done. But we found our house! Our move to Kansas has always been temporary, Kyle‘s work moved us down here for a position that he held for two years. And in the last couple of months he earned a promotion and while that role move did not relocate us back to Minneapolis we knew that it was time to return home.
We drove up and February spent the weekend looking for homes. We were still torn between the area around our own neighborhood or moving out West closer to where his office would be. We kept trying to convince ourselves that the bright new shiny houses that suburb life offers was where we should be, but deep down we kept having that pool toward the city. We love Minneapolis and what we love about it only comes from being in the city.
The February trip didn’t turn up any keepers but it did help us narrow in on an area and we were focusing on Edina knowing that we wanted to be closer in. But once we got back home and started looking at houses from afar we were back to gawking at those monster houses out west. We really wanted to be close to water or on Water, but when you’re out west you lose the trails around the water the bikes the quick access to restaurants, etc. And the price tag of being any Dyna just wasn’t matching our budget. We took a family vacation spring break and decided just to take a mental break from househunting and before we left on that trip Kyle had mentioned having a gut feeling (aka God talking) that I should go up the weekend after we get back. We’ve been eyeing the airline tickets and had figured out what was a good price what was overpriced and when could be a good time to go. There was a afternoon flight leaving Wichita on Friday and the plan was to return on the Sunday flight that came back in the morning. When we got back from our trip we did to FaceTime tours of homes with our realtors. One we love the house but not the location the other one was about reversed. Those homes only lasted two days so not only were we not digging what we were seeing, we definitely didn’t want to have to put an offer in on some thing we didn’t set foot in. The market is crazy things are moving so fast that nothing would last long enough for us to get up there so I made a list of homes that we wanted to see and we had about seven or eight and decided yes let’s let’s go ahead and send me up see what happens. So Wednesday night I book tickets let our realtor know they start to develop a schedule of homes to see and the research began. Wednesday night we spent roughly an hour looking at this one house and researching it and reading it documents and we were really excited about it, only thing was it was the farthest west we had started to look. We woke up Thursday morning to discover that even though it was not yet on the market and it was coming on the market Friday that someone had put in an offer sight unseen and the sellers excepted it and all viewings of this home are canceled. Well crap, househunting game stepping up a bit.
We talked a little bit more Thursday when we could get in a conversation, never uninterrupted with children around. We decided to scratch the far west houses but that I would drive around and explore those areas we had never been in and we added three new homes to the list that were around Lake of the Isles.
Friday morning went about our routine got the kids off to school I even had a haircut appointment that was previously scheduled, then Kyle drove me to the airport about noon. I got to Minneapolis got my rental car and headed out west to check out the suburbs. Boy did it feel like I was about to end up in South Dakota, it felt so far out there I immediately had assurance that we were not meant to be out there. I met up with my realtor that evening we had two showings the first one was a little disappointing it was a lower price point but it was smaller and we thought maybe we could add on or renovate. But in the end it just wasn’t for us. The second one we saw that day was something that needed some remodeling new windows baseboard heat removed a lot of not fun improvements. But it gave me hope I did love it when we stepped foot, it was right on Minnehaha River so we had our water access. It was in Edina so we had really good schools and it wasn’t a complete know.
Saturday morning met with my realtor again and we had a full day of homes to see in various neighborhood so I still did get to explore some of those western suburbs just to make sure that wasn’t where we wanted to be and toward the end of the day we got in toward the city. Now prior to going up Kyle had a favorite and his top of the list was the one that we ended up getting. By the end of the day I was tired and we had seen so many houses everything was blending in together but we didn’t get to spend a good while at this house and explore and we even scheduled a second showing to come back after dinner although it was dark at that point.
Now the amazing thing about this is how God had his hand over the entire situation. I know, from experience, how faithful God is. And my prayer this entire time wasn’t for a specific house or specific features but just that God would open our eyes and give us clarity and give us direction in how to act. I knew moving to Wichita was God calling us here and he showed us his protection with the events that rolled out. Wes the house we were in during a global shut down having more space a yard to space out in, the school that we were in although not the top academically, at least the kids get a did get to go in person all year. God protected us by moving us out of Minneapolis just before the riots took place that spring of 2020. And most recently he protected our kids by not having to experience a teacher strike while Minneapolis Public Schools were closed down for three weeks. So as you can see we have been truly blessed and I am so grateful for God‘s love and kindness in our life.
So this house, now I told you that the market is crazy things are selling so fast. How was it that we got this one? Well for one this house has been on the market for two years, which makes you wonder what’s wrong with it? We asked that question to but went with it. Ironically we were in the same situation we were with our previous house that went on the market when our twins were born but it was on the market for two years as well until we were able to get our head above water and move. That house served its grand purpose of being able to birth our fourth child in our grand master bedroom. So of course with this house we questioned the story and why it had been on the market the so Long especially in this kind of market. Well it turns out that the owner, who’s an anesthesiologist for the U of M hospital, got deployed two years ago for medical army reserves of some sort. He had put the house on the market at that time, which given Covid understandably did not sell. After about six months, they had a tenant in it for the next year. Apparently this tenant was just a pain to work with, she wasn’t allowing showings and when she would agree to a showing she would chain the door so then they couldn’t get in. The agent said they finally were able to get her out about a month ago and since then showing to pick up. But I’m assuming everyone who sees his house on the market and sees how long it’s been on the market probably either get scared away or don’t wanna waste their time. We are asked if there been any offers on it, the agent said they had one just the day before but that it wasn’t going to go anywhere. We’re guessing it was probably a lowball. So this guided us in our next steps I’ll flew home Sunday morning Kyle and I talked about it we went over photos and information and we decided to to put in an offer Sunday evening. Our agent was very quick to get all the information needed she submitted that offer Sunday evening and we woke up Monday and we had a counter after. We we merely were fine with it however it did take me some time to get the paperwork signed because I was at Costco with little signal but once I got to the car I signed my house Kyle had already signed his half and our agent got it submitted. Gods kindness prevails again when we learned that literally 15 minutes after we submitted our signed counter offer they got a text message from another agent offering over asking price quick close and we’re requesting that the sellers resend their counter to us. But the timing was perfect and they were too late and we got the home. So we did have an inspection on it however given the circumstance we did not want to put ourselves in a position to allow the sellers to back out because there were other offers coming in so we will carry forth the things that the inspection revealed. We had our inspection done on Wednesday everything looked pretty great especially for the age of the home. Funny enough we just keep getting older and older with our homes. Our Drew Avenue house was 1927 and our Wichita house is 1923 and now our new home was built in 1915. The main thing that the inspection revealed is that there is an attic leak, the sellers had disclose some moisture possibly from condensation, but our inspector said there’s no way especially with an empty house that this would be from condensation. There was a winter storm rolling in the day of the inspection so he was unable to get on the roof but advised that we get that checked out as soon as we can once the roof is safe to access. A few other things were the stove range exhaust isn’t working, The water heaters are old, a few of the older doors don’t latch when they close, typical things. Of course the chimneys are not safe for use they are wood-burning but that’s as expected we dealt we have dealt with that in all these homes. Funny enough the breaker for the double ovens was turned off sorry inspector was unable to check if those worked because they don’t turn breakers back on for fear of not knowing why they were turned off in the first place. We had asked the sellers if they knew anything and they said maybe the tenant did it. Which brings me to the dead possum. As we were viewing the home for the first time we come out the back door and on the back step is this dead possum. I took it as a sign from God because we have been dealing with our own little possum in our yard and I knew immediately it was a possum do the shape of the facial bones and although my phone had died of because I had been using it to FaceTime with Kyle on houses all day I was FaceTime in on my agents phone at the time and was able to get this photo. My theory is maybe the tenant is the ex-wife of the seller who might be making a little difficult for them to sell their home and who knows maybe she’s the one that place this dead possum to scare potential buyers away. Maybe she’s also the one that fiddled with the oven just to make things difficult. Who knows if their tenant story is just covering up dirty laundry.
In the end it is so amazing how God works and just the location is perfect for our family. Isaac will be getting to go back to his original school that he started kindergarten at. We will be planning for private school once we get into middle school and high school. But that’s another bridge we will cross when we get there. The elementary is great and we know some of the staff so it’ll feel great to be back although everything will be different because the world has changed while we were gone. And while we really wanted to be in your water, God not only provided one lake but he put us smack dab in the middle of two. I know his plans are always way better than I could ever plan for and I was excited to see what he would reveal. It’s pretty exciting where we are we’ve been mapping out various locations it’s an eight minute bike ride to Sebastian Joe’s ice cream shop. We are .2 mile walk to the canoe launch on Lake of the Isles and a .3 mile walk to the swimming beach at Cedar Lake. We’re super excited to get settled and moved and unpacked and just being in a place that we know we don’t need to leave for a while.
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