Sunday, November 25, 2012

City Home Owners

After many months of research and looking at houses, we can finally say, "We are city home owners!" Rick and I are still on a high and love saying those words!  To include you on the journey, below we have a few houses we seriously looked at and what we liked best about them.

When first looking in the city, we thought Lafayette Square was where we wanted to live. The square is built around a park with many restaurants and shops. Many of the homes have already been restored and some are still under construction. 
This house was top on our list in Lafayette Square.  The house itself was  2 bedroom & 2 bathroom plus an apartment area on the lower level.  If we decided on this house, we planned to try the landlord life as well.  However, once we look at the inside, we decided against this house due to the amount of work and money it would require.  A little above our heads for the first large rehab.
We looked at the two left houses in this picture.  The center was my favorite at the time, but space was a little small for the price. The left one was sold before we made up our minds - just meant it was not the house for us.


Once we realized Lafayette Square was not exact location for our needs, we were directed to Benton Park. This location is in the area of Hwy 55 & Arsenal / North of Cherokee Street / East of Jefferson. I have a co-worker who has lived in Benton Park for years and her family runs a local market.  She spoke highly of the area and suggested certain streets. 

This house was beautiful inside and mostly finished!  The downstairs area of the kitchen, dining room, and the living room were perfect!  The upstairs bedrooms, were slightly odd. One of our favorite attributes of this house were the two porches on back! One on the lower level and one from the bedroom level.  It was beautiful to look over the city. As nice as this house is, we just new it was not "the one."

Now, this was our first house to bid on. Beautiful house, old wood floors, exposed brick walls, and tall pocket doors.  This house had all the old character we were looking for and was listed well below value!  However, it was a hot item and was sold for much higher!  We were disappointed but at the same time, this house set the bar for what we were actually looking for.


Now, we looked at a billion houses (minus a few) but obviously can't share them all. While the search continued, we started looking at Tower Grove East.  This area is right by any highway a person could need, so many restaurants to choose from, a very cultured area, and the houses were the style we were looking for.  It did take more research to find a house in the right price range and on an "ok" street (I am finding this is very important to city dwellers!) 

Here is our new home :)
We will be sure to keep you posted on all the personal touches we will be adding!



Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Chapter 1: STL Love


My husband, Rick and I absolutely love our city of St. Louis, Missouri.  Now, we have not always had this feeling.  In fact, for awhile we were actively looking for the next place to live.  We felt that our tenure in St. Louis was complete and it was time to move on.  However, these feelings (and not agreeing on the next city to live) prompted new adventures.  Rick and I decided to really take a look at our "own backyard".  I am still amazed at how many options STL has for entertainment, restaurants, concerts, theaters, museums, and the list can go on and on! The best part, so much of the entertainment is FREE!! There is no way we could visit every attraction in the city, but whatever we do visit, we are looking forward to sharing!

This is the beautiful skyline I have fallen in love with! Be sure to check back in for additional excitement on St. Louis, MO!

~ Hope you enjoyed a day in the STL