If your life is one that includes a “corporate relocation” factor, your mindset and views on the future are vastly different than those of individuals, couples and families without it. I’m not saying that it’s good, bad or otherwise – just that so many conversations and decisions of people who live the relocation life start with, end with or hinge on the phrase, “if we’re even still here“.
We’ve been back in TN for 4.5 yrs, the longest we’ve been at one address. We don’t feel that it’s our final stop, but we also have learned that anything is possible. (It’s not like either of us ever imagined moving out of Illinois, let alone living in Memphis, then New Hampshire, then moving back to Memphis.)
Craig and I built our first home. Then we remodeled our second home, inside and out.
When we moved back to Tennessee, we definitely didn’t have the luxury of time. We received an above-asking price offer on our NH home the same day it went on the market. I was extremely pregnant. So pregnant, in fact, that I was too pregnant to fly and gave Craig the go ahead to purchase our current home without me ever seeing anything more than the MLS photos.
With the closing date on the sale of our NH home the same day as Maddie’s due date, we were grateful for the home we did find as it theoretically ticked all the boxes on our list. Having done all the work we had in NH, we knew that we would be able to change the things we did not like in this house as we saw fit.
We’ve gradually done just that over the years. For us, we’ve found that our remodeling tends to come in spurts and always involves us asking ourselves the question, “Is this something that needs to get done before we resell the house?”
The first thing we did when we moved in was repaint all the interior walls. Since then we’ve completed a couple large scale landscaping projects, replaced all the carpet, painted the exterior of our home, changed all the bathroom fixtures to oil-rubbed bronze, purchased a couple kitchen appliances, completed a mini kitchen remodel, and most recently, replaced all the lighting fixtures throughout the house.
(Sorry, but I don’t think gold crackle finish was ever an acceptable lighting choice. Especially not in 2004 when this home was built.)
Craig’s been on a roll these past 4 days getting house projects done faster than I can add them to the Honey Do list. Although there’s always a lot of hemming and hawing about which projects we should undertake, we both also realize that there’s a limit to living in limbo: This is our home, and we need to enjoy it as such. Even though our tenure at this address is uncertain.
We’ve made the decision to knock out the final few things on our “We want this AND it will be good for resale” list, and then sit back and enjoy our hard work.
So, while he’s busy painting all the interior doors, I’m going to get started admiring my new dining room. The new paint, blinds, drapes, wall hanging and light fixture all make me very, very happy.
