Beginning of our story

Several months ago we decided against refinancing our current home because we don't like our floor plan. We like our neighborhood, lot, neighbors....just not our layout. We decided to sell and buy a home to last us the next 8-10 years. We looked for months and have changed our minds many times. We went from Eastwood Homes (Wilmington II plan) to True Homes (Riley plan), etc. We kept coming back to Ryan Homes though. It was always going to be either the Rome (our dream) or the Naples (far better than current home but maybe not for the 10 year plan.)

After doing some work to our home to help compete in this market, we finally listed it, had 8 showings in 2 weeks, and offer to contract within a few days and MANY counters. We are scheduled to close in early July.

We did not want to jump into a contingency before we had a contract on our home. We knew there was no real financial gamble but there is the emotional gamble. We did not want to get our hearts set and then not even be able to sell our house.

With our house sold, we got serious with the rep at our community of choice (actually third of choice: The first one Ryan left due to issues with developer. The second was too expensive. The third bowl of porridge was just right.)

Like most others with Ryan blogs, we assembled our dream home on paper and then started working on the price. We signed our purchase agreement a week ago, got loan docs to NVR the following day, and picked out exterior and kitchen colors this past weekend.

To avoid a book of a first post, I will post our options and color choices later.