My...20 Years goes by fast!

Yep, this is me and my little Adam (June 30, 1993) at our 1st house in Hoffman Estates, IL as we said goodbye to our old house and looked forward to our NC journey.

March of 1993, my husband (Mike) came home from work one day and asked, "What do you think of North Carolina?"  My response, "I don't know, as I've never been there."  You see, growing up on a farm in the midwest and then living in the suburbs of Chicago, I really didn't get to see much of either coast.  But as it turns out, this question that he posed was just the beginning of our NC journey.

We flew to NC for a visit in April.  I was treated to warm weather, beautiful Azaleas, smiling faces and a slightly slower pace than the Chicago suburbs.  It seemed like making a decision to move to NC was a no-brainer.

It was Northern Telecom (back then) that helped us relocate. They became Nortel at some point. The house in these photos is the one we sold. It allowed us enough profit for me to become a stay at home mom when we arrived in Cary. I hated to say goodbye to my friends, neighbors and our first home.  As soon as that "sold" sign went up, I recall a feeling of homelessness.  But, it was a necessary part of moving and as I have learned from helping others go through this process, a fairly normal sensation.

And now...through a blur of 20 years, we look back to celebrate how much we have grown, learned, loved, and become: "North Carolinians".

Who says you can't close quickly these days?

Happy New Homeowners and closed in 17 days!  

Here's the story:

We sold their house so quickly that we didn't have much "shopping time" to find a new one.  But, we went out on a mission to see if we could prevent a double move and still find the perfect home.

Step one was shopping.  We found a house and it was great, but it had a 5 day wait period for making an offer because it was a foreclosure property. Then, when we heard there were multiple bids, we decided to go big or go home.  Despite going more than BIG ($20K over asking price) we were not the winning bid. Can you say "panic?"  That closing deadline for the sale of their home was fast approaching.

Our shopping time was diminished even further by the time we found another great home. This too, turned out to be a "no-go" property when we discovered there were permitting issues with the finished attic space.  We had wasted precious days in getting answers from the listing agent, owner, builder and city of Raleigh, but at least it prevented us from making an offer on a property that would have turned out to be a nightmare.

Finally, we located a great new construction home and it needed finish work and we needed to be able to get financing, and there wasn't much time to get either done.  We inquired with a lender to see if we could have a chance of closing on the same date as their sale property.  We didn't give this lender much time...17 days exactly from contract to close.

In today's ever changing rules for lending standards, most will tell you they simply can't close in under 30 days. Well, let me tell you, that they are wrong! And we did!  A great deal of work went into making magic on June 24th for the Clayton family.

With much appreciation to Christian Gladwell of American Equity Mortgage, to Trimark Home Inspections for getting our inspection and report done, to Shedor Law Firm for helping us coordinate a rapid closing on top of a back-to-back closing (remember we had to sell a house too!) and to the Claytons who were fantastic sellers and buyers!

Want to know how to make all of this happen?  Call me and I'll help to guide you in the right direction.

Kathy Evans
RE/MAX United
919-810-6965 cell
kathyevans@remax.net