our journey to homeownership....

i figure i'll keep a journal (yeh, right cuz y'all know i'm no good at keeping up w/ my blogs) of our experiences as we make our way to purchasing our first home.

for reasons beyond our control (long story some of you already know) we're needing to purchase a home sooner than later. apparently this is a good time to do it since everything we read and everyone we talk to say it's a "buyer's market".

so far, we have a pre-approval on kalen alone. we have decided although we're approved for more, our max budget is 90k. we need a 4bd 2bth house to fit everyone comfortably. of course, dre'a and lexi would love a 5bd so they can have their own rooms, but they'll get over it.

we had to first decide what area we want to live in. our biggest deciding factor is joshua. if we stay in certain parts of the city then the girls could remain in their kirkwood schools, but joshua would be suffering. he's in the city public schools (because kirkwood can't take a full time special needs student from the city)...and the city SUCKS! our best bet to get joshua the services he needs and are entitled to are to either move to the county so he's serviced thru the special school district or remain in the city and pay for him to go thru the archdiocese. sooo, with that being said, county it is. we can't afford a mtg and a school tution. the girls have stopped crying and are excited about the move now. they'll be happy to have a backyard and more space.

we were focusing on the spanish lake area since that's where my in-laws live and a couple of my closest friends, but it dawned on us that they're subject to move at any time so we need to just get across the county line where it best suits us.

we'd found a prospect in spanish lake that seemed promising. we went to view it saturday and omg! i think the house was built in 1976 and has NEVER been updated! if it were a case were we had to move like w/in 30 days, we'd take it...it IS doable...however since that's not the case....it's on the list but has moved out of the top spot.

we welcome feedback along the way since we are new to this. any tips, things to look for, things to avoid, etc...please share.

this is house the only house we've seen so far...the price has been reduced from 99,900. it was last appraised at 127k. it's apart of the deceased's estate now. it's not BAD but it needs help. they replaced the plumbing stack last week once they found a leak in it. like i said, if we had to move NOW it'd be ok...omg the microwave! i've never seen anything like it. you know those clocks were the numbers like scroll upwards..almost like a stamp where you change the date on it, you scroll it around, yeh...it's one of those...i mean all original here!

midwestgroup1.missouri.remax.com/listings/listingdetail_r4.aspx?LID=53950786