Welcome Home ... Yet Again
Executive summary: It’s ready! Come see our new (hopefully forever-ish) home!
A year ago, I was showing you our condo, never imagining that I was about to go through a whole another round of house-buying and prepping and moving. Life (and the university faculty housing lottery) are unpredictable that way! Having just been through this rodeo once, the second time felt more practiced, but it was still a ton of work. And this time, we have a small yard that we’re responsible for making over too! I’ll share the numbers and then the links for our home tour.
If we live here longer than 4.5 years, it’ll be a record for us staying put in one place in our adult lives.
I once again asked the handymen to paint the doors (Benjamin Moore Newburyport Blue this time – a dark blue heavily infused with gray), put up curtain rods, swap out light fixtures, and fix a long laundry list of small issues ranging from replacing broken door latches to climbing onto the roof to patch up a potential leak. In the condo, we paid $6k for two handymen to come for three days (this includes materials fees). This house, being 70% larger and with twice as many doors and windows, cost $8.5k for two handymen to come for four days. This is not including emergency repairs — it seems that every time we move into a home, something urgent pops up. In the condo last year, we discovered a plumbing clog on our move-in day that was regurgitating dirty water into our kitchen sink, so we had to call a plumber to snake the drain before it overflowed into our kitchen. That $2k was reimbursed by our HOA, because the plumber determined it was a building clog (he snaked the drains 25 feet!) Then this year, we discovered our AC was malfunctioning in the middle of a freak heat wave and had to call around to find a vendor who could come the day of (everyone else was booked out). We paid $1k and got it reimbursed because some pipes in the AC unit were flipped during installation before Stanford sold the house to us. Yes, it was that stupid.
Then there was the yard too, which cost over $6k for a small overhaul. It essentially consisted of me telling the landscaper “remove the mushroom-infested planter boxes and weedy excuse of a lawn, add more shrubs around the perimeter of the house and fence, fill it in with tanbark, and drop some pea gravel in the middle.” Basically the lowest cost and lowest maintenance option I could think of that would not be an eyesore (plus they power-washed and stained our faded fence — unexciting but necessary upkeep). We shied away from planting any more trees (we are told they’re treated like humans in Palo Alto, and I don’t want the tree police to come after me if anything happens), instead opting for a recommended mix of lavender, rosemary, sage, kangaroo paws, succulents, snake plants, and other shrubbery I can’t even name. But all drought-resistant for the Mediterranean climate we enjoy in California … and my complete disinterest in yard upkeep.
Backyard makeover coming along. I’m no landscape designer, but this looks 10x better without the lumpy sad excuse of a lawn that we inherited.
Our house is in a great location, with a playground literally out front and a community clubhouse, grill area, pool, and large lawn directly across the street. Now that I’ve given you a look at the outside, let’s take a look at the inside that I’ve been busy putting together — all tours are posted under “Peek at our Pad.” As this home was purchased through Stanford Faculty Housing, there is a long list of changes I’m not allowed to make (e.g., we can’t touch the floors, cabinets, counters, etc.) but I’m happy with what I was able to do, and quickly too! Thanks for stopping by … yet again!