Shhh...I'm Hunting!

When Ami isn't watching Curious George, she has quite the imagination. For Christmas we got her some legos. She can make anything out of legos or paper. Today I was picking up the house and Ami came up to me, "Mom, I shot an elk!" with her lego gun in hand. A minute later she comes back, "I'm going to pick it up." I asked her, "What are you going to do with it after you pick it up?" "I'm going to hang it on the wall," she said. Duh, mom! Oh, how proud both grandpas and Uncle Steve will be.

Sold!

So it's been a whirlwind few weeks at the Griffin household. Late last year we decided to sell our home! Hoping to take advantage of the tax credit that expires at the end of April. We met with a Realtor who has turned out to be absolutely amazing. If you need a great Realtor who knows absolutely everything about homes in Albuquerque, check out Rosie Singleterry. She's incredibly nice, responsive, and knowledgeable. Forgive the plug, but she really has made this entire experience much easier.

We painted and touched up a few things before and after going to my parents for Christmas. After coming home we listed our house on Monday, the 4th. We didn't get a single call all week. I was discouraged heading into the weekend. We went and looked at some homes on Friday, but had to tell ourselves that we couldn't get too serious until we were under contract on our home. We had an open house on Saturday and were told we had a pretty good turnout but that open houses typically don't generate any serious offers. Sunday afternoon we had a voicemail from a Realtor asking if she could show the house. We called back and she said that they didn't want to look at it any more because we were under contract already.

This was news to us! We called Rosie and she said that she had received an offer and hadn't had a chance to call us. I think she wanted to come over and surprise us with it. We were very excited. Rosie presented the offer to us later that evening. It wasn't full asking price, but was very close so we countered only pushing back on a few fees the buyer wanted us to pay. We were confident that the counter would be accepted but also worried because the buyer wanted to close on February 11th. Four weeks is pretty quick for a closing so it meant that we had to find a new home ourselves by the end of this week or we would be moving into an apartment.

We scheduled with Rosie to see some more listings on Monday afternoon. But the more we talked about it, the more we liked a listing on Big Bend. By the time we met with Rosie on Monday, we had all but decided on the Big Bend listing. We saw the other listings first and then went back to Big Bend for a second look around. It was the one that we wanted to get. We had to wait until our buyer accepted our counter offer which didn't happen until Tuesday morning. On Tuesday night we made an offer to purchase Big Bend. They countered on Wednesday evening and we accepted the counter and initialed the changes on Thursday! They graciously agreed to let us into the home almost 2 weeks early to to paint (the "custom paint job" done by a renter was a doozy.) My Dad will be coming down to help and we hope to get the whole house painted that week. We will also move into the home on Saturday Feb. 6th (anyone want to help?), and pay rent for a few days , in order to get out of our home and clean it. We plan on doing both closings on February 11th.

This has been a stressful process, but we are excited to have a new home (we get a garage and a doorbell!) The new home is in our current Ward, so we are happy about that. We also are excited about the neighborhood. We saw a few people as we were looking at it, and they were nice and excited about us buying the home.

It's been a whirlwind week. From listed to under contract on our new home in about 10 days. The appraisals and inspections are starting to get done this week and next. We are trying to get paint, carpet, and help with moving scheduled. Lots of work, but we sure are excited about it!

P.S. After I typed this up and posted it, Becky asked me if I mentioned that it was Eli's birthday today. All he's gotten for his birthday are a few new teeth, which have made him a joy to be around. Happy birthday kid!