The Journey

For years we have talked about wanting to live in the country. A place with a little bit of land to spread out on. A place away from the noise and smog of the city. A place for the kids to run and play. A place we can invest in for the future. Kind of like our retirement fund.

On and off, Al would search the MLS listings in hopes finding something that would meet our needs, fulfill our hopes, and convince Andrea to want to leave our first home together.

When new neighbours arrived with issues (and visits by police often), Al desire to have a safer place for his family increase.

The first farm we looked at was south east if Hamilton - 70 acres farm land and a huge barn with stalls for 25 horses. Even though the barn needed some work, there was huge potential in this place. The house on the other hand needed a LOT of work. While we liked it, the resources were not available to purchase a farm of this size and also renovate the house.

It wasn't until the spring, just after Nathan was born, when Al started seriously searching again.

Nathan was just 6 weeks old when we ventured onto another farm near Caledonia. This was a horse farm. The business was well established and the horses would bring in some good income. But again, the house wasn't perfect. It was built in the early 1800's so it had lots of character. But most of the windows needed to be replaced and the floors fixed and without an addition, it wouldn't meet our needs.

We next looked at a small 3 acre horse hobby farm on Hwy 6 near Caledonia. We loved this place ... So much that we put an offer in on it. But, there were two offers presented that day and the owners went with the other people.

We were disappointed. But the search continued.

We found another spot just outside Binbrook that we would have enjoyed calling home. This one had a horse barn and acres of bush. The house was definitely somewhere we could live. But, the owners didn't like our offer amongst four others.

While we were sad, we found ourselves not too disappointed - that place was not for us.

At this point, the rollercoaster ride was getting to my already sleep deprived brain. I needed a break from this project.

But a couple of weeks later, Al found a farm in a great location for a steal of a price. I was convinced to check it out. As soon as we walked up the stairs of the house, we figured out why. Water damage and loose floor boards plagued the whole second floor. Now here was a fix-er-up-er. Al really tried to see if we could make it work since the price was so low, but I was not convince. I just didn't want to move into a place with two small boys that needed that much work.

But, then our gift arrived. An email from our agent caught my attention! It was just out of our price range, but beautiful. I showed it to Al and said this place could be my dream house.

We decided to take a look - and fell in love. I could live here!

Al spent hours researching income potential, township by-laws, mortgage options (farms a lot lot more complicated than just houses) school boards and yes, it may be possible to make an offer. After much conversation and a ton of prayer, we decided to send in our offer.

After going back and forth for a couple of days, we had a contract for purchase! We were so excited!

The home inspection and water testing passed with flying colours. The mortgage approval was another story with the bank holding off on their decision until literally the last hour. We almost had to default on the offer! It was so very stressful, but finally all the conditions were met and in 8 short weeks it would be ours!