After living all over the world in a few various places, you have to ask yourself just where is home?
Sit down and think about what you want, what makes you happy.
For me, being from PA, the northeast, it's what I grew up with and what I also have fond memories of and what I want to surround myself with. Now I could very well live in many states and enjoy the nuances of each of them, but something keeps calling me back to PA. Although, after searching the past year or so and finding out all I have, I began to set my sights to Maine.
Yep, the frozen cold tundra of the Northern Woods. You might see that show on tv now, North Woods Law that showcases the game wardens up there in Maine, sort of like their version of COPS.
It has taught me a bit about Maine watching that show.
I began my search on Zillow.com. If you are not familiar with that site, it's very user friendly and does not take long to figure it out. You can have an account for free and save homes you like, create searches for what you are looking for and Zillow will even email you as often as you want with new listings or on the weekend it gives you a whole bunch of suggested property that fits your criteria. It's really brilliant! Has pictures and prices and all kind of information.
It is not, however, the most accurate nor up-to-date as say realtor.com or trulia.com although I suspect trulia is along the same lines as Zillow whereas realtor.com is a bit more current.
I wanted a good bit of land at first and even tried Land Watch but then after going to that Log and Timber show in PA, I was leary about buying land to develop. What if the land is not able to be developed? We'd be stuck with the land. Then all those trees that would be cut for a log cabin too? Yikes! Plus it would take a while. So, I began the hunt to find the right kind of property with an established house. Not too close to people, no one on top of you but not too far away from civilization.
I found that I could get a lot more for my money in Maine. Maine is the more repressed state in the US and many people have left it to move to other areas when some of the industries tapped out or boomed in other places. Still, many people do vacation in Maine in the summer, escaping the heat of their regular homes and having camps or cabins in the woods usually near a resort or such.
The property taxes are cheaper and there is a state sales tax in Maine. Still you could get a lot more property for your money there than in PA. Granted, yes, the winters are going to be harsher, colder, more snow and last longer, but the trade off from what I could see was worth it.
I had looked at several properties starting last fall and had narrowed it down to a few. Contacted my bank who offered a service to help you purchase a home and they sent us off to a realtor in Maine. This realtor contacted us and got on their 'portal' which is a real estate site with listings that are current and contain a lot more information than any of the other sites I mentioned above. It was great! Took me a while to get it figured out and to be able to maneuver myself through it. But once I did, it was fantastic. Then now and then, when a new listing came up, they would email it to me. Awesome!
I had passed up this one property that noted that they were part of an association, later it came up again and I looked more closely at it and found out it was not a Home Owner's Association as I had dealt with in Texas, but a Road Association instead. This is where the people along the private road got together and share the expenses of having it plowed and maintained. This is brilliant! Loved it and changed my whole attitude about it.
So the first step, was to contact the realtor to ask what questions I might have about the property and I was also able to find out they had 2 other people look at it just recently! OH NOOO!! The more I looked at this property, the more I liked it and wanted it. So I made arrangements with the realtor for a showing that very weekend (last weekend!) and flew up!
I got there before the realtor and waited for them to show up and once they did, we went to the door and the owners were there. I was told they would be and many times, most times, the owners were not but we were glad they would be to help answer the questions we had. They were a very nice elderly couple and showed us all around the house and we chatted for a while and they showed us how things worked and what they had done and added to the property and showed us the garage and everything. It was great! I fell more in love with it from the moment I got out of my car to have the wind whispering with the tall pine in greeting and welcome to the lovely home itself! I didn't get to look over the whole of the land down to the stream because there was still some snow back there and I didn't want to go traipsing off as it was a bit brisk out.
After that, we signed papers with the realtors to be assigned to them so they would become our realtors and represent us. Now you have to be careful here because if they are the seller's agent too, they could have a conflict of interest. In this case, the sellers had a different realtor than I did, so that worked out well.
Then, we had to take some time to think about the property and if that is what we wanted? Good question. I fell in love with the land and all the things I could do with it. But it is a big, huge, scary step! This is to be IT! The last one. The forever home. Oh boy is that a very scary step!
We took some time to think about it. Mull over pros and cons and sleep on it a couple nights. The more time went by, the more I wanted it however. Yes it is scary, but nothing ventured, nothing gained they say!
So then...the next step....was the bid!
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