Homeless

It has been silent on the blog as of late, yet the adventures are still taking place. We sold our primary residence over 3 weeks ago, yet our new home wasn’t ready. The new home is a 50 yr old farm house under major renovation. I’ve been the GC on the project and have enjoyed many aspects of the project. We were on schedule until I hit some permit roadblocks which set me back 6 weeks. Well, here we are in the home stretch and most everything is coming together for a final inspection this Friday! School for the boys and my wife starts Monday so I’m under the gun to get this pulled together.

The sale of our primary residence was a blessing in this market, yet now where do we live. Family some, a camper that sleeps 8 many more.

Why? This is a question I’m often asked and at times wonder myself. We were living in a large 4BR home in a very nice neighborhood. We purchased a very rare piece of land .6 miles from our current house. We had a vision to build a new home and I even have the final drawings from an architect after quite a bit of work. The housing market started to fall and the thought of sinking $$$ into a house and in reality being a bit finacially strapped was more than I wanted to bear. Thoughts and small attempts of selling came up short as I didn’t want to give away something which is a once in a lifetime type of property to come across. Thoughts changed into what could I do with this old farm house? I posted an Ad on craigslist for cheap labor and the phone didn’t stop as jobs are scarce in the building industry. We began with a full gut immediately and haven’t stopped. The only thing remaining was the roof and exterior walls. We are now close to wrapping up the inside of what will be a 2000SF 3BR 2Bath Ranch with a full basement. The house is still very ugly on the outside and is a far cry from your standard Naperville home, yet internally it is a new home. The outside transformation won’t be as great, yet still will get an update.

Still why? In Naperville, where do you find 1.5 acres of land with 150 year old Burr Oak trees that is surrounded by and even denser forest that will never be developed? This doesn’t sound like much to those in the sticks, and that is where I’d rather be, so this is a refreshing bit of feeling like I’m in the middle of nowhere while being somewhere.

All that matters is that it makes sense to me.