The Psychiatrist's House

The house had been on the market for several months, but was out of my price range. After a year of disappointments, my expectations were low, but I monitored the house on the realtor's website just in case it ever came down to my price range.



One day, the price came down to just $25,000 over my budget. That was close enough to schedule an appointment to see the house. We had to wait for a day that both of us had off, which only happens four days a month. We also had to see the house when the doctor wasn't seeing patients. The psychiatrist owner worked out of his home.



The appointment was for late in the day after a long day of house hunting. I was tempted to skip this last house because of fatigue and the long drive to get there, but was reluctant to say anything. We ended up driving there and planned to wait until the agreed upon time.

As we drove around the corner and saw the house for the first time, the feeling I has was more than love at first sight. It was recognition. I knew that was my house.




We saw the house on the first day of Spring. The hillsides were green. Trees were blooming and birds were singing. The weather was perfect. It was simply paradise. The photo above was taken in August, three months after the owners stopped watering. The lawn is brown, but at least it matches the hillsides.

My biggest requirement, and most difficult and expensive to find, was land. I don't want to look out my windows and see into someone else's house or vice versa. I don't want to look out the window and look at a wall. I don't want to know if the neighbor is taking a shower. I need space.

The new house is on nearly two acres of land. That sounded great in theory and perhaps if I didn't have a full time job it would be great in reality, but right now I feel overwhelmed. We live in a high fire danger area and there is four years worth of brush that needs to be removed. I would do it myself, but I don't have time, plus I'm afraid of rattlesnakes.

Only about half an acre of land is fenced. The rest is wild. A creek flows through the unfenced land and native oak trees line the banks. It is very nice to sit on the patio and look down on my oak trees and listen to the creek. The coyotes also like my land. A pack of them live on it. That wasn't mentioned in the sellers disclosure statement. They seem to be afraid of my dogs, so hopefully they will stay out of my fenced yard. But, that also means I can only have big dogs. No more Cockers. *sigh*

The picture above shows my backyard. I own it up to the fence on top of the hill, lined with Italian Cypress trees. A top priority was getting a play pool. Newfoundlands must have water to play in.

I'm sorry that the picture above is sideways. If I knew how to turn it around, I would have done so. But this is the only picture I have of the creek. I could have hiked back down there and taken some upright shots, but I didn't feel like it. I'm still trying to get the stickers and burrs out of my shoes and socks from the last time.

Nailed to one of the oak trees is a no trespassing sign. When I first saw it, I was hesitant to go any further until I realized that the sign now belongs to me. I never thought that I would own property with a no trespassing sign. I will probably remove it, though. I don't mind if people want to visit the creek and coyotes and rattlesnakes can't read.

A New Direction

Has it really been three months since I last visited my Blog? I, at least, have a good excuse for my absence.

It occurred to me about a year and a half ago, that with the economy being so bad and so many people losing their jobs and homes, that it would be a great time to buy a new house. I'm taking a big risk with my life savings, but I was finally able to buy my dream house. It was at one time a million dollar house, but not anymore, otherwise it would not be mine.

It was a short sale, which is a type of Hell. The first buyers walked away from the transaction during the third month of the bank's shenanigans. I then moved to the front of the line. My biggest problem was with my mortgage broker. The broker was both an idiot and unlucky. His appraiser under-appraised the home; so, I had to start over again with a different broker when we had only three weeks left to close. My life has been a roller coaster ride for the last four months and it has been mostly downhill.

For the year prior to this, my second job has been house hunting. I looked at homes on the Internet and visited the ones that looked promising. It seemed quite hopeless. All I wanted was a decently sized modern home on a big lot, with a view in a safe, quiet area. And, it had to be in my price range. Was that too much to ask? It appeared to be. It took an entire year and three Realtors before I found my house.

I'm all moved in, but there is still a ton of stuff to unpack. But mostly, I'm so glad to finally have phone service and my computer on line again after over a week of grief from AT & T. That is a story all by itself. I live in a dead zone and every time I needed to call AT &T, I had to get in my car, drive to the other side of the hill and wait on hold for between twenty and thirty minutes to talk to someone. They would promise to send someone to my house to connect me and then not show up. That was my routine for several days. I was both angry and scared. I sort of live in the country now and being out of contact and not able to call 911 was scary. I'm feeling much better now.

In a future post, I will show pictures of my new house. I'm a little overwhelmed by the size of the lot, but I got what I asked for. Yikes.