Looking for a house and shop

[mmcmdl]

Have a little more impetus to get moving on this. My new granddaughter was born yesterday.

Well Congrats !

 

[woodchucker]

Congrats!

And like Dave says... HOA's are bad. If you don't know that, watch Lehto's law on youtube, and many other video's are runaway HOAs.
Some have taken peoples homes away by leveraging all these fines and it's not worth it. I personally will never reside in a HOA community. I don't like people telling me what to do. Too many people have bad intentions.. I could tell stories but... I'll let it go.

 

[rwdenney]

Yes, the prices are high everywhere in this area. But buying an older house with a workable shop already built will be significantly cheaper than building a shop that didn't exist before.

Ask me how I know.

But the existing shop building may entail more compromise than what I had to deal with--I could design most of the problems out of the building I had built. And because it was an agricultural building, I was not subject to a range of residential building codes--those would have significantly increased the costs and construction time.

Yes, HOAs are to be avoided. Actually, neighbors that are too close are somewhat of a problem, too. Everyone has good intentions (I keep telling myself) but they still would love to meddle in your affairs, especially if they perceive you will interfere with their personal peace and affluence or in their minds even slightly reduce their property values. Maryland is supposedly the South but the attitude is more northeastern in terms of people telling you how to live your life. I moved here from Dallas so I was already exposed to nanny neighbors (or neighborhood nazis, which was my preferred term), but it was worse here even in Virginia.

All my hobbies are antithetical to nearby neighbors, it would seem. Nobody ever complained when I lived in San Antonio, and nobody complains now that I live on rural acreage. But the suburban neighborhoods between 1992 and 2003 were filled with busybodies and do-gooders.

Rick "whose shop adds abundant value in all dimensions except dollars" Denney

 

[mmcmdl]

Lot of my neighbors always stop in on Sat nights when the fire pit is up . They always say they envy me not being in an HOA .. My little street sure has changed in 38 years though , although we still do what we want when we want .

 

[Rex Walters]

My new granddaughter was born yesterday

Congrats! Man the grandad gig is great, isn’t it?! None of the headaches, just pass ‘em to the parents when things go awry. (Laugh)

Re: HOA’s, it’s not the BAD intentions that get you. It’s the others that are the road to the proverbial. HOAs and politics tend to attract the same sort of people. Normal people would rather poke their eyes out than do that work! Leads to the worst possible people in those roles until people can’t take it any longer, imo.

 

[WobblyHand]

Thanks for the forewarning on the HOA's. Haven't lived in one for the past 38 years, nor do I want to. Lots of people that let power go to their head and forget why they were there, which was to "try to have a nice place to live". (Whatever that means.). For some reason I've been reading some threads on HOA's gone crazy. Interestingly enough my younger daughter got on the board of her HOA because she didn't like how it was run. Hopefully her power won't corrupt her. She just wants the property management to be responsible and transparent, can't say that I blame her. She told me some pretty weird, inept stuff about looking into the finances.

Of course, folks and neighbors can be pretty weird, even without an HOA. But that's a whole different thread.

This is my second grandchild. Hope she's calmer than my grandson, who is fire on wheels. He will need to learn how to not be an only child, and to share. Going to be a transition for him!

 

[matthewsx]

We lived in an HOA neighborhood once. When it came time to paint the house they said we could only paint it an approved color (this is after several warning letters about the weeds that pop up overnight when it rains in Arizona).

Well, we just wanted to paint it the original color and were more than happy to do so at our expense. They couldn't tell us what color it was....

Literally had to take a leftover paint can our neighbor had to the paint store and get it matched.

Not sure we ever got formal approval but we did get the place painted....

John

 

[verbotenwhisky]

Looking to relocate closer to my kids and grandkids. My kids are searching for places and sending me links. What I've noticed is the listings rarely show things like out buildings, or even interiors of garages or non living spaces. Often there's a street view, but not one of the back view of the house.

What's a decent strategy to get better info on stuff like this? I'm not eager to do the shop in the basement thing again. It's what I've done to get by, but I'm looking for more comfortable digs.

Complicating this right now is that I'm not really ready to buy now, so I'm not wanting to jerk a realtor around, nor do I want to visit 33 crappy houses with absurd defects. I have a budget in mind, but I will need to sell my current home to pull this off, and likely add funds, due to the area.

Location is Maryland area, somewhat near Gaithersburg, not too urban, but not in the middle of nowhere. My wife and I are aging, not wanting to drive an hour for groceries or other important things.

I guess I need to make a list of requirements with some sort of squish factor to them. In other words, how important is that one item compared to others.

Any wisdom to share? Sorry, it's vague, struggling with some of these changes. Think it's a good idea to move, but change is tough sometimes.

I know what you mean. 6 more years and we move back to the farm, having to sell a house and build another. Looking forward to being back on the farm, not looking forward to the move, selling a house nor building another....