The Homestead

I’ve mentioned a few times over the last year about our home back in Charleston so I figured today would be the day to present…
The Homestead.
Last year Eddie & I were looking to potentially buy some land to eventually build on and we actually found a parcel that was BEYOND what we wanted. We walked around 10 acres filled with the tall grass, peered at the pond, and thought about where the house would be placed – it was a magical moment. UNTIL we started putting together all the different bullet points on what would have to do in order to make this home become a reality. We looked into building material cost, shipping costs, laying new electrical down the long driveway all the way to the middle where we would want the house, figuring out plumbing the numbers were starting to add up. We then had to think about what was really a priority when it came to making this investment. The whole reason we know we will end up back in Charleston is because we both love it and my entire family is there and we want to be close with them. This land was about an hours drive (depending on traffic) from my brothers house and was a little more remote which would mean longer trips to the grocery store, going to events, getting last minute items. The more we started checking things off the more we began to realize this beautiful land may just not be right for us, and that was a hard pill to swallow.

The night before we were flying out of Charleston back to Connecticut I made a little joke with Eddie how I had found a few houses I would totally be interested in buying if the land opportunity fell through. We ended up picking out three houses to just drive by, see the area, and get a feel for the outside. Eddie, Maria, my brother, his wife and I all piled into the car and drove to Chipotle for some dinner (priorities) and then went to the first house. We absolutely LOVED it but I knew the area wasn’t the best; while the price was perfect and there was so much GOOD that house had – I just have lived in Charleston long enough to know that isn’t exactly where I wanted to be (traffic, crime, etc). We then drove by the second house which was about a 5 minute walk to a close friends home and while the location was great the house was just a little smaller and more dated than we were hoping for and for the price they were asking we just couldn’t justify it. We started driving to the third home and as we approached it we noticed the house next door that had a “For Sale” sign in the front yard and all 5 of our heads snapped to it. It didn’t come up on our original search because it was above the price range we were hoping to stay in but we decided since we were there we could be a little creepy and walk up the driveway to really look at the outside of the house and y’all…it was so pretty! Eddie ended up pulling up the Zillow listing of the home and the minute we started looking through all the pictures I think we were both done for.

We shot an email off to our realtor that night saying we wanted to set up a walk through of the home ASAP.
As Eddie and I were flying back to Connecticut our realtor was making plans with my aunt/uncle and brother/sister in law to walk through the house for us. The next evening we were face-timed in and we virtually walked through the home with my family. My aunt and sister in law were both smitten with the home and that gave me all the assurance to love it. Long story short, the house was only on the market for 4 days when we made our offer and Eddie and I ended up purchasing the home, site un-seen (!!!), and WOOHOO it was ours.

Every time I’ve been back to Charleston I’ve been staying in our house and while I haven’t made too many adjustments yet I AM SO EXCITED to get started! When I was home in January I painted the entire F.R.O.G. (furnished room over garage) and upstairs stairway white as they were yellow. Actually THE ENTIRE upstairs, minus the master bedroom, is/was this hideous yellow. Why someone wanted to paint it all yellow is beyond me. Another fun fact, minus the foyer, 1/2 bath, and dining room THE ENTIRE down stairs AND master bedroom (closets and bathroom included) are painted-over-textured wallpaper. I’ll be getting back home next month and am so excited to share the restoration journey with y’all!

Here is a little walk through of our Homestead!
The first 2 are from the amazing snow storm we had when I was home in January.
I’m using most of the listing images as well as a few of the rooms cleared out since I’ve been home. I ended up emptying my storage unit from my old house (that my brother is in now!) so I’ve got random pieces of furniture and nick nacks all around in some of these pictures.
When we were back home for my brothers wedding in October we hung up curtains in the sun room and I AM IN LOVE and CAN NOT WAIT to paint it!