Is it any wonder I've got too much...

A few weeks have passed by, and a lot of stuff happened.

For instance, one of my coworkers went away on vacation and came back a husk of his former self.

I imagine I'll be in similar circumstances by the time I finally get to take some time off...which is coming up in a couple of weeks! Alison and I have planned to visit the NY Gibbs in June, and we're slowly combining ideas together for an itinerary. Hurricane Sandy, unfortunately, put the kibosh on a lot of my ideas, like walking around the Statue of Liberty, visiting Ellis Island, or seeing the Space Shuttle Enterprise. Then again, I've heard that mutual commiseration can bring out the best in some people...

Although it may not bring out the best grammar

Also, I learned that the Guggenheim Museum is largely under renovation. I guess you can't always pick the perfect time to visit somewhere, but I'm sure there's still enough cool stuff to do and to see. Since I've never been before, I don't have any aversion to acting like a major tourist n00b.

Even though New York City is steeped in history and culture, a big city like Houston certainly attracts its fair share of...attractions. One thing that's really nice is the number of performance centers. I got a deal to go see Philip Glass and his ensemble perform an original soundtrack to the Bela Lugosi classic Dracula. On the way, we stopped by one of the many restaurants we love downtown: the Hearsay Gastropub.

It's built in the second oldest building in the city, and attracts a younger trendy crowd. So we qualify, right? The food is great too.

The city is full of neat sights, like old Volvos...

...and old school newspaper headquarters.

Our seats at Jones Hall were way up in the nosebleeds, but that didn't really distract from much since the movie was projected on screen, and the orchestra was plenty audible.

I have a great love of classical minimalist music, Philip Glass being my favorite. I would very much like to see Einstein on the Beach someday (well, as much as I can, because I hear it goes on for hours). The soundtrack was classical Glass (hehe) with running strings and winds. Unfortunately, as of late, whenever I get put in a darkened room, I drift off to sleep. Alison did her dutiful best to rouse me, so I caught about 3/4 of the performance.

Food trucks are also a thing, although Austinites may claim that they own its true spirit. Regardless, they are in Houston as well, and we had a blast at the Houston Food Truck Festival. There were a lot of trucks with odd novelties, such as Korean BBQ tacos (which we did not try, because we didn't want to wait an hour in line). Each truck has a distinct personality. I particularly liked the Japanese/Mexican fusion truck (chicken keraage). Alison liked Tila's Tacos (tortas with succulent fajita beef), and we both really liked the Golden Grill (grilled cheese extravaganzas like Green Eggs and Jam or Smore).

We also took more pictures of our house's model home in Fallcreek.

We also had to go to our design center appointment, where for 3 grueling hours we picked everything that wasn't "standard" with our home. Turns out that the standard options are often bleh and bleh. Another unfortunate thing is that it's hard to visualize what your flooring and tile choices will look like in a real house. I asked the design lady if they had any software they could give a visual representation of your tile, carpet, and paint choices, and she said no.

So I sought out my own.


It's not perfect, but I think it is a fair representation. Sound off if you hate it! Or even better, sound off if you like it...

Phenomenal Residential Powers!

Last week I just kind of did a lazy ninja update without any details. I posted that update after the second of two lengthy sessions at the sales office. I wanted to get the news out and then go to bed. Now that it's finally Sunday night and I should be getting ready for bed (again...why do I have to go every day?), I'm going to blog because it's a good thing to do or something.

Actual real life view of our existing home

After prayer and deliberation, we felt like it was the right thing to do. Of course, our realtor felt like we could have been better served with another builder. Probably because she had found a way to get them to bend over backwards to give her clients a lot of concessions. This builder (Meritage) wasn't giving anything up, and our realtor felt like the sales guy was being too unreasonable. I wasn't really prepared for what happened next:

Genuine footage of negotiation between realtor and sales agent on 4/29/2013 (props to Joeartguy of dA)

Well...perhaps it wasn't as physically violent as I may have indicated. Jabs and jibes were exchanged, and I think after 2 hours or so the sales guy started to try and find a way out. Turns out that it was to throw in a covered patio for free.

"I'll take it."

In exchange, we sprung for a bay window and a sprinkler system, since the cost of installation wasn't really that much more expensive than it would cost to do it myself (that plus the multiple weekends it would have devoured). All this talk took so long that we had to come back the next evening and finish the deal. In the end, we finally were at peace with one another.

Much like Christian Bale and Kermit the Frog

Then came the small matter of financing. It took a lot of phone calls and typing to figure out what the heck was going on.

"We're making money right now!" 

After talking to 4 banks, we finally settled with the builder's lender, because they were offering to pay a ton towards closing costs. There was actually another bank that came close, and their monthly rate was a bit less because their mortgage insurance premium wasn't as high, but the difference would have taken about 8 years to manifest. Alison and I had to scrounge together pretty much every document that proved that we existed, made money, and did productive things with our lives. Heck, the bank now knows more about my 401k than I do. I just hope that the fact that Alison had difficulty with "University Survival" back in her freshman year at USU doesn't come back to bite us (yes, they asked for our school transcripts).

Once all that gets processed, they'll start moving some dirt around. So far, it looks a bit like this:

And this:

Other than this, we've just been trying to keep up with the goings on. I'm still trying to figure out whether or not HP will force me to use vacation time around the 4th of July, whether or not I have it available to spend. Alison has been getting a bit sick to her stomach off and on; we're hoping to figure out what's going on (no announcements here, people, relax).

The store manager can detect the blend of fabric here by burning and inhaling fabric fumes. He was willing to give us a 25% discount after a good hit of a 65-35 poly-cotton blend.

We abandoned our plans to go see Indiana Jones on the downtown IMAX screen and instead viewed a silent film with an original live soundtrack on Discovery Green, hosted by Houston's NPR affiliate.

An Academy Award winning movie? How passé. 

Also, Iron Man 3 was great. Go see it.

"We're done here."

See the picture

No, we did not get a Hugh Laurie. Sadly.

Home Economics

For the uninitiated, getting a house is a lot of work. There is a lot of physical, mental, emotional, and most importantly, financial exertion involved. Alison and I had casually started looking at online listings as early as last July. That's when I learned about her negative feelings toward garage faces and strong preference for nice big kitchens.

Once you see it, you can't unsee it...

Back in February I finally broke down and got a real estate agent. I was referred to her through USAA, and so far, she has been very helpful. I told her up front that we were playing the long game. I thought the long game meant that we weren't actually looking to buy until next year or something.

Well, Houston has become a pretty active buyer's market. In the past few months, inventory has shrunk and prices have started creeping upward. With mortgage rates at historic lows, it started seeming like we needed to act soon. We stepped up our efforts, pounding the pavement. With Alison working in Porter and me working off of 249, it became increasingly apparent that our search was narrowed to the NNW segment of Houston.

We're still in our lease for several months, and resale houses are disappearing within 15 days of their listings. We're looking to build, because that offers some pretty significant advantages: lock in a lower price, choose exactly what goes into the house, lower utility costs, lower maintenance costs, and a longer lead time to closing.

By now we've probably looked at 10 different model homes. Each builder touts their "upgraded" features, their energy efficiency, and of course, their excellent financing options. Despite all this, judging the builders by their track records and value, four builders in our price range come out on top: Meritage, Ryland, Plantation, and David Weekley.

The Plantation home that we looked at was very nice, but there was something off about it to us, because it was awfully inexpensive for the features that they were offering. Plus Ms. Realtor didn't seem to be thrilled by the area. David Weekley isn't building anything in our area. That left Ryland and Meritage. Our agent preferred Ryland to Meritage, but only by a small margin. That's when the real decision making happened.

Ryland homes are pretty nice, but the floor plans we liked the most were out of our price range. We were able to find something that we liked well enough. The neighborhood is gated and butts up against a railroad. The noise didn't really bother me, but that gate did. I've lived too long behind gates.

The other option was Meritage. They make a big to-do about their "green" features, including their spray foam insulation that they install in all their homes. I'm pretty impressed with the stuff; it seems much more robust and reliable than fiberglass batts or insulation. The stuff doesn't flake off as much or make you itchy (I hated going up in the attic when I was a kid because of it). Alison and I saw one floor plan and immediately fell in love with it.

Not the house we are buying...but it could look like this

This is a 3 bedroom, one story "starter" house. We've been so heavily advised by various sources to upgrade features that it seems downright luxurious to me. But...according to some of my spreadsheet wizardry, it can be affordable.

An interesting note is that despite Ryland's lower overall cost, it isn't all that more expensive than the Meritage home due to the difference in tax rates. That's been one of the biggest eye-openers for me during the process: the principal/interest portion of your "monthly payment" for your home works out to only be about half of what you pay for taxes, HOA dues, and homeowner's insurance in the price range we're looking.

Now, here's the catch: the community is nothing but cleared dirt. No roads, just a bunch of clearings in the middle of trees. It makes it kind of hard to envision what the final product is going to be. We've been promised a recreation center along with the sun, moon, and stars...of course, we might have to just settle with a couple of little flecks of comet dust by the time it's all said and done. There's a baseball park nearby (and I mean that literally, there is room for parking, 4 baseball diamonds, and nothing else), as well as a "convenience store." It feels pretty "country" out there.

Then there comes all the questions about what you have the builder do versus what you do yourself. Should we try to install sprinklers ourselves? Should we consider a gas dryer rather than electric? Should we attempt to do our own landscaping? Our own window treatments? Is the nice 17" tile worth the extra five grand? I'm hoping to clamp down on all the upsell, but I'm afraid we may run up our budget another ten grand before I even realize it.

The next step is to sic Ms. Realtor on our Meritage sales guy and see if she can negotiate on any items, including the steep lot premiums. Big thrills...

In other news, Alison didn't, and now has, her full-time position at her high school. Her administration was almost a classic case of tsundere.

I eat a Frosty with French fries.

I take a surprise picture of a few of Alison's family friends.

I make a strange Chuck connection with a sales agent.

Chris Brown has a lovely dinner setting.

Alison and I finally participate in something nice and counterculture, like RECORD STORE DAY...

...in which I find the one true diamond in the rough.

FIN