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(Dream) Home shopping

by Erika Torres
11 comments

Before Eric started his new job, most of our weekend mornings were spent walking to our local bakery for some morning coffee and a fresh basked pastry. I loved the laziness of it, the not rushing to be somewhere, and I enjoyed our conversations as we stared at the lovely Newport Beach homes that we always dream of buying.

Most of Orange County has cookie-cutter homes, they all look the same, they’re built in a tract, and the yard is probably about 20 square feet. Eric and I dream of big yards, high ceilings, a white picket fence (maybe that’s just me?) and plenty of room for improvement. But the truth of the matter is, I doubt we’ll ever be able to afford one of these homes–unless we moved to Kansas. And since both our families live here, it doesn’t look likely that that will happen.

Of course we just happen to have the most expensive taste. Because the homes we adore happen to be in Newport Beach–with an average price tag of $1.6 million. Yup, million. And that’s after the price drop that has occurred.

A few weeks ago, Eric had a Saturday off–the first one in about 2 months. So we took advantage and went for a lazy Saturday morning breakfast, sipping our coffee along the way and dreaming of the future…

I love this one…how can you NOT love this one? I feel like I would automatically know how to bake if I moved into this house and Eric would come home from work with a suit and tie and say “honey, I’m home!”

So darling, so cute, still out of our price range.

Who am I kidding? At this point, we don’t even have a price range. We’re not even in the vicinity of thinking of buying a home…

Still. I treasure those moments, walking with my husband and our dog, and saying “One day…”

It’s sort of like window shopping for homes.

Anyone else dream home shop?

11 comments

City Girl December 19, 2010 - 8:02 pm

How did I know that you’d want a white-picket fence ;)? Love it!

I used to go through the New York Times Sunday real estate section when I was in middle school and pick out my favorite home every week. It made me so happy!

Keep the faith, girl! One day will really be…one day :).

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Ashley November 30, 2010 - 9:47 am

I love dream home shopping! We’re nowhere near ready to sell our townhome and look for a new home, but it’s so much fun to check out all the options. But I do have to say, it’s SO MUCH more affordable in Iowa! Haha! Guess that’s what you get for all that nice weather!

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Fabulously Frugirl November 29, 2010 - 7:45 pm

Those are beautiful houses!

I think I’d love a little house where we can do some renovation, have a yard and enjoy our little corner on earth. I’d also like to payoff the mortgage in 5 years, so no time in the near future!

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Teacher Girl November 29, 2010 - 2:38 pm

I own a townhouse and I STILL dream home shop all the time. I live in a neighborhood that has amazing houses, but alas, just like your area, they are in the millions. It is fun to dream though!

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Rebecca (Craving Simplicity) November 29, 2010 - 12:35 pm

We LOVE to drive or walk around and look at houses…we’ve had tons of those “one day” moments!!! 🙂

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Shannon November 29, 2010 - 7:43 am

Just sayin..those types of homes around here are only about $200,000-$300,000. Totally doable. With an acre of a yard. I don’t think you should rule out living by me yet:)

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the MRS. November 28, 2010 - 7:33 pm

Oh you bet! Have been for years…Adam and I LOVE the little old houses in our area. They are TINY with nice yards. They have character…they have charm.

and maybe in a year or so we can buy one.
hopefully…

I am so glad that my ENTIRE family relocated. We grew up in Northern California, where there is NO WAY the MR. and I could probably ever afford to buy a house.

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eemusings November 28, 2010 - 6:19 pm

Ugh. I hate those cloned, stepford type houses! Unfortunately urban sprawl has seen a fair few of those kinda suburbs pop up in the last few years (shudder) I couldn’t handle living somewhere like that. I saw an aerial photo of a place called Henderson in Vegas just like that, and it freaked me out SO much.

Funny thing is, there’s a suburb called Henderson here too, and part of it (Henderson Heights) is exactly the same.

I doubt we’ll ever live anywhere else – we love auckland despite the COL and the rain and everyone we know is here. As are job opps.

BF sometimes talks about moving out to a small town, but realistically, he’s such a family oriented person, it would never actually happen.

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eemusings November 28, 2010 - 6:22 pm

And yes, even though it’ll be another 10 years before we can even think about buying, I love dream house hunting anyway!

Here’s my recent post on this exact topic: http://eemusings.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/my-real-estate-dream/

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Randa November 28, 2010 - 5:55 pm

Oh, those are beautiful! Of course, I’m always surprised at the price differences in California compared to my little piece of home in Georgia – a home with that size [from what I can see] would easily be in the low 200 thousands. Higher the closer you got into the city but still – not too bad.

And I am ALWAYS dream home shopping. Always. I blame it on my addiction to HGTV. In fact, on one road trip to Florida, A. and I mapped out our “dream” home as we headed down the highway – at least we both picked men who are just as dream home-happy as we are!

:0]

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Red November 28, 2010 - 5:03 pm

All the freaking time! I’m so grateful that I was born in an area with affordable home prices. A million bucks in Tenn. would get us a mansion. But I totally understand not wanting to move away from your families… I don’t know that we ever will! 🙂

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