If you've been following my journey, you know it's been a wild few weeks. We decided to say goodbye to the northeast, and begin a new adventure in sunny Florida! Like the nuts we are, we up and left our beautiful home in Connecticut at the beginning of January, and moved to the Tampa Bay area with no real place to land. We had a dream, and we went for it! We've been bouncing around different AirBnBs while "test driving" the various neighborhoods in the area to see where would be the best fit for us, while house hunting with a realtor. The market is still absolutely crazy here, stemming from the real estate feeding frenzy that peaked during the pandemic. The demand is high, and the supply is insanely low (and wildly overpriced). We've been stressed and discouraged, to say the least. Oh, and did I also mention that we've been doing all of this with a 5-month-old, 2 and 3-year-old in tow? With no help? Aah, don't forget that little detail. An adventure for sure... but we're also desperately ready to settle down now.
The house hunting came to a head a few days ago. After seeing nothing but investor-owned, "lipstick on a pig" properties, we finally found one we loved in a very desirable part of South Tampa. It had only been on the market for 13 days and we knew we had to move fast. The biggest sticking point, was that our Connecticut house is still on the market and hasn't sold yet. We weren't quite sure how we would make things happen, but figured we had to at least try our best, or we'd regret it.
As we left the property showing on Thursday, I told my realtor that I was compelled to write a personal letter to the owners. I knew we didn't have enough money on hand to get into an intense bidding war, like we saw happening with many neighboring properties. So I felt in my gut that it would be best to just be honest. Tell our story. Explain how beautiful we know their house is. Tell them a little about us, our family, and how we got here. And most of all, how we promise to love and care for their house the same way they had for many years to come, if given the opportunity to have our offer accepted.
After nearly moving mountains, we got our financing in order fast, and were able to submit an offer along with our letter. Two additional showings had already been booked for the following afternoon and there was a big open house scheduled for today (Sunday). As someone who is also in the process of selling my home, I knew the value of not having a bunch of strangers sauntering through the place you sleep in. I wanted to avoid it, too. So maybe if we came in strong, it could be a win-win for both parties involved, I thought. And honestly, anything we could do to avoid having other potential buyers throwing their hats into the ring was necessary - so we also decided to add a 24-hour expiration to our offer. That would mean that by yesterday (Saturday) at 9pm, we'd have an answer either way.
The next day felt like an eternity. By the afternoon, we'd finally gotten communication from their realtor, except it wasn't good. One of the couples that had pre-booked the Saturday showings were making an offer, and a strong one. Then to make matters worse, my realtor had a wedding for her nephew starting at 4pm that would effectively render her unavailable the rest of the night. As life would typically have it, on her way to the wedding, we got word that we'd been outbid. But, our letter really mattered to them, and because of it, they said they wanted to counter with us! (This is a true reminder to always follow your gut!)
During the next several hours, we came to terms and got our updated contract underway. My husband and I were low-key freaking out all evening because our realtor wouldn't be able to execute the final paperwork until the wedding was over - which would take us out of our expiration timeframe. We stayed up all night waiting for the email to come in. At 11:15pm, the final contract finally arrived. I woke my husband up to review (in our sleepy stupor LOL) and got our initials and signatures on the dotted lines. WE DID IT!
Today, the sellers cancelled their open house, and we moved forward with booking our home inspection. There's still a few important steps to go, but it seems we can finally take a sigh of relief that our offer has been accepted and the dust is finally settling.
In the next few weeks, we'll be ironing out all the last-minute details, and hopefully scheduling our move-in. We'll be able to book our moving pod from the storage facility, and stop living out of suitcases with 3 kids 3-and-under. We can finish off-loading our CT home, and also finally get a Florida mailing address to officially establish our residency, and get our kids situated in programs and the community here.
Even if I spend the first few days sleeping on an air mattress, I know we have so much to be grateful for. I think we did it - we really did it. It was scary, it was tough, and it was risky... but it's already been worth it. We can't wait to officially be Tampanians. ;)