Found a House!!

So after what felt like days of searching, Greg took me down to South Philly to look around. And when I walked on to this block on 13th Street, I felt really really good about it. I really felt like it was a place where I felt comfortable and like I would be able to get involved with neighbors. It reminded me of Brooklyn a bit. The hosue was a bit crazy inside with wallpaper but it had good bones.The owner had obviously taken very good care of it. Later, I met the neighbor across the street who is bringing trees back to the streets down there. I just like that people sit on their stoops and know everyone. So maybe that says it right there. The other thing that helped me is that David, Mike's brother, and his partner Robin, live RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET. They moved in to their apartment in March and they seem to really like the nieghborhood.

A few days later, after I had looked at a million other places, my dad I rode around the city and went back past the 13^th street house. He noticed how well kept it looked, and how the brick had just been repointed. He really liked the block and then asked “So why haven’t you made an offer on it?”. We talked through the issues, and he told me he thought it met our criteria even though it looked like a grandmother’s house inside (good amount of space, well kept, has potential, good block, walking distance…13 blocks to 11^th and spruce, etc…etc…) and that the grandmother-like cosmetics like venetian blinds, wallpaper and carpet were all lot easier than making structural repairs or putting on a new roof. He was right...so I made an offer....and negotiated...and now we have a house!

Its on a beautiful block, but in South Philly of all places!!! 1416 S. 13^th street. We’ll call it mummer’s headquarters for 2006. I will have to hurry and order the plastic slipcovers for my sofa. Inspection is next Monday. It is obviously not exactly my decorating taste inside, so we will be doing some wallpaper removal and carpet replacing ASAP (Clear the week of July 29 would you? ha ha), I also hate the country-time look of the kitchen cabinets, but don’t know that I can change those for a while….we’ll see - my Dad seems to think he can help me work some magic to make it more modern looking. But it has an awesome roof for a roofdeck, a little backyard and, best of all, it is literally located right across the street from Mike’s brother David and Robin’s house, so the Dunn’s will be taking over the block! The block is really cute and full of trees and stuff. I have my own stoop. And the victor café is right around the corner. It’s a bit bigger than we had wanted and not as close-in town, but the subway is right there and the price was competitive, and so I think we are just going to rent a room out for a while so I have some company while Mike is away.

We settle July 28 and move in early August pending all things going well with inspection.