Clubs and Realtors: Oh My

I interviewed today, and the principal seemed genuinely impressed with my idea of gardening in the quad.  He gave me both hope, and confusion, though, which is typical of my conversations (of everyone's conversations) with him, stating that he wanted to find a way to convince the superintendent to at least give me some kind of stipend, if they choose to keep the current advisor in place.  Sounds both promising, and a sign that the interview was a formality, and he may plan to keep status quo, regardless of inadequate and lame that "quo" is.  Here's hoping.  I know for sure I could take the thing and make its vision bigger and more adequate to what was intended in making a Green Team in the first place.  Hopefully, the supe likes the idea of gardening on the quad enough to be sold on investing in me.

We also got our current land lady to agree to work with us as our realtor.  I'm hoping the conflict of interest isn't an issue: she had dropped the hints herself months back that we should look, and admitted that she was hoping we'd get that to mean that we'd work with her.  I just don't want to see her motivation to keep us as tenants ending up being a factor.  But, to be honest, with us out, and a max of 2000 in cosmetic upgrades, she could charge someone easily another 300/month over what we're paying, and she'd make her commission off us too once we did find our place.  We have another address in mind and are just waiting to hear back from her about whether she was able to arrange a visit for us this Thursday.  This time, we'd be looking at a property that at minimum, needs 20,000 in work, but the price is in a place where we might be fools not to take it, given how many of our dream features are there, if the structure and guts are sound... and we could borrow that extra to get going on the projects anyway.  I'm hoping our search isn't as long  and protracted as other people I know have described theirs to be.... and that may be an unreasonable thing to hope for, but given how much of my life has been harder to achieve than anyone else I know, maybe this will be my compensation, and a bit of cosmic balance? 

House Hunting Really is the Most Fun and the Most Miserable at the Same Time

First house was, in my opinion, about a 60% match.  I loved its woodwork, and its kitchen... hated how close everything felt, and how there was no master bedroom door (the arch way was pretty and all, but holy no privacy, Batman!).  Loved the attic bedroom, and the way they'd made one of the second floor bedrooms into a dressing room/walk-in suite.... hated the fact that there was one bath, and no way to cram in a 1/2 later.  Hated, and this killed it, the almost complete lack of any land upon which to garden.  Barely even enough room to store a bicycle and a grill in the super shady back yard, and less than ten feet between the house and the sidewalk in front.  And, much of what I liked about the house, D. didn't even care about, so I'm seeing that we're on two totally different pages in terms of what we want, and while that should come as no surprise, it's just another obstacle that may make the whole thing more complicated than I want to allow myself to think about. 

I prefer to remain hopeful.  And, we already have a second house in mind, one which will need a ton of work but which could allow us a whole lot more house--and land--for a similar budget.  A different town, with slightly less reputable schools, but I know that other town too well anyway to judge fairly, given that it was the town I was schooled in.  A fresh start town might be best anyway. 

We learned a bit about realtors from that first experience, and have made some phone calls in the direction of finding an agent to work with.... and I think I should inquire about this new house by Tuesday if I haven't heard directly from one of our leads yet.  We may not yet have an agent, but that shouldn't stop us from looking, and seeing what connects, or doesn't, with this set of photos.