Total, there were 6 houses to look at:
1 in Sunbury
2 in Williamsport
1 in Jersey Shore
1 in Montgomery
1 in Coal Township
In that order.
The Sunbury property was a twin at 550.00 a month. On the drive over ( and just before you get on the bridge in the picture) we saw another twin for rent. We figured we'd catch the number on the way back.
Sundbury is a gorgeous town .. historic. Very Norman Rockwell-ish. We ooohed and ahhhhed driving through the whole town .. until we got to the place to rent. Obviously the ONLY part of the town that was left off the tourist brochure. It wasn't that it was bad, per se.. it's just the front door look out on the back of business' so we had a loveLY view of dumpsters.
As the Italians say .. FURGEDDABOUTIT!
So we drive back the way we came and got the phone number for the house we saw on the way in. Called the number and left a message.
On to Williamsport.
We met April, THE best realtor in Pennsylvania at her office (which happened to be a few business' down from the hotel we stayed at.) She had two properties for us to look at so we climbed into her little clown sized Jeep. Nimble Tim got in the back which was so small that being nimble was of no help. Good thing he stopped wanting more kids because his manly parts got kind of mangled getting in and out of that thing!
The two houses that we had called her about the week earlier were already rented and she was overly apologetic for it. She explained that because of all the gas workers flooding the area because of the shale finds, not only have rental prices doubled but they get scooped up as fast as they are listed
Figures.. I'm always a day late and dollar short.
First house was in Williamsport. Nice size house.. but even though they were doing remodeling, it really wasn't much better then the shit hole we had seen the week before. But it did have nice large bedrooms and a full sized walk in attic. Color choices were a little bizarre but it seemed like the hunt was going a little better. Wasn't crazy about the yard (shared with a neighbor that apparently bought every Fisher Price toy for her kid) because there wasn't a fence but it did have a balcony off the master bedroom. The only thing was the owner wanted 1000.00 but April said he would negotiate.
Eh.
Next stop was Jersey Shore, located about 12 miles outside of Williamsport.
Recently remodeled, it has an updated kitchen with granite counter tops, a double sink with the new old-fashioned Kohler spigots and tin back splash.
OMG.. I get goose bumps just thinking about this house.
As Tim said, this would be a house I would have my mother visit .. because right now, she's not allowed anywhere near where I live! Ghetto Chateau that it is!
But this house.. OMG is all I can say
What can I say .. it was the whole Mars / Venus thing. I was giddy over the asthetics and he was more concerned about furnaces.
He's the ying to my yang.
Me and April were still in the kitchen looking at pantry sizes and cabinet space when Tim walked into the next room which was the dining room and loudly exclaimed YOU CANNOT COME IN HERE!
But what you don't see is what really knocked the socks I didn't have on off.
See that doorway to the left?
That's a bathroom. A HUGE bathroom. A FULL BATHROOM!! Big enough even to have the washer and dryer in it.
Can you say SOLD!!!!!
The whole downstairs was really tastefully decorated.. there wasn't one thing that I would change. Tim neither.. and that's a big thing because we have completely different tastes when it comes to decorating.
The upstairs had three bedrooms.. all nice sized except for the third one. That was a little small and had the stairs that led to the attic. The attic could be remodeled to make it a room so I really wasn't that concerned about the size. I mean, right now both boys are in one room anyway and the whole upstairs isn't being use at all. Paying for a house that I'm only using half of sucks. Big time.
No fence, but that wouldn't really be a big deal. I've built fences before and until one could go up, there's this thing called leashes for the dogs.
The stickler is that the owners want 1000.00 a month. Way more then we wanted to pay however, Tim and April started talking and he said that he was willing to pay 800.00 a month is there was a lease / purchase deal.
The house has apparently been on the market for sometime and even though it's 89.9 price tag is considerably cheap where I come from, I guess it's a lot for Jersey Shore. But April said that she would talk to the owners and see if she could negotiate some kind of deal.
Reluctantly, it was back to Williamsport to see another twin that we found on Craigslist. April drove us buy it and we didn't even have to pull over or slow down. Not for us.
We returned to April's office to get our car and I told Tim that while we were driving back from see the house that I would give all my eyelashes to live in, I had seen another house for rent on the main street going through town.
So back to Jersey Shore it was.. found the house.. got the number.. called it and left a message.
Back on the highway now to Montgomery, PA. About 20 miles outside Williamsport. I had found this house online.. had sent an email to the owner and also made a phone call. She sent me the address but no pictures. I checked it out on Google Earth and it seemed like a cute little town. But just like Sunbury, we were all stoked driving through the town until we got to the actual house. And like Sunbury it was a nooooooo!! A bunch of houses squeezed together in what would have been a cul de sac if the road didn't cut right through it.
Call me whatever.. but I really don't want to live in an area where all the neighbors have cruddy houses.
We still had one more house to look at in Coal Township.
I don't know whether it was the weather, put the place looked dark and dingy. I half expected to see people walking around with coal dust on their faces and head lamps.
The house we were going to look at was being rented for 410.00. Three bedroom, one and a half baths and from the pictures that were sent, looked well kept and nice. I do have pictures of it but out of respect for the owner, I'm not going to post them. I will post one of the outside because she included it on the ad.
But the drive to the house gave me the same feeling I had the weekend before when we went to see the shit hole house. This seemed like a step back.. not forward but the rent amount was attractive enough to get out of the car and we had already said we would see the house and I wasn't about to stick anybody.
I wish I could show you the inside of the house.. it was ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS! Stained glass windows.. wood trim.. three really nice size bedrooms.. really cute bathroom... balcony off the master bedroom.. back deck.. really nice size fenced yard. The current tenant had to move for personal reasons and she had a dog and cat so the pet issue wasn't really going to be an issue at all.
We met the owner's mother who lived next door and she reminded me so much of my grandmother that it was almost frightening.
I loved it .. and didn't think going back to a house on a street of row homes would be that bad. It's been over 20 years since I lived in South Philly but yknow.. I would deal.
It started getting dark so we left .. and I'm not even going to go into just how dark it got.. just how many winding roads we had to drive down and just how many times I almost got us killed because I have a really difficult time driving in the dark on roads I'm not familiar with.
Let's just say our next trip will include Depends.. just in case.
This particular tirp was EXHAUSTING .. other then being out of the car for a total of 45 minutes.. it was all driving. We started out at 7am and didn't get home until almost 9pm. That's 14 hours.
14 hours of fighting with your bladder.. and dealing with asshole drivers.. and running out of coffee when you really NEED coffee.. and willing your digestive system not to revolt because of the Egg McMuffin you had eaten earlier.
As soon as I got home, I emailed the owner of the Coal Township house and told her that we loved it and would be more then happy to rent it. She said that although we were the first to look at it, there were still a few more people that were lined up to see it. She sent an application and I filled it out and emailed it back. She then asked if my current landlord knew we were moving and I said that he didn't. She was concerned because she wanted to contact him for a reference but didn't want to jeopardize our situation here. I told her that I would call the landlord and tell him that we were looking but wasn't going to give an offical notice yet.
I did call and talked to the property manager.. she said that she understood our situation and that she would give us a good referral. I then shot another email off to the Coal Township owner telling her that she can go ahead and call.
I had had a really good feeling about this place.. but then later on in the night, we saw that she reposted her ad. Nice. What a let down. The current tenant was vacating at the end of December and we told her we'd pick right up on the lease on the first so she wasn't going to be losing any income. So I don't know. Not so much of a good feeling now.
April, THE best realtor in Pennsylvania, did email me on Monday and say that she's negotating for the house that we really loved in Jersey Shore and that she should have an answer soon so there's still that.
It's just getting harder and harder and I'm really not looking forward to putting out another month's rent here. That's 1400.00 that could be used on another property but the pieces don't seem to be falling together.
But I have to walk on faith and not by sight and we'll end up where we're suppose to end up.
It's just getting harder and harder to afford going up there just to look and coming back empty handed.
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