Buying a House that’s “Good Enough”

There comes a time in every home search process (and often the home selling process) where one says “this is good enough.”

Arriving at the point of whatever you want to call it – concession, compromise, acquiescence, acceptance, or, to use a positively-connoted descriptor – satisfied – is hard.

The home search process can be hard, even if you’re looking at new construction in the Charlottesville area market, as you’re seeking a home where you and your family will live for, usually, at least seven to ten years. Coming to the conclusion of, “this is a place that will be good enough for us for the next phase(s) of our lives,” requires deep knowledge of the area, the neighborhood, schools … and deep self-awareness of your life patterns, work demands and security, as well as awareness of locality growth and planning.

Buying a home takes time, patience, and on-ground knowledge. The number of times I’ve heard, “this (house, neighborhood, surrounding, bedroom, kitchen) is way different than on Zillow” …

My simple advice – start the search early. Hire the right representation early. Establish where you don’t want to live early. Be patient, and ready to say, this one is good enough, and while another one is going to come on that will also be good, I’m happy with this one.

*Interesting content dynamic – I started this post on 3 April, 2018, let it simmer, and then ended up talking about it on the podcast in late April (archived: 2019), and then realized in mid-May that I still hadn’t written the post.