I'm here! Finally posting:)....long... (hotel, big house, buying)

[Rushmore]

Originally Posted by clarabella

We were lucky enough to sell our house in MD before move and just about broke even (don't count years of v high mortgage payments and 100K of improvements, we consider ourselves lucky). Anyway, we're renting in a gated community in Gulf Gate for approx 1/2 cost of our MD mortgage. We signed a one year lease and will start looking to buy in about 4-6 months.

I love Sarasota and mean no offense to any locals but a big surprise re neighborhoods is how um...'70's looking lots of places are. Not that there's anything wrong with that it's just a bit of a culture shock....many streets well groomed and great trees, yards etc with very square, flat houses, just not something I've ever seen It is very different from MD and worlds apart from CT (if you live any where near my in laws in Greenwich

Well, I'm rambling but again, SO glad to be here, love the weather and the sky, birds, ocean, and SHOPS!!
Claire

Re the bolded:

When you buy, your mortgage should still be much less than you were spending as well. When I calculated a 30-year fixed, it came out at about 60% of what I was paying in Baltimore (for an excellent house), so I chose a 15-year fixed and figured this way I could pay about the same as I was in MD and be building equity MUCH faster. In just a year and a half, I can already see results.

As for the 70's style thing, that is definitely a Gulf Gate-specific phenomenon, especially the low ceilings. I recall there was some similarity in the Phillipi Creek area, but other than that, I haven't seen that at all.

There is a neighborhood we were considering west of Osprey, adjacent to Southside Village (I cannot recall the name of the community), and there were some older homes back there as well, but they were much more substantial. Ultimately, it was just too much money, relatively speaking.

Anyway, sometimes, in this damned economy, I find myself longing for the days of carefree renting.

But I get over it pretty quick.

Anyone want to buy a gorgeous Federal townhouse in Bolton Hill, Baltimore? I can kick my renters out, I think.

[rglb]

Congrats on the move. I was there two weeks ago and loved it. Hoping to write a similar post (finally here) in the not to distant future. Keep up the posts, interested in learning more about the place. enjoy you new hometown.

[macyny]

We just returned after house hunting for 3 weeks and didn't like any of the houses in our price range- $300,000 - $350,000. Houses are very similar with strange layouts. As soon as you enter the front door, you face a space which is called the living room. No real foyers or entries.

We didn't want our living-room at the front door. Also they have a sliding door to the pool area on this 'living-room wall making it impossible to place furniture. I wonder who came up with this idea.

We looked at some older homes, which we liked better, but they needed too much updating.

We returned home, disappointed. Very strange housing styles.

[Sue in Ohio]

Originally Posted by macyny

We just returned after house hunting for 3 weeks and didn't like any of the houses in our price range- $300,000 - $350,000. Houses are very similar with strange layouts. As soon as you enter the front door, you face a space which is called the living room. No real foyers or entries.

We didn't want our living-room at the front door. Also they have a sliding door to the pool area on this 'living-room wall making it impossible to place furniture. I wonder who came up with this idea.

We looked at some older homes, which we liked better, but they needed too much updating.

We returned home, disappointed. Very strange housing styles.

That is why, when the time comes (hopefully soon!), we will be building a house. We have looked at many, many homes during the past year and a half, both in person and online. At this stage of my life, I do not want to settle for something I am not thrilled with.

[mrs.cool]

We had the same issues when we were house hunting. instead of a house we could rent out for now and then remodel when we're ready to move, we ended up buying land to build on someday. None of the existing home layouts would "work" for our ideas of the home we want to live in someday without ripping everything out and starting fresh. If you're going to do that, you might as well build new, right?

[macyny]

You are right, Mrs Cool. I just don't get the layouts of these houses. We don't want to go through the process of building.

[Avalon08]

I've looked at many new-construction floorplans in that area (just out of curiosity) and they all seem to be similar. I think the idea behind the sliding-door out to the "lanai" is that the outdoors becomes an extension of the living room. There's usually a slider out from the master bedroom to the lanai too.

[Rushmore]

Originally Posted by Avalon08

I've looked at many new-construction floorplans in that area (just out of curiosity) and they all seem to be similar. I think the idea behind the sliding-door out to the "lanai" is that the outdoors becomes an extension of the living room. There's usually a slider out from the master bedroom to the lanai too.

Absolutely, and it is one of the most appealing designs to those coming south to get out of their Manhattan apartments or their Baltimore townhouses.

As for the open floor plan, I definitely saw plenty of houses that did not have this, but I think you might need to spend just a little more. Have you searched in Southside Village at all? These homes tend to not have this aspect, but will be a bit older and/or smaller.

[CTGirlNoMore]

Congrats on the move and thanks for tip about the cats!

[mrs.cool]

Originally Posted by Avalon08

I've looked at many new-construction floorplans in that area (just out of curiosity) and they all seem to be similar. I think the idea behind the sliding-door out to the "lanai" is that the outdoors becomes an extension of the living room. There's usually a slider out from the master bedroom to the lanai too.

That's actually one of our favorite parts. What we didn't like was the kitchen being so closed off in most of them, (we looked at older homes). We also wanted to be able to change a 3 bedroom into a 2 bedroom by knocking out the wall between the two smaller bedrooms, wanted the master to be on the back of the house and put in a slider to the lanai. NEVER found one like that! We also decided, after opening up one of those triple sliding patio doors that then wouldn't close at one of the houses we were looking at, that we didn't want to be absentee landlords. We didn't want to get a call up here in Wisconsin from a renter that said his patio door wouldn't close.