The House That Got Away + A Couple More (#househuntingatlanta)

How cool is this house?!? I was minding my own business making dinner last week when my agent texted me that this had just come on the market.

I went through the listing pictures and texted back "I want it." She made a 930am appointment to view it the next morning and I called our loan guy just to make sure everything was ready for us to make an offer. Yes, that is how sure I was.

SPOILER ALERT: There were multiple offers and they didn't go with ours.

But look at that cutout brick. Ughhhhhhhhh!!

Was it PERFECT? No. It was A LOT of work. A LOT! I didn't care. I liked the bones and the location.

The price was good too....not as good after we bid $15k OVER the asking price of course (and we still didn't get it) but good for this area and such a cool house.

Yep, it's a sellers market out there. And it's hard to believe, but we may not be the only people looking to buy a mid century modern house in Atlanta. Ha! I totally blame Mad Men! UGH! This could take a while.

Another thing is (as we are finding out) there are many investors out there ready to snatch up cool houses with cold hard cash. If this one is done up with all the best finishes they will be able to sell it for a nice little profit. (This is what is happening with the house we offered on back in January)

The floors would need changed out here obviously, but that isn't s huge deal.

Paint. A lot of painting.

Then the walls between the kitchen, dining and living rooms would need to come down.

The master bathroom is a great space. Combining the two little areas with sink and bath would make it BIG. Especially with the vaulted ceilings...but at this point you really just have to use your imagination.

Can you see it? Also, I would TOTALLY keep this green bathtub (and the matching toilet)! I don't want/need a tub in the master, so I would switch them to the kids bathroom though. Working in these vintage pieces would make the remodel so cool.

Here is the master, nothing spectacular, but those windows do it for me! Plus the vaulted ceiling makes it feel a lot bigger.

The kitchen is a time warp.

Those cabinets seem sooooooo country. I'm sure they original to the house, but it boggles my mind why they chose those cabinets with the architecture of the house.

Also the appliances are from 1959. Not surprisingly none of them function, so, remodeling the kitchen would be the top priority before moving in. (Im totally talking like we are moving into this house. I know it's already under contract, but just let me go on imagining ok?)

Holy storage!! The basement is humongous and almost doubles the square footage of the house.

One of my favorite parts is the little courtyard with the brick surround.

And off there in the distance is our the big back yard/forest. Soooooooo dissapointing. Ernesto did not care that we didn't get it because he thought it was too much work. This is funny, considering all the houses we are looking at need work. Good thing I have the final say on our offers. Ha!

We looked at a couple more this week, but both were missing some space.

This one was sweet and basically in HomeGoods backyard in Buckhead's (technically a Brookhaven address in Dekalb county) Pine Hills neighborhood.

It needed some work and in that neighborhood you could pour money in and not even be close to the asking price of other homes there. However, only two bedrooms upstairs and one down. (with the laundry) Plus living room was small too.  

Yard was great with woods and a creek (that the boys would have a blast exploring) along the side/back and BONUS bomb shelter! Underground maze and huge area to wait out the bombings. Very creepy actually.

Then yesterday we went to see this house in Briarcliff Woods.

We knew it wasn't ideal, because no basement. But! We decided it could be a great investment and why not make some money while waiting for our perfect house to come up? If this house had had a basement, we would have offered on the spot because it had a lot going for it.

Beamed vaulted ceilings in all of the rooms. Living room AND family room (gotta love mid century ranches!) a garage and .6 of an acre! That's a big yard!! Again with LOTS of work. Walls needed to come down, new kitchen, a roof etc.

I like the bones, and the low profile is cool too, but it needs bigger windows.  I think adding a peaked carport in front of the garage would make a huge difference to the curb appeal.  Dont' you think?Something like this.

Anyhoo.  We thought about it for 24 hours, which was just long enough for it to go under contact. Boy oh boy this housing market is nuts!

The hunt goes on! Stay tuned!