It feels like it took forever – and it sort of did at 280 days – but we’re officially homeowners of the house we’ve been building since December of 2020 in our new town of Babcock Ranch, Florida.
As with all things related to this house, there were some last-minute stressors and things that should have been done long beforehand. Like getting the “certificate of occupancy” from the county. They didn’t get it until mid-morning on closing day. Why it wasn’t in their hands a week before is beyond us. We moved in without a microwave or gas meter – which meant no hot water right away. Other than that, the house was in a pretty good state of affairs. And we were all too excited to care.
We spent the first few nights with just the stuff we’ve had in our RV – and stole a few mattresses from it to avoid sleeping on the cold tile floor. Ruby, our 11-year old dog, was the first one in the pool. She was looking at it and got bumped in by a kid. She didn’t realize the sundeck didn’t extend forever and took a nice swim too ;).
Adelaide got to ride her bike to school all week. It’s about a 1.5 mile ride. None of the kids lock their bikes – which is both surreal and cool. Emerson was off all week, so got to help clean and explore the house. We took a few e-bike trips to the Publix. But the big excitement was when our 5 boxes of stuff from our old house showed up…
We promised we’d pick Adelaide up from school when the boxes came so she could help unpack. Emerson had a blast watching them get from the truck to the driveway. We let the kids pick which one to open first…and their outright giddiness was fun to experience!
Because of HOA rules and not wanting to be get off on the wrong foot, we scheduled the boxes to be picked up just 24 hours laters. We didn’t think they’d all fit in the driveway..but they did. And in hindsight, we could have kept them for a few more days. But it was fine. We had help from Karissa’s parents and some new friends and got the boxes empty by dinnertime…most of the stuff into the garage to be dealt with later…but empty boxes!
We now have a bunch of stuff to sort through and figure out new homes for. A few projects like closet systems and rebuilding some of the furniture. But we’re enjoying the new house too.
We tested Amazon delivery – it works – and even had our first non-family overnight visitor! It’s been a great first week in the new house!
This house has been a dream that started when we first skipped winter in our RV – back in 2017. We planned to spend just a month in Florida and it turned into 2. We came back the following Christmas when Karissa got us in touch with a Realtor. We looked online at houses for a few months – mostly in Florida but also in Arizona – and got up the nerve to physically look at some when we spent June of 2019 in Florida. That trip turned into a house-hunting trip but no place felt “right”. We kept looking online and spent our Christmas of 2019 looking in-person again. We actually toured Babcock Ranch on that trip but had a horrible experience and wrote it off.
By that summer, we’d basically written off moving. We loved our life in Illinois. We lived in our home town. In our dream house. A mile from my parents and the elementary school. A view of 2 golf courses and a river. Played volleyball every week with lifelong friends. Life was great – other than the weather. But we accepted that trade-off.
Until one day we just both sort of “knew” we had to try making the leap. We would always be living in limbo – even though we’d “accepted” not moving – but we “wanted” to move. We “wanted” to have summer all year…and the kids were at the right age to do it. So on a bit more than a whim, we got a Realtor into our house in Illinois and figured out that Babcock Ranch checks enough boxes to give life there a try. We wanted to build a different house with a different builder, but the crazy housing market was just getting started – and required a bidding war. So we picked a different builder that hadn’t yet gone to bidding and chose my favorite floorplan. There’s very little “wasted” space in this house. It’s 1,500 square feet smaller than our old house – but our old house was too big. We build Karissa’s dream pool with a hot tub that overflows on all 4 sides. A sundeck to sit in the water. And a panorama screen to enjoy the full water view. It doesn’t yet feel like home, but hopefully will soon. We’re excited to build the life of our dreams in this great weather and fun little, growing town.
We still have to figure out the future of our RV & truck, find a new vehicle or two, and fully move in. So come back regularly to follow those parts of the comign adventure!