Selling Our First House

This fall was a major milestone for our family. We are no longer landlords. It's been a while since I mentioned it, but when we bought our new house, we planned to sell the house we were in. After consulting with a real estate agent, he convinced us that the timing wasn't right. Boy was he right! In the two years we kept renting, our house appreciated considerably. This was due to a lot of reasons, but mainly the neighborhood around us kept getting better. When we moved in, the neighborhood was brand new. But there were big plans for the surrounding neighborhood, including putting in a new Costco, a new high-rise luxury apartment building with a grocery store, and a new community center. All of these plans have come into fruition over the last decade, with the new community center opening days before we listed our house for sale. There is still future potential for improvement too, as our town is in the middle of redesigning the downtown area.

We knew that now was the right time for us to sell because the house is ten years old. While still relatively new, now is the time that bigger ticket items might come up. Appliances needing to be replaced, new flooring, HVAC system, etc. While we were making a little bit of money on the rental, any major expenses would wipe out our profits for the year. And, to be honest, Dan did most of the work over there, and we both agreed we'd rather use our free time as a family than to have him trimming bushes and unclogging toilets at a rental property. The big decider was that our tenants of two years bought their own house and moved out. They were amazing and would be really hard to replace. So it was time to sell.

Selling the house came with a lot of mixed emotions though. It's the house Dan and I moved into after we were married. We watched it go up, plank-by-plank. It's where we adopted Nori, and where we brought home Asher. Where Zahara learned to talk and Asher learned to crawl. It's where we had amazing neighbors and fun snow days. It was a great house.

The sale couldn't have gone better. We got multiple offers within 24 hours of listing, and ended up significantly above asking! A lot of that was due to our incredible tenants who kept the house in tip-top shape over the last two years. They even helped us stage the house for sale, painting rooms and moving their furniture for the official listing photos. We really lucked out with them.

I have nothing but good memories from that house, and wish the new owners a lifetime of happiness!