We Got A House!

We're back from a successful house-hunting trip in Florida. It was exhausting. Looking at houses wears you out. I think it's all the anticipation before you go in then the let down when you actually tour the home and realize that the current owners are madly in love with stenciling and faux-painting. (I'm not intrinsically opposed to either of those but blood red roses stenciled around a pee yellow tray ceiling really creeped me out.)

One house was mint green with teal trim on the outside and *shocker* mint green with teal trim on the inside. With teal carpeting. That was a Dramamine moment, let me tell you. Even a great pool and a view of the lake couldn't redeem that one.

Another, which I have fondly nicknamed the "Persian Drug Lord Starter House" had a predominate color scheme of gold and purple. Until you went into the masterbedroom. Where it was burgundy and bronze. That whole house had a freaky vibe, like vampires or Mary Kay saleswomen hung out there. The family room in that house was mirrored, floor to ceiling, so it probably wasn't vampires.

Yet another hummed with old lady vibes. Ignoring the smell of mothballs wasn't that hard but the overwhelming flowery pinkness was. The walls were pale pink, the carpet was medium pink and the windows all had some sort of flowery fabric draping them. I like pink. I really do. But not on the walls and carpet of every room. Okay, the powder room wasn't pink. It was wallpapered with foil fish. Felt like you were doing your business inside a disco aquarium. The kitchen counters in that house were the color of Barbie's skin. *Involuntary shudder*

Two homes had identical bright blue Corian countertops. Was this a fad I didn't know about?

What's most frightening is that none of these houses were under $700,000. Go back and read that again. Yes, that's correct. I didn't accidentally add a zero. Now, we did look at a few homes that were considerably less that we liked but when we wanted to make an offer on those, they were already under contract. So was another more expensive but perfect house we looked at. The good stuff doesn't last long in that area of Florida, I can tell you that.

Finally, we found two great houses in a fabulous gated community, both brand new and right across the street from one another. One had a pool, one didn't - but had room to put one in. We bought the one with the pool. It has a great view of the $1.9-million-and-up homes across the lake, walk-in his & hers closets, plenty of guest rooms, offices for hubby and myself, a three-car garage, a pool and a hot tub and best of all, no stenciling or fushia floor-coverings.

And it will stay that way. At least until the leopard carpeting gets installed in my office.