Where thou art - that - is Home.
~Emily Dickinson
Our most recent marriage-preparation task has been searching for our future home. We've decided to go the apartment route for the first few years while we save for a house.
I know, I know. Right now, you want to ask: Do we realize that this is a great time to buy a house? Don't we want the extra space? Why are we willing to throw money away every month on rent, when we could be paying a mortgage? These are the questions we get nearly every day from concerned friends and family. What do I wish I could say to them? Mind your own business. What do I actually say to them? While we might have enough savings for a down-payment, since I don't have a teaching job yet we're not comfortable making that kind of commitment.
We began our apartment search with two-bedroom apartments. But after looking over our budget once again, we decided that in order to be able to pay rent, utilities, feed ourselves, and still put money away for a house, we should probably be looking at one-bedrooms. At first, I was a little disappointed. I had already mentally-decorated our guest room/home office, and didn't want to give up my purple-and-yellow themed space (we're MN Vikings fans!). And, although I'm still a little nervous about keeping our master bathroom clean enough for visitors, I've come around to the idea of snuggling up in a smaller space together and making it our own.
We've narrowed it down to two apartment complexes. For the sake of the Internet safety that I preach to my students at school, I won't tell you the name or location, but they are both in the KC area. B loves his job, and we forsee free baby-sitting from our parents, if we stay in the area.
Here are the floorplans for our two favorites:
As you can see, in this floor plan, we love the kitchen. The island in the center has a ton of storage underneath, and creates a nice, open space into the living and dining area. The cabinets are modern (and pretty!), and it's a flat-top stove. However, I really dislike having the washer/dryer in the kitchen. I know it's hard to find a one-bedroom apartment set up any differently (just wait!), but somehow dragging stinky gym clothes through the kitchen is not too appetizing.
I also really like the huge closet in this floor plan. As I told B, there's plenty of room for me to have one side, and half of his side :-)
This floor plan (which was harder to edit in Photoshop), is actually the one we're leaning towards. We love the "L-shaped" patio, the huge living room, and the separate laundry room. The downsides are the smaller kitchen, a really ugly light fixture in the dining area, and gross folding closet doors. Luckily, the latter two are easily remedied, and the dining area is large enough for a hutch to create some extra storage.
The other interesting thing about this second floor plan is the difference a first floor or second floor apartment makes. We originally really wanted a first floor apartment. As a matter of fact, in floor plan #1 (above), we would definitely want a first floor apartment, since we could let Delilah out from our back door. However, in this floor plan, the bottom floor has low ceilings with a huge beam across the middle of the living room. Yuck. But the top floor has huge, vaulted ceilings, and incredible natural light. B and I have decided that it's worth the extra calorie-burn to take D down and up a flight of stairs every time she has to go potty.
Neither of these apartment complexes is willing to hold an apartment for us until July (how rude!), so we are in the process of waiting to go on their waiting list. I've never been good at waiting (what can I say, I'm Generation Instant Gratification), and it's killing me to not know for sure where we'll be creating our future home.
