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We thought we were in a pretty good place by about four months in. Jordan, Mum and I had taken turns going to inspections, we knew how much we needed to save for the deposit and really, we were just taking our time mentally preparing for the future. Until one Saturday morning, when everything changed.
Mum and I were out and about browsing a few properties, as normal. I wasn’t expecting to find anything more than I’d found all of those Saturdays past, but unexpectedly I did. Whatever that thing is that makes people fall in love with a house, this place had it. I just felt right there. So right, in fact, that I knew then and there that I didn’t want this to be an investment property, I wanted this to be our home.
Whatever that thing is that makes people fall in love with a house, this place had it. I just felt right there.
I really can’t explain what stood out so much about it. Truthfully, it didn’t stand out at all. This place literally had the ugliest carpets, and these super retro bathrooms… I can’t even describe them.
I remember thinking that we couldn’t waste any time, I called Jordan straight away and told him to come look at the place. He came straight over (finally managed to get him off that golf course – ha!). Honestly, he was just as excited about the prospect of buying our first house as I was, so he knew it was serious when I told him to get over there.
As we walked from room to room, we agreed that this place had potential. We were really able to look beyond what existed and build our dream home in our minds.
It was completely surreal, considering we had no plans of buying a house so soon – let alone our first home – but we were both too excited at that moment to even notice. As soon as I got home from the inspection, I went straight onto Pinterest to start collecting ideas on what we could do with this place and how we could start making this place our own. By the end of the night I was so far in that if it hadn’t worked out, I would have been really disappointed.
I took the weekend to ride out the high of finding our dream property, because I knew full well that if we were going to make an offer we needed to get pre-approval for our loan. Knowing that I could call Gerard in the Home Loans team on Monday and get him to talk me through the process allowed me to stay on cloud nine for just a little longer.
Finding your dream home completely unexpectedly may be an ideal scenario, but it doesn’t always happen that way. If you’ve started your home buying journey, it’s helpful to have a checklist of what you’re looking for to share with real estate agents as you search.
Whilst Sam is an ING DIRECT employee, these are her own views as an ING DIRECT customer Testimonials appearing on this site are individual experiences of customers that have used our products and/or services. We do not guarantee that they are typical results that consumers will generally achieve. Testimonials are not necessarily representative of all those who will use our products and/or services. A Pre-approval is not a final or formal loan approval. A pre-approval is simply an indication of your ability to borrow funds based on the information provided.
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